Today was my first of three stage checks for my instrument training. I was pretty nervous early in the day; worried about not knowing everything required to pass. After a couple phone calls to my instructor and the stage check airman, I decided to go for it.
I met with Lou, who would be testing me all afternoon. We went in to the trailer so we could cover the oral knowledge review. The first thing he asked was, which instrument is your primary instrument based on different scenarios. We then went over questions about constant airspeed and rate climbs/ descents. Afterward, we discussed timed turns, and turns using the magnetic compass versus the heading indicator. Lou also wanted to make sure I knew how to recover from unusual attitudes before we got in the plane and actually did them. Later, we moved onto partial panel questions and stalls. Then lastly, we reviewed navigation aids ranging from VORs, to NDB orientation and tracking. This included questions about time, speed and distance calculations, along with localizer tracking. After an hour, he felt that we were ready to fly.
I do the preflight inspection on our airplane. All looks safe, except that one screw missing from where the wing strut meets the wing. After a simple fix from the maintenance tech, we're ready to go. We takeoff from runway 27. My instructions were straight forward; climb to and maintain 1700ft at 500 feet per minute. After about 300 feet above the ground, Lou asks me to put on the foggles. No wasting time! Once at altitude, he had me turn north then climb to and maintain 2500ft at 100kts. Shortly thereafter, I trim out the airplane and perform the clearing turns that he requests. The area is safe; we can do our maneuvers now.
First up, unusual attitudes with the use of all available instruments (full panel). I do the first one. Then he does one to show me some tricks of the trade. I do another one, recovering from a different situation. He shows me more tricks on the last one. Lou then has me do some steep turns. I anticipated screwing these up because of the lack of practice, but I did surprisingly well. He then covers up my attitude indicator and heading indicator so that I fly with only a partial panel. Time for stalls. He asks to see a power off stall first, but he wants the plane to go into a full stall, not just recovered at the first sign. Not bad considering I don't remember ever doing full stalls with foggles on. We then do a power on stall, but I'm allowed to recover at the first sign. Good! The last thing we do under a partial panel is standard rate timed turns, magnetic compass turns and more unusual attitudes.
Lou uncovers the two instruments and now everything is visible. We go over the use of GPS and ADFs for navigation. Once finished, he has me fly to the FASHE intersection that was indicated on my approach plate. We use the GPS and VOR to get us there. Upon reaching that point, we can follow the instructions that safely take us in to our airport. We descend down to 2300ft until we hit our next point. Once we arrive, we can descend again at 500 feet per minute down to 1160ft. Lastly, down to 800ft. Foggles off, time to land the plane. We cross over midfield and perform a teardrop entry into the traffic pattern. Another airplane was approaching, so we did a 360 turn to allow time for them to pass. Now on the downwind leg, power back, and pre-landing checklist done. Turn left onto the base leg, add more flaps and keep slowing down. Onto the final approach. We have a slight crosswind, so we make some adjustments. Power completely out to idle... touchdown. I passed!!
Lou has over 30 years of flying experience. Working with him today was a pleasure.
My next lesson will be back with my instructor Mark as we start Stage Two training. Now comes the good stuff!
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| Sunset at the airport |
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