Flying an aeroplane with only a single propeller to keep you in the air. Can you imagine that? — Captain Picard, 'Star Trek: The Next Gen'

Flying is something that you can't imagine until you do it. When you do get to fly, and not just as the passenger, it feels wonderful. Only a few steps away until I can fly this bird on my own!
My first couple of flights to get back up to par have been pretty good. The first flight went amazing. I impressed my instructor and myself by not having too much rust built up and I remembered how to fly more than I expected.

turbine windmill farm. the clouds show the turbulence.

The second flight we did we went to the bottom of a hill where there are the giant turbine windmills on top. It was fun trying to do 360's and ascending and descending turns with turbulence while your instructor tries to distract you :p that's their job! I'm still having a bit of a hard time with approaches, but that will come in time. I can do it, just not as perfectly as I would like.

One thing a student should remember is that they are not looking for perfection when you are first starting out. I'm told I am very hard on myself and that I am usually doing better than I actually think.
My third flight went pretty well. We did pirouettes (I know its a dance term but we like to think we are light and smooth on the pedals like dancers are with their feet :) and I did very well at those. We hovered around a painted object on the runway at about the same altitude and distance away in a circle in a little bit of wind.

Collective control. Throttle twist

We practiced governor off work for my first time, which is interesting and requires more concentration than usual. For those who don't know, in layman's terms the governor essentially adjusts your throttle to what power you need to pull from your engine at any given time. If you turn it off, you need to watch your RPM's very carefully and keep it in a very small point on the tachometer to fly. This means you are always adjusting. This is important to learn because governors fail occasionally and if it does you don't want your blades to slow down passed a certain point, or you will crash and die. Okay okay, you might not die, but its possible. Or your governor could speed the engine up and you could cause severe engine damage and damage to other components.

I thus far need to work on trying to understand the radio talk a little more and to be more outside of the cockpit (which I should have learned long ago) and using a little bit more situational awareness.  I plan on using liveatc.net to help me understand the radio a bit more. I understand the lingo for the most part, its actually understanding what they are saying. Just practice is all.

At the end of the flight my instructor told me good job good job, maybe one more flight and we will send you off to do emergency procedures with the instructors that are qualified. When I looked at my schedule for the week I noticed that I am scheduled with those instructors that will get me through to soloing. I suppose it's about time although I am still nervous.
 I've had a mock test where they sit down for two hours and ask you question by question about anything you have learned. They try to trick you! I've been fooled a couple of times and I was nervous enough to get a few things wrong, but overall he said I would definitely pass a private pilot (only counting the lessons we were reviewing) and I even had a lot of commercial pilot information that impressed him. Confidence booster! They will ask if you are sure if that is the answer or they will ask if B is the answer instead of what you said which was A.
 Stick to your guns! I sometimes have a hard time or I get nervous and second guess myself. Over time though I am learning to trust my first instinct.

ON THE AGENDA:
 - practice regular and hovering autorotations until they say I would survive a crash if one were to happen when I solo
 - oral test about lessons 1 through 6.
 - SOLO!! (stage 1 of 3 complete)

After soloing:

ok, my night flights wont look AS awesome..but still!

 - start studying lessons 7-14 which I have already acquired (stage 2 of 3 complete). It's been a while so that might take some time.
 - Start learning lessons 15-18 (the last lessons of private pilot and stage 3)
 - start doing cross-country, night flights, and cross-country solo flights
 - there's a flight in there somewhere where the tower and my instructor will devise an evil plan to confuse and elude me. I will be sent all over and around the airport in a crazy fashion following radio calls and dealing with traffic under pressure. That one will be greaaaat.

Really I don't have all that much left to go. A LOT of flying is coming up!

And, of course, more studying. :)
Sorry for such the long post!
Until next time!

It is possible to fly without motors, but not without knowledge and skill. — Wilbur Wright

Wow, it's been a good - oh, 6 months since I've blogged. But for good reason, my dear ones!

If you don't have your medical certificate and you have any reason as to why it would be delayed to the FAA, let me just foremost you in this:

GO GET IT LIKE, YESTERDAY.

In my humble experience with this situation, just take heed and do it like right meow. It took me from October until February for them to process my registration with them and give me my certificate. That doesn't mean I couldn't fly (obviously because I didn't have it before), but it does mean that it would have been a waste of time and money for me to fly during that time.

Alas, I begin flying next week. Today is Sunday and I fly Tuesday and Thursday. I better get used to it again!

To recover from my slightly off-kilter situation, I thought I'd retain some pride and let you all know I have not just been sitting on my bum! I did get through the next stage in my training (aside from flight-planning but that is next).

The goal thus far is to knock all of the rust off my flying, and solo as soon as possible, so I can start flying to surrounding cities alone and to get my hours built up. Without supervision. Just me and the chopchopchop of the blades...one of the most monumental things about being a flight student is that first solo flight.



How much further would I have been if I hadn't had to wait? My goal for having my private license was February and here it is...come and gone. I could have been doing instrument flight training with the foggles right now :( Ahh, soon young padowan!
On the other hand, I really just can't wait to start flying and doing my autorotations again!! I have my new kneeboard to use as well!

Anyways, definitely more updates coming soon.

- Ready, Fire, Aim!

Keep your airspeed!!

Goooood morning everyone! I finally have a moment to breathe, and decided I'd write a post. So in the Privates license, there are 3 stages at my school. I am on Lesson 5, going on lesson 6, and there are 7 lessons in the first stage. So I am almost through one milestone! (It's always important to note here that every time a lesson is done, it's a milestone. Every flight even!)
Lesson 5 has been all about Emergency Procedures, memorizing all of them and other information we need to know as pilots.
Today I started autorotations.
Autorotation - A state of descending flight.
Why do we practice them? They are practicing engine failures in a helicopter. I suppose they do them in a plane, too.
We began starting out with doing an intro into an auto, instead of me trying to learn everything all at once, we are going step by step. Which is great! So far the intro is basically just : Do your checks (Three in the green, engine rotor, no warning lights, carb out of yellow, gas, trim down) Then you can begin your autorotation!
You announce, "Auto in 3-2-1" and then goes as follows: Lower collective Right pedal Aft cyclic Off throttle, Catch RPM. This should be done in the time it takes to say, "Autorotation" out loud.
Need to keep your Rotor RPM in the green arc (101-104% on the tachometer) and then when the RPM goes down, you lower collective a little to keep it in the green. If it goes up, raise collective a little to keep it in the green arc.
Then you do more checks, which include: RPM, Airspeed, Trim strings, Landing zone. Then you keep an eye on that for a while, as you are correcting each thing.
Then as you come down, at approx 40 feet AGL (above ground level), you roll on throttle and accelerate out of it and climb. IN AN INTRO AUTO.

In a full autorotation practice, the POH has power failure above 500 feet (this is on page 3-2).
1. Lower collective immediately to maintain RPM and enter normal autorotation.
2. Establish a steady glide at approx. 65 kts.
3. Adjust collective to keep RPM in green arc or apply full down collective if light weight prevents attaining above 97% RPM.
4. Select landing spot and, if altitude permits, maneuver so landing will be into the wind.
5. A restart may be attempted at pilot's discretion if sufficient time is available (see air restart procedure)
6. If unable to restart, turn off unnecessary switches and shut off fuel.
7. At about 40 feet AGL, begin cyclic flare to reduce rate of descent and forward speed.
8. At about 8 feet AGL, apply forward cyclic to level ship and raise collective just before touchdown to cushion landing. Touch down in level attitude with nose straight ahead.

Along with a million other things, this is one thing you have to memorize and know by heart. Doesn't seem hard, you say? Well, you aren't in school to be a pilot, eh? :)

I decided that I wanted to get a sticker for my car that says something along the lines of "i'm a student pilot, I don't speed." lol because as a pilot knows, a speeding ticket on your record is something that your bosses will look at.. (what else will you do to break the rules while you are flying a helicopter for their company?).

A few weeks ago, I was invited to go with the base manager of my school to fly over our river and drop off ping pong balls to the public in a public duck race event. I was super excited because it was my first "commercial" type of experience!
Alright, I'm going to go relax on one of my first days to relax in months!

This is one of the helis that is at our school! I just googled this photo so I shouldn't get in trouble, and the school will remain unnamed :) I have actually flown in this exact heli before :) So proud!

This video is what a full down autorotation looks like. every auto (except hovering autos) looks like this except for the touchdown. So, yes, I will be learning that. :D YAY! Doesn't look too hard. What I think might be a little difficult will be the hovering autorotations.
The hovering autos video is right below:

While we're at it, lets do a dynamic rollover video DONT TRY THIS AT HOME lol:

Dynamic rollover is a powered roll that happens at a 15 degree tilt. The heli goes over that 15 degree tilt or pivot point, and you cannot recover.
Alright, that's all I've got for y'all today.