PPL Lesson 6 – Turns out bad
Exercise 9 – Turns
Not the best start
Well today started early again, an 8 O’Clock rise and off for lesson 6. This is my second lesson this week due to having to miss a couple of weeks.
Over a cup of coffee, I quickly skim over the turns chapter in the training book as a refresher and set off. I normally arrive at the airfield at approx 10.10 for my usual 10.30 lesson, and today is no exception. I walk in and order myself my usual black coffee for the pre-flight brief and take a seat in the club house. My FI catches my eye and at first I do not hear what he says, he repeats something along the lines of being early for my lesson. I always get here around now I repeat, “that’s correct Paul, but your lesson is at 12:00 today!” Damn it ! Not the best start to the day eh?
It gets better…
So to pass the time, I get my phone out and start browsing through Facebook. I notice my wife has posted, and has commented how she will be tucking into the pack lunch she had prepared last night. The pack lunch she prepared to bring along when she came to watch me fly today, only I had got up early and left without her ! The morning just gets better.
So, with 1 1/2 hours to kill and my FI is about to go out on his 10.30 lesson. He asks me to do the pre-flight on our aircraft before he gets back so we can crack on straight away, and with that he leaves. I order another coffee and request a bacon sandwich, it’s not the planned packed lunch, but I’m going to need something to eat. With the bacon sandwich and the second coffee despatched I walk out onto the apron. I do a leisurely pre-flight check and get the aircraft ready to go as soon as my FI gets back.
Pre-Flight
Pre-flight done, FI is back and we taxi out. I’m still a little tentative on the rudder but it’s coming on and we climb straight out over the A1 and surrounding villages to approx 2500 feet. My FI demonstrates a 30 degree bank angle level turn. “Turn, balance, attitude” .. “You have control Paul, make a 130 degree turn to the left please”. Whereby my FI had demonstrated it in such an elegant, smooth and effortless manner, me on the other hand… turn into a 20 degree bank angle, completely forget the rudder, the nose drops and we start loosing height! I adjust to 30 degrees, chuck some rudder in and heave the nose up. It was about as pretty and elegant as a scrum half doing ballet !
“OK, lets try a right turn please Paul, make a 180 degree right turn” Again, I thrown some aileron in and forget the rudder to balance and do a half hearted job on the attitude. To make it worse, I chase my mistakes and start putting rudder in when not required or should I say instead of turning the aircraft with aileron. My FI takes over and demonstrates once again an elegant 30 degree bank turn. “how hard can this be Paul” I say to myself, get a grip.
Things do not get much better, I spend the whole session
chasing my errors through the turns and I can feel myself tensing up and concentrating way too hard. My FI asks if I’m feeling tired or something as this is not going well today. I’m not tired but getting more and more frustrated at my poor performance. To mix things up a little we also try some climbing turns, only 15 degrees, and these seem to be a little better. We then also did some descending turns of which I seemed to get the hang of, or at least did a better job than the others.
The lesson could not end too soon for me today and we head back towards the airfield. Again we go through the standard procedure for the circuit and we bring her home.
I walk back to the club house totally dejected at my very poor performance today. I had hoped to capitalise on having two lessons in the same week and pressing on somewhat. Instead, all I got today was : up too early, ruined my Wife’s surprise to come we me today and had a very poor time in the air. My FI tries to gee me up with some positive words and how it will come together in time Etc. I drive home kicking myself and upon arrival promptly tuck into the sandwiches my wife had made… What a day !
This Lesson
26-06-15 : PA28-161 : G-BOZI : PUT : Conington to Conington : 12:25 : 13:20 : 0.55
Total time : 5 hours 35 mins