Day 4 – Ormond Beach, Florida – Some Simulated Instrument Flying

Hi All,

Due to fly at 11 am this morning but the FAA turned up at school for an inspection so that delayed us 40 minutes while Bill went through everything.

We got in the air for 11.50 am and started by climbing out to the northeast of the field, did some more steep turns, did engine fire and engine failure drill.

We completed a few timed turns today, simulating that you lost your turn and slip indicator. Basically, if you do a rate one turn, you will be turning at 3 degrees per second, so 90 degrees is in 30 seconds. They worked out pretty good.

Bill then put the hood on me and he asked me to climb up to 5000 ft whilst always maintaining a rate one turn to the left, kind of like a spiral climb. The cadet struggled around 4000 ft with the OAT (outside air temperature) well above 30 Celsius. I did approximately 1 hour under the hood, climbing, turning and descending. I was then asked to fix my position relative to the VOR, which i did, so I was instructed to follow the 330 radial outbound. There we did some more climbs and descents.

Bill then simulated we lost the attitude indicator, which I always believed was rubbish up to now, but I really missed it, especially for turning and climbing! After about 10 minutes, I got used to it. I was using my VSI for pitch and turn co-coordinator for roll.

I was never so glad to get the attitude indicator back. We picked up the 330 radal again and got back to Ormond. Bill told me I could take the hood off at 10 miles.

So today I logged 1.8. Total, I have 4.8 hours now, which is reasonable considering we had such a bad weeks’ weather. Bill is encouraging me to take the Warrior up solo so I can practice a little over the weekend, so I may not have another entry until Monday! But I’ll be sure to keep everyone posted.

Andrew