I’m flying with Steve today on dual instruction. As we climbed out of Livermore, I noticed deteriorating visibility which I assumed was a cloud layer. Steve pointed out that it was actually smoke from a very large wildfire burning near Big Sur on the California coast. On the east side of the Livermore ridge the conditions were a little better, enough for us to continue with a training flight after having had thoughts along the way of possibly turning back.
At 3000′ the smoke layer wasn’t bad so I did steep turns on the right and left. Still not very comfortable doing steep turns. Steve demonstrated a turn which was fairly steep and he might have pulled up to keep the nose from dropping and I was not comfortable with the associated sensations.
Next we did slow flight and then a few different stalls – power off stall in the landing configuration, power-off stall on a right turn and then a power-on stall.
We went through a routine engine out simulation and at the end of it we spotted the pipeline and transitioned into S-turns. At that time I spotted another aircraft which was also flying at our low altitude seemingly also using the pipeline for making S-turns. We watched it for a while as it appeared they were leaving the area but then they really didn’t. After one turn we decided to leave the area and do turns about a point at a nearby location.
Lots of traffic everywhere today. As we were approaching Byron and announced our position over Discovery Bay, another aircraft was taking off and was going to do a 270 en route to Livermore. That would put it coming straight at us at comparable altitude. Radio communications helped save the day with each other knowing our locations.
There were gliders flying today at Byron and there was unexpected thermals as we approached the threshold for Rwy 30 that caused me to stay up longer even though I had pulled out the power on the engine. Two touch and go and we headed back to Livermore.
Today the winds were calm and clouds were 4900′ scattered. As we taxied out, we noticed that the construction of Three Rivers FBO is making good progress and they are getting ready to open by Super Bowl. The new fuel station has been opened and the old one removed. Miraculously, the intercom in the back seat of N906MD has been fixed! We no longer need an intercom extender and people in the front seats can hear the person in the back.
We headed to Byron and made steep turns in the vicinity of the airport. Upon rolling out of the steep turn, use opposite rudder to stop the turn. Then Srinath practiced slow flight followed by three kinds of stall. First, power-on (departure) stall. Upon reaching stall, just relax the back pressure on the yoke. Because it is a power-on stall, the engine is already running pretty hard so relaxing the yoke should cause it to recover quickly. If you shove the power in, more altitude will be lost before recovery. It is only in a power-off stall that once recovery is achieved with relaxing the yoke that the power should be shoved in.
Power-off stall was next, followed by an approach to landing stall. Start with a pre-landing checklist, then come back on the power to extend full flaps while within the white arc. Achieve a descent as if we are coming in for landing. Then pull back to stall. Recovery is the same as a power-off stall – relax the yoke to drop the nose and build up airspeed then shove full throttle. So we went through all varieties of stalls today.
Steve pulled back the throttle to simulate an engine out situation. The ABC checklist comes in handy here – Airspeed, Best place to land, Checklist to attempt restarting the engine. It is important to achieve and maintain the airspeed for best glide. On the 172 that is 65kts. Then you determine the direction of wind and scout for the best place to land. Preferably you land into the wind. In our case we found a restricted runway which of course would have been fair game in the event of an emergency. Keep the runway in view all the time as you weave around and descend. If there was no runway, look for a hard field or green field but certainly not one that is wet or just recently plowed. Land along the furrows if there are any.
We proceeded to a long pipe in the vicinity, descended to 800′ AGL and made S-turns by entering downwind. The first maneuver was intended to watch for the wind and the right turn ended up being too shallow because the wind pushed us into the turn. On the next attempt Srinath proceed a little further ahead before attempting the turn. He could also have tried a shallower right turn so the wind pushing us back would have made it a fine semicircular turn.
Finally Steve asked Srinath to use the GPS to take us directly to Byron. He landed by making a right base turn and after touchdown Srinath tried maneuvering the plane to get on the centerline which Steve reminded him never to do so for the risk of getting into a ground loop. Just staying parallel to the runway is sufficient. Srinath took off with a soft-field technique. Once the nose comes up off the “dirt”, shove in full power to maintain the nose slightly off the runway until the plane lifts off. Then push the yoke forward to stay in ground effect to build up airspeed before climbing out.
Finally, maximum performance takeoff. Stand on the brakes and shove the throttle fully in. Watch the RPM come up to 2200 and then release the brakes. Plane will race forward rapidly. Maintain control and at 60kts, pull back on the yoke to climb at Vx until a “50-foot obstacle” has been cleared. Then relax the back pressure to build up airspeed and climb at Vy. After a pattern, Srinath did a precision landing on the numbers. One more maximum performance takeoff followed by a 270 turn to overfly midfield before heading back to Livermore.
A bit of drama on the way back to Livermore. Our radio didn’t connect well and we barely heard the tower transmission after we reported our position over Brushy Peak. Tower asked another aircraft in the vicinity to check if we could hear them. In the meantime, because of this, Steve took us on a 360 right turn to maintain position over Brushy Peak while we re-established connection. A mooney was taking off from Livermore and heading in our general direction, which is probably why Steve did the turn. We were soon cleared in to land on runway 7L.
It was a fairly warm day and right from the initial climb the engine ran hot. There was a crosswind at takeoff, managed with right rudder and right aileron.
First off some more steep turns. Srinath is still inadvertently making them too steep and needs more practice. You can see me at 4:06 in the video holding on to dear life as Srinath pulled up steeply to correct a nose down pitch attitude during the turn.
Engine heat was getting very close to the red line. So it was time for an engine out simulation to cool it down. After setting glide speed and scouting for a place to land, at about 300′ we decided to climb back up with throttle simulating a go-around.
Next, at 800′ altitude Srinath started S-turn ground reference maneuvers. In the area north of Byron, we found a long pipeline running east-west for reference. Always enter the turn on downwind, Steve instructed. The first turn is to get a feel for the wind speed and direction to judge where to turn and how much.
The next maneuver was 8-turns around a pylon at around 800′ altitude. The two anchor points were a white tank and a pickup truck. Midway through the maneuver, the truck started moving so we had to choose an outhouse as a different pylon. We noticed another plane making 8-turns at an altitude below us. At one point we came pretty close and the instructor took over to avoid. We turned back to Livermore and on the way back before we climbed the hills another plane was at the 9 o’clock direction. He was coming in the opposite direction, passed us on the left and turned left behind us.
Crab Tales 