Lesson 27 - Consolidation
April 19, 2023
What can I say? It feels like I have turned the page in my piloting career in the last few lessons, and today’s lesson was an important lesson to consolidate all the skills learnt so far. It included my authority over controls, deliberate actions, pilotage, ADMs, everything! - To a point where I am now comfortable to experiment with PITCH- POWER-TRIM configuration. So far I have done over 120 take-offs and landings, and after those many, finally Drew seemed confident enough to introduce to me a bit more challenging technique of take-off.
Soft-field Take-off
Not all runways are asphalt made. Asphalt runways are hard-surface runways that provide surface uniformity for your take-off roll. But there are other “soft” or “rough” runways that may vary in complexity - from grass runways to muddy or snowy runways. These are considered as “soft” field runways.
On soft runways, normal take-off and landings procedures present great danger. Due to uneven and soft surface, it takes a lot of power and a lot longer for airplane to build airspeed to take-off. This advanced technique addresses these issues. At the core of this technique there are two fundamental problems addressed. First, how to get the plane airborne as quickly as possible, and Second, how to build airspeed as quickly as possible. This is where the magic (or science) of ground-effect plays essential role.
Ground-effect
Ground-effect is the change in airflow around the wings when airplane is very near to the surface. Think of it as, it is floating or hovering above the runway at about “a wingspan to one-and-half wingspan” height from the ground. That means anywhere between 20 to 30 feet above the ground. Once airplane gets into the ground effect, the plane accelerates much quicker to a safe airspeed for climb-out - usually Vx (best angle of climb, if there is an obstacle) or Vy (best rate of climb) speed.
So how do we achieve that?
You achieve it by using a secondary control surface called flaps. Flaps are drag-inducing and lift-inducing control surface. Using the lift-inducing property of flaps, plane gently becomes airborne well before its rotation speed. Ohh! and while the taxiing and during take-off roll, you need to make sure the nose-wheel is off the ground too, otherwise on soft surface, you run into danger of hitting prop into the ground. So as the main tires come off the ground, you gently level the plane and let it enter the ground-effect. As it enters ground-effect, it starts picking up speed. As you reach Vx or Vy based on obstacle, you climb-out. This is a pretty damn cool manuever to perform.
So, I performed couple of soft-field take-offs, and they were fun. To my surprise, I was not overwhelmed, which was unexpected.
What else did we do? We did a couple of steep turns, a couple of S-Turn maneuvers, and a Turn-About-a-Point maneuver. I am definitely getting better at them, but I still need a lot of practice to hold my altitude, airspeed and headings. After maneuvers practice, we turned our focus to landings.
Landings
I have exactly 127 landings under my belt as of today, and one thing is clear to me.
AIRSPEED IS THE KING.
All the actions I take - from downwind, right upto the time I cross the runway threshold - it all boils down to how much airspeed I carry. The other factors are important, but in my personal opinion it all boils down to carrying precise airspeed when “runway is made”.
I am getting more comfortable in experimenting with my PITCH and POWER setting to get to the perfect airspeed. I have been ahead of the power curve, I have been behind the power curve - sometimes to have dangerously low airspeed. I have to work through my settings and find that sweet spot, where I am consistently carrying 70 knots of airspeed when I cross the runway threshold.
I am getting there, with much tighter spread after every iteration.
The byproduct of carrying too much airspeed is the extra-float that would carry the airplane farther than my touchdown aiming point. Carrying low airspeed would prevent that float, but with too low of airspeed, I risk stalling the plane prematurely, or land much shorter than my touchdown aiming point. Either way is not acceptable.
Another adjustment that is Work-In-Progress is aligning the plane along with runway. It's a hit or miss as of now. It's not terribly misaligned, but if it is not aligned, if mains touch the runway at an angle, that can damage tires and potentially topple the airplane itself. It has to be perfectly aligned with the runway. Period.
Noteworthy Incident
Along with all the hard skills, there is another skill a pilot must possess, and that is spatial awareness, and it is mostly learnt, rather than taught. I experienced one such incident today.
During one of the climb-outs, I heard a guy on radio. A Cherokee airplane pilot said that he was crossing midfield at Rostrevor and was going to join downwind at 45 degrees. As a student pilot my first instinct was to extend my upwind and give that guy some space. But Drew said we would be fine, since the other guy would be still at 1000 feet above us (ideally) and that we would have ample of time before he joined downwind.
So I continued the pattern and turned crosswind. We were visually looking for this guy over our left shoulder. Soon enough we spotted him, only to find out that he was actually crossing the mid-field at same altitude as TPA. Immediately, Drew took controls and turned us away from him. Drew radio-called
“ Rostraver traffic, we are gonna do a three-sixty, Rostraver ”.
The other guy was NORDO - he did not acknoledge the reception of our message. Ideally you would expect acknowledgement, but there was just silence. After a few seconds (which felt like hours), we heard the guy joining Left Base for runway 26. That meant that we were in clear for that moment, and a potential crisis was averted. But in my mind, him being NORDO raised a few questions:
Did he hear what I am doing?
If he heard and he is communicating, does he know it’s not reaching us?
Why in the world would he cross the airfield midfield at TPA?
These are the things we study in the ground school, but reality is much stranger than that. Today’s incident was a proof of that.
This lesson has been lengthy and all over the place. Things are starting to click for me. More excited stuff is ahead, for sure. Until next time then !
Though this is a totally different field of learning, it reminds me of my surgical lessons learnt in operation theater with my seniors observing.