September and October 2010 where the busiest of my short flying career so far, totaling 24 flights spread over five or six weekends. To this point I had only flown with Matt and Dave but on my first weekends flying in September I was to fly with an instructor called Robert King, Bob, as he is known around the airfield. Now I had been used to a softly softly approach from Matt and Dave, lots of demo's followed by you doing the exercises, Bob on the other hand works the other way round, you fly and he corrects when necessary. My first brief with Bob he asked me what I had been up to and I had explained that my general flying was coming along and I had been allowed to fly the second half of the launch, so after a thorough briefing on winch launching Bob had made it quite clear that I was going to be flying the entire launch where he would only take over if I made a complete stuff up of it. we carried out our preflight checks and hooked up to the cable in one of the clubs ASK13's. What followed were two launches that started out ok, nice ground run and a gentle rotation into the climb, it was at this point I messed up, after several clear and rather stern commands from the back seat to increase back pressure Bob took control and increased the angle of climb as we were no where steep enough. The second flight of the day resulted in the same scenario with Bob taking over about halfway up the climb, by the third attempt however I had it and after pulling the release at the top I heard "that was much much better" come from the rear, I was beaming. Bob then ran through an in flight brief and demo'd some stalling from mushing to steep stalling. The mush is nice and easy the glider just seems to float downwards rather quickly, the steep stall on the other hand requires a higher nose attitude and the stall is a lot more pronounced, the nose falls away and you are left swallowing your stomach during the recovery. Bob let me do a couple and then it was time to join the circuit for landing, I made a good effort of it and manage to land the glider not to far from the bus.
So that was it, my first three lessons with Bob, the instructor that would eventually send me solo. Windrushers has plenty of instructors and I enjoy flying with all of them and with a multitude of different teaching styles any pupil will be able to find the right instructor for them.
I then spent a day in reasonably poor weather (low cloud base) circuit bashing with Matt. he spent the time and gave me a really good run down on circuit planning and then let me fly my own circuits. the comments I had placed into my log book simply said "prefers to be a bit close" Dam right I was going to be a bit close, flying a contraption without an engine there was no way I was wandering to far from the landing area and it would take a little while for me to get used to the right distance to fly during the circuit, it depends on a lot of factors but when you get it right it makes life so much easier.
A weekend later the weather was great with broken cloud at around 2500ft. I was introduced to another instructor I would make good progress with Oli Bosanko. Oli suggested after looking at my log book and training card that we should take advantage of the good weather and go and do some stalling and spinning. These exercises require an aerotow to around 4000ft so we made arrangements with the tug pilot and got ready, as I had not done any aerotowing Oli took control for the launch and climb to 4000ft letting me take control every now and then to carry out some exercises in flying behind a tug. To be completely honest I was so blown away by the view as we climbed up between the clouds that I was finding it difficult to follow the tug. Reaching 4000ft we released and turned away watching the tug dive back towards the airfield, we were ready to begin. we ran through our HASSLL checks (which stand for Height, do we have enough? Airframe, can the glider cope with what we are about to do to it? Straps, are they tight? Security, is nothing going to float around in some of the manoeuvres? Location, are we in a safe place? Lookout, is there anyone else that could get in the way?) to make sure we were ready and then we started with some normal stalling and recoveries, these I flew myself and Oli seemed pleased with them. Oli then demo'd the spin, he explained that spinning in off a final turn was one of the biggest causes of accidents amongst glider pilots and the cause was a slow, low and over ruddered turn. With this in mind he set about showing me a slow over ruddered turn and the result was dramatic to say the least, at first you can see the nose is slightly high for your speed and that the bank angle is quite shallow, then with the premise of not making a turn we added more rudder, this caused the inside wing to stall first and drop away behind us, within a second I was staring at the ground which was now rotating quickly below us. Oli had time to explain that the rotation speed was high but the g loading and airspeed remained reasonably constant, he then took corrective actions and we recovered. So that was my first serious departure from normal flight, not to bad, next up was the spiral dive. This manoeuvre is a lot harsher on both pilot and aircraft, it starts out in a similar setup to a spin but can also result from a highly banked turn, with a wing down the nose drops away and speed and g loading build up very quickly as the glider enters a diving sprial. Oli demo'd and explained that the spiral dive must be corrected immediately otherwise it is easy to overstress the glider. I managed to get the glider into a few spins and a spiral dive before it was time to hit the circuit for landing. During the debrief Oli said I was flying well and only certain aspects of the departure recoveries needed to be "finessed" overall I was really happy with how my flying was coming along.
I flew again in mid October with Dave Morgan, but as the cloud base was low on that day we were confined to circuit practice. A worth while day however as it keeps you currency up and the practice coming along.
Towards the back end of October my flying had gotten to the point where the instructors were happy with my general flying skills and we had begun to concentrate more on launch failures and stalling/spinning exercises. I flew with Bob again and we did a full brief on launch failures and I flew a simulated cable break, which is quite obvious, you get a loud bang and the glider begins to slow down rapidly. Speed is of the essence when recovering from a launch failure of this type, you need to get the nose down to regain any lost flying speed and then decide whether you can land ahead or switch to one of the options discussed in you eventualities brief. The cable "broke" at around 200ft so with plenty of airfield left ahead after the recovery we landed ahead. I then flew a gradual power failure and I can see why it catches people out, you don't get any bang or really clear warning, simply that the airspeed begins to reduce slowly at first and then more quickly and any delay in spotting this and taking action brings the glider very close to the stall speed. The power was rolled off at about 600ft, after the recovery and deciding we could not land ahead and acting on what was discussed on the eventualities brief we turned downwind to get us into a position to have available the best options for landing, in this case we were high enough to land into wind further up the field from the launch point. Bob seemed happy and his comment in my log book simply said "well handled" we then took a 4000ft aerotow to do some more stalling and spinning exercises, these were actually more difficult to do with Bob as our all up weight was near the upper limits for the glider, what this meant for spinning was that we were in effect nose heavy and the glider would drop a wing and begin to rotate "incipient stage" but would get very nose down and recover itself before I could take any action. After the flight Bob and I discussed what had gone on and how ballasted limits for a glider give you a range of weights you can fly in but even when inside those weights you still have an affect on the handling.
I had six flights at the end of October, three with Alan Twigg, instructor and CEO of windrushers which were more launch failure practice with the added too fast signal and abandonment. I then had three flights with Richard Chapman who introduced me to the art of side slipping. This is where you present the glider to the airflow at an angle and is achieved by full rudder deflection to one side, dropping the wing that is foremost slightly and picking up the nose with gentle back pressure to maintain track over the ground The result is that the glider can be flown down an approach slipping with no breaks and the speed remains manageable due to the increased drag on the aircraft, that means a landing can be executed at the end of it without too much speed. With brakes a much steeper shorter approach can be flown which is useful for field landings later on in your gliding career. Richard had me do a couple of practices in the air and then let me fly one down the approach and by more luck than judgement managed to get it down where I wanted.
As November arrived I was into my last four weeks before my membership ran out, I had completed 30 flights for around 4 hours of flying. I managed to squeeze in three flights at the start of the month around a busy work schedule. I flew with Debbie Thomas, whose small frame meant it would be much eaiser to carry out spinning exercises. We flew two winch launches and Debbie had the altimeter covered so I was relying on my judgement in the circuit, Debbie comments in my log book "2 good winch launches without altimeter - nicely judged" We then took an aerotow to do some more spinning and stalling Debbie was happy with my attempts and also let me fly the entire aerotow, which was good for my confidence.
A week later on the 13th of November I had planned a whole day of flying to try and maximize time in the air and to brush up and complete the remaining exercises on my training card, I had also got my medical sorted and pre solo exam in time for the possibility I might just get to solo at the end of the month. I was teamed up with Graham Bambrook in the morning and we did some launch failure and out of position practice to get some of my training card exercises finished off. After lunch I was teamed up with Bob we did some stalling and Bob flying the aircraft into unusual attitudes and saying "right you sort it out" Bob also pulled the airbrakes and held them out round the circuit to simulate high levels of sink, the result was an early turn in and landing up the field. We then took a launch and flew a normal circuit, well what I thought was a normal circuit to end the day, after a nice flight around, chatting about lookout and the weather I turned onto final, after a short assessment of my position I pulled on the air brake lever, it did not move! I looked down and pulled again and Bob said from the back "they are stuck" I did the only thing I could think of and tried to side slip in, not as successful as previous attempts but I got it down about half way up the field. We jumped out and turned the glider round and while waiting for the car to tow us back to the launch point Bob began to look around the sky he then turned to me and said "so is your medical all in order" "ummmm yesssss" I replied slowly as I waited for what seemed like an eternity "ok then, I am going to send you solo, you will only have time for one due to the light fading now but your ready" This was it! my time had come! I had at least ten minutes to get used to the idea walking the glider back to the launch point I even text the wife to tell her what was going on and that I would fly over the house as we only live across the street from the club. Bob helped me get ready securing the back seat and giving me a brief on how the glider would handle without him in it. I ran through my checks and called for the cable all the time trying to convince myself that I could do it. I heard the all out and I was off, the glider was much more eager to climb and had to be checked a little but the launch was uneventful and I released at 1300ft, silence.... I was now acutetly aware that I was by myself and it was all up to me, I made a right turn and headed for my house, after a few circles over the house I headed for the circuit all the time talking myself through what I was doing, the approach and landing was one of the best ive done and Bob was waiting to congratulate me as I stepped out, I was on a massive hi.
That was it!!! I had gone solo on my 40th flight and just shy of 3 months. All thanks to a great team at windrushers and especially Bob King who saw fit to declare me safe to fly by myself.
Look out for updates as I report on my progress towards single seat conversion and my Bronze.
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