Loops & Rolls in cloudy, hazy and freezing conditions - I really wish that spring would begin!

I managed 30 minutes today, but suspecting that conditions might not be ideal, I had decided to fly to Marham in my Shadow microlight. On landing I was pleasantly surprised to be greeted by co-owner Adam which was nice as he was supposed to be otherwise occupied today.
I wish I'd thought to bring a camera because a visiting Tornado GR4 from 617 Sqn was parked in the same rubb hangar as G-AVKI - talk about little and large!

After a quick look around and B/F I strapped in and was away, or so I thought... The engine quit at the hold, so out I jumped and spent a few minutes getting the engine running. Grrr, very frustrating!
Second time lucky and I lined up on 24 at the intersection with 01/19 before climbing away to the NW. There was quite a lot of medium level cloud but I managed to find a reasonable space. Conditions were hazy and I was a little bit twitchy about the engine so only did a few loops and rolls this time. I'd forgotten to wear my lined Craghopper trousers and it was bloody freezing up at 5000', so with my knees shaking from the cold I followed Marham Aero Club's C150 G-JAGS in for a landing after half an hour total. Not thrilling, but at least it was something and the manoeuvres went well. Roll on spring, summer and those long, long evenings! One thing that I found out today, Adam isn't taking the plane away until August, so I'll get an extra 2 months of hopefully decent weather to get myself to a reasonable standard at Basic Aero's. Fantastic!
After Adam did a few circuits, the engine cut yet again as he was backtracking 24! I'll tweak the idle next time I have some time free and we'll see if that sorts it out.
I had a lovely flight back in the Shadow and gave it a good (non-aerobatic) thrashing in Honington's empty skies before landing just before sunset. Not a great afternoon, but not too shabby either.

05 Feb 2010 - An impromptu lesson; spins and loops in a Citabria

Well, the weather in East Anglia today was rubbish, which meant that unfortunately I had to drive to a meeting at RAF Halton near Aylesbury instead of flying (as I usually do). On the drive down though, I couldn't help but notice the skies becoming clearer and the cloudbase lifting significantly. Hmm (think I), perhaps I could squeeze in a lesson after my meeting? A quick phone call to friend and instructor Colin McInnes and would you believe it, he's free and the aircraft is available - result!
I decided to use this opportunity to polish up my spin recovery technique...

Taxiing out to Halton's 'Chipmunk runway' I felt quite rusty (it being 4 months since my last Citabria flight), but Col's excellent tuition saw me lifting off cleanly and then heading for clear skies near Aylesbury. Climbing to 5000' I did HASELL checks and then asked Col to demo spin entry and recovery. I then span twice and did a couple of loops just for the fun of it!
I've said it before, but I really like the Citabria, its roomy and solid feeling and spins (and recovers) very nicely. I had a big grin on my face now, which I promptly wiped off by failing to get the Citabria to spin at all on my next attempt! Full left rudder but without pulling the stick fully back resulted in a mushy descending turn... Yuk! Best I have another go then! Success - I do like to spin it's great fun!
The landing was a little 'touch and go' though as the only available runway was directly into a very low sun. I must say that I was very grateful to have Colin in the back, his excellent advice resulted in a nice landing. I had a great flight of 50 minutes and achieved everything that I wanted from it. Not bad on a day that I hadn't expected to fly!

31st Jan 2010 - Cocking up the stall turn...

I had a smashing little flight today in clear blue skies over Marham. I thought that I'd have a go at stall turns but couldn't quite get things right! Diving to 110mph, I pulled up to the vertical, fed in a bootful of rudder and round she went, but instead of a neat 'inverted U shape', it seemed to mush over backwards a bit, despite my checking forwards at the vertical. Mind you, it proved the value of having done U.P.'s on Thursday! I basically braced all controls, let things sort themselves out and when it was settled, had another go. Loops, rolls and chandelles all went well, I just need more practice on stall turns. I guess, like all things aerobatic, practice makes perfect! Hopefully I will get up again next weekend if the weather's ok. Can't wait for the clocks to go forward - roll on spring!

28 Jan 2010 - Unusual positions and half Cuban 8's

Well, what a great day today was! With good weather forecast for much of East Anglia I decided to fly my friend's Aeroprakt Foxbat over to RAF Wyton, where I'd been invited for another lesson in the Grob Tutor with 5 AEF. I arrived bang on time having taxied past the lines of Grobs, parked up outside the flying club and made my way to the teabar, there I got reacquainted with Stu Rawnsley and watched the mandatory safety video again. After a quick cuppa I was fitted out for RAF flying togs and was introduced to my instructor Neal Adams, a very experienced ex-F4 Phantom pilot. We discussed the sortie and then walked for our aircraft. Neal isn't a QFI so I wasn't allowed to do the take-off this time, but he very quickly relinquished control once airborne (rather to my relief!).
We climbed to 6000' in-between Sutton Meadows and Chatteris and Neal demonstarted some 'unusual positions' and their recovery. It makes 'normal' unusual attitudes look rather tame I must say! My favourite 'U.P.'was pulling up well past the vertical and then recovering from various power settings. Lots of fun and I think I made a reasonable job of it all things considered (not perfect but safe).
Next on the agenda I pulled us into a standard loop just to get my eye in, and then Neal demonstrated a half Cuban 8 which was great fun. I don't think I'll be able to do this in the Nipper as there's quite a bit of negative G during the roll element. I shall ask my fellow Nipper fliers on the forum!
Sadly, UP's plus 1/2 Cuban 8's had made me a bit queasy so I only attempted 2, but it really was very satisfying and great fun. I flew us down to short final and then Neal landed. All-in-all, a very good lesson. Thanks again 5 AEF - you're absolute stars.
After a good de-brief with Neal over a cuppa, I jumped back in the Foxbat and flew back to Honington with a big grin on my face. Wyton even offered me runway 33 which was damned decent of them! On the way home, I got vectored out of the way of a KC 135 tanker near Mildenhall which is quite unusual. I never get tired of buzzing round the MATZ though, you never know what you'll see; I watched a pair of F-15's landing at Lakenheath on my way out!
With time in hand, I put the Foxbat to bed and pre-flighted my Shadow. 3 types in one day; why not! I had a nice half hour flight and chucked the Shadow round quite a bit to see how my new micro camera performed. It looks pretty good so I've put together a short video (below).
Well, that was the end of a great days flying; hopefully I can get up in the Nipper this weekend. Fingers crossed...

Sunday Jan 17th - a bit frustrating but got up in the end!

I managed one flight today but the weather had deteriorated by late afternoon with quite a bit of cloud at around 2000' along with haze and a low sun. Had to climb away from the field to the NW and ended up doing some unco-ordinated loops, rools and wingovers. Still, every little helps and maybe next time I'll get clear blue skies so I can try and tie the manoeuvres together.
Of considerable frustration was the engine which twice cut out on the ground. Not a drama you might think, however it's no fun when you have to jump out away from any chocks and try to handswing the prop! I tried the 'behind the prop' technique for the first time today and this worked fine (and felt pretty safe) so another deposit in the experience bank...
I should hopefully get tomorrow to tinker with the engine and then check-fly it along with more aero's; ah, the joys of operating on a PTF! I could never afford a C of A machine and it would break my heart to pay someone to do what I'm perfectly competent to do!
Mind you, the airfield's open tomorrow so I'll have a bit more to worry about than a C152, Chipmunk and glider... Tornado's in the circuit focus the mind wonderfully I find!

New Years Day 2010 - 3 flights and an alarming incident...

Happy New Year! Well, I got a free pass from 'SWMBO' today so headed over to Marham to fly KI. Despite snow flurries and some fairly heavy snowfall on the journey there, the skies above Marham were a clear blue - perfect! Mind you, a bloody pheasant took my passenger-side wing mirror off by flying straight at the car. Grrrrrrrrrr!! I got a new toy for xmas, a tiny video camera, so thought I'd try that out by strapping it to my forehead... As the footage shows, that wasn't the best idea I've ever had, but will do better next time from a fixed position! I pre-flighted KI and was soon heading skywards, and before I knew it I was in the overhead at 5000' - time for some fun. The total flight time today spread over 3 flights was 1 hour 35 minutes and as ever, I did loads and loads of loops; On my first flight I was particularly pleased by doing a double loop; on flight number 2 and 3 I did 4 in a row which was fun, and proved that you can loop the Nipper all the way to the floor (typically I seem to lose 250' per loop). Next up were rolls, both left and right this time. I'm pleased to say that my rolls are getting a lot better; KI seems to roll much better to the right, and I don't think it's just down to poor technique on my part! Next I tried rolling off the bottom of a loop which was fun, and I managed this both ways. Max strain today was 5G although as its only transitory, its no problem at all. Makes me grin a lot though! During flight number 2 I felt something drop onto my left hand - rather worryingly it was the canopy shoot bolt! I knew that there was another part to the bolt somewhere in the cockpit so using very gentle manoeuvres I descended and brought KI in for a landing on 01. Fortunately I located the other part and satisfied myself that there were no other loose articles in the cockpit. After fitting a new stiffnut KI was good to go, so I did! On the last flight I introduced a new manoeuver, the wingover, which went well both left and right, so I did a 4-loop sequence from one of them. Very satisfying! That was it really; a great start to the New Year and I'm definitely improving (although I'm very aware that I'm still at the bottom of the learning curve!). Next time, I'd like to try spinning and then rolling off the top of the loop. Should be fun!!

27 Dec 2 flights

Well, today went reasonably well and I managed to get up twice. On the first flight, I flew quite a few loops and a couple of rolls. My rolls definitely work better with a dab of rudder, but I need to try right hand rolls next time. It started out as a clear day but clouds rolled in after about 25 mins so I decided to land and hand over to majority owner Adam. Adam went up for a non-aerobatic flight and came back after 30 mins with a huge grin on his face!

There were a lot of clouds in the sky but I thought what the hell, I'll give it another go and see if I can find a space. The only problem with this idea is that the Nipper has no starter and isn't fitted with inverted systems, so if the engine quits, down you go! This means that if I want to do aero's then I need to be over an airfield really...

As I lifted off, cloud was blowing in to cover Marham so I headed north to try in the East Winch overhead, but even here, I was hemmed in by clouds and couldn't get any higher than 4000'. If I was happy to do aero's in any old place then I could have hunted for a bigger gap, but for now I'll stick with over an airfield! With this in mind, I wasn't happy doing rolls as I am not consistent yet and end up coming out of them at high speed and all angles! I only managed 2 loops and then called it a day, threading my way through the gaps into Marham's ATZ in a power cruise for an uneventful landing. Can't wait to try again on a day with clear skies!!!

My video (above) is pretty poor, but it was taken holding my cameraphone in one hand while looping with the other, so not ideal, but it gives something of a feel anyway...