Well, at home anyway !
When I rang to book a lesson, it was 200m visibility at EGNT, so no-go.
Heavy snow today so another no-go.
Lesson
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Weather perfect yesterday for a lesson
Thursday, February 18th, 2010Video of Short Taxi from Police Hangar to Flying School
Monday, February 1st, 2010Sadly, the ATC recording didn’t work for this flight, but the camera was at an “ok” angle. The ATC worked brilliantly for the second part (the lesson), but the video angle was too bad to make any film from it. Sod’s Law !
Flight 40 – 28th January 2010 – 1210 – 1 hour 6 minutes – Total so far – 40 hours 46 mins
Thursday, January 28th, 2010It’s good to get back in the saddle. Was surprised how much I missed my helicopter lessons.
Thankfully, the weather was perfect for it. Nice cold temperatures meaning high performance from the engine, and good visibility, with no precipitation.
I had in mind what I wanted to get out of today’s lesson. I wanted to leave it thinking “Oh yes, I can still fly a helicopter” and I achieved that, so am happy.
I arrived at the flying school early (10am) for my 11am lesson. I had decided to take a couple of exams today, the last 2 theory ones. I did some last minute revision, but was surprised about how much I had remembered from previous revision. Scores on the doors :-
Human Performance – 95%
Radiotelephony – 93.33333%
Well pleased with that. All theory exams done, just the radiotelephony practical exam to do PLUS the helicopter equivalent of the driving test ! The end is in sight.
So, today’s helicopter was G-DOGI (Doggy as it’s affectionately known). It was in a hangar next to where the police helicopter operates from, so a bit of a trek in the cold to get to it.
The great thing was I got to fly it from there around to the flying school at no cost to me ! So, takeoff, some precision transitioning (or fast taxi at least) and then landing. Loved it.
The takeoff went “ok”, but then the initial hover showed my lack of experience for the last 3 months, but I was pleased at how quickly I got the knack again.
Once filled up, I started her up again or at least tried to. But it wouldn’t start AT ALL. Steve was booking us out, and I couldn’t work it what I was doing wrong. I knew it was something stupid, but just couldn’t figure it out ! I rang Steve and he said he’d be there shortly.
Well, before Steve returned I realised that the rotor brake was still on, and that was the cause of it not starting. It started fine without the brake on 
Once I’d started it and all the checks were done and I had the clearance, Steve returned and we headed off north. Past Morpeth, we did a vortex ring exercise. We were at about 2300 feet, and Steve asked me to enter a hover. Once in the hover, we entered vortex ring and then came out of it by gently increasing speed and powering away. Then onto the plateau where we did some autos, some quickstops, quite a bit of precision transitioning (fast low stuff, love it). We finished off with an auto to powered recovery into the hover. It went “ok”, but I could tell I was out of practice and Steve could too. But, I wasn’t disappointed, in fact, I was quite pleased that so much of his training was still in me.
I have a tendency when doing “autos to a hover just above the ground” to keep the nose high for too long, whereas I should be levelling out. I know why, but it’s only just dawned on me. At no point, am I thinking of landing it, and although we don’t ever land it (when practising an auto), I need to think and do everything as if I was going to land it. With that in my mind, I feel sure I’ll do it to Steve’s (and my) satisfaction next time. On the way back, we had a good catchup. Steve also slipped in a “small criticism”. Apparently, I’ve been hovering too low. Wasn’t aware of it, but he wants it about waist height for added safety, so I’ll work on that next time too.
So, all in all, a fruitful lesson. My helicopter head is nearly fully back on, more practice required.
I’ll try and get a lesson in next week (weather permitting).
I took video of both flights (PLUS atc), so all being well over the next couple of days, I’ll edit and upload that.
How Bizarre !
Tuesday, October 27th, 2009Been prepping for the next exams (Human Performance & Communications).
Mock Test Results are in…….
Human Performance = 67.6%
Communications = 67.7%
.1% of a difference !
Both are fails, so more work needed.
I had forgot that it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow (OUCH!), so tomorrow’s lesson is a no-go. Ringing on thursday/friday mornings to see if they can fit me in. Fingers crossed. Getting withdrawal symptoms.
Back from a week in Rhodes
Thursday, October 22nd, 2009Great break. If heli lessons were in Rhodes, it would be a lesson a day.
Sadly, it’s British weather that is key. Next lesson booked for Wednesday when I’m hoping to do some exams too. Fingers crossed !
Lesson 36 – 5th October 2009 – 1310 – 54 minutes – Total so far – 37 hours 22 mins
Monday, October 5th, 2009Well, I’m used to seeing myself type “Great Lesson” a lot recently, but not today. No fault of Steve who did his utmost to boy me up. I just wasn’t in the zone.
It started off ok. I had worked out over the weekend how to record the full ATC communications and I brought that setup with me ready to rock’n'roll. It was the new aircraft today G-DOGI (Doggy). It is a beautiful machine. Metallic Blue and everything looks very fresh and new on it.
So, I checked her over. I spent 5-10 minutes setting up the camera and ATC recording unit and it all tested fine.
All good so far !!!
With only the final LOW RPM Horn to check, I waited on Steve. When Steve arrived, he plugged in his headset and then we realised it didn’t work with my headset. BUGGER !!!!! So, with the rotors turning and everything setup to work with my headset, I made the snap decision to just swap mine out for the school headset, which means no video and no ATC 
I was gutted.
The insides of the new helicopter are a little different. There’s more buttons on the cyclic for changing the frequency, swapping channels and it took me a few seconds to realise that to talk on the radio, there is a button where the fire button on a joystick would be ie a trigger button.
The aircraft felt different. It’s funny how accustomed to G-MAVI and G-BZBU I have become and how different a new machine can feel. But it was easy to get used to quickly.
Today, we did some advanced autorotation practice. We flew out north past Morpeth and did a variety of different types of autorotation……
Standard auto (60/5 knots)
180′ auto
Range
Max Range
and a new one……
Not sure what the name is but basically we reduced the speed in the auto to zero knots. So basically, we are in a rapidly descending hover, the idea being that we don’t need to move forward much to reach a field. When we are at about 400 feet, we bring the speed back in, so we have it for the final flare.
The last few autos we did at the plateau so we could do it all the way down to a 5 foot hover. There was virtually no wind today, which made the autos much harder for the final flare. Steve reckons we’d have rolled over on one of them. I reckoned we’d have done somersaults personally It wasn’t pretty, not enough speed shaved off and a messy flare and bit of pedal work.
But, I don’t think anything would have felt right today. I just wasn’t in the zone. After we’d done about 5 or 6 autos, we headed back to the airport. As we taxi’ed in, I was close to asking Steve to do the final landing next to the bowser, as my previous performance was so poor, but my gut told me to do it. And it went really well. One of my better landings (8/10), so was well happy with that for what had been a pretty dire lesson. Gutted there’s no footage and audio. But maybe next time.
I did take a photo of Doggy…..
And totally unrelated to helicopters, but I just LOVE this youtube video…….
Lesson 35 – 28th September 2009 – 1110 – 1 hour – Total so far – 36 hours 28 mins
Monday, September 28th, 2009Didn’t expect to be flying today, but I managed to get a lesson in.
The weather looked bad for lunchtime and afternoon, but Steve rang and said we could fit one in, in the morning. And we did ! Quite a challenging and fun lesson.
Order of the Day was :-
- some VOR work
- Autos to Powered Termination at 5 feet
- 180′ Autos
- Confined Area Practice
When I went out to check G-MAVI over, the windsock was limp. Surface Wind = Variable, less than 3 knots. Boy, would that change !!!!
The Lightspeed Zulu headset is really paying dividends these days. Today was a good example of it being worth the money. I heard everything that was said, not needing to ask Steve “what did they say ?” at any point.
So, 25 departure, right turn to Morpeth. The winds may have been calm on the surface, but it was like riding a bucking bronco at 1000 feet. I normally like to go upto 2300′, but the cloud prevented us going higher than about 1500′. At times we skirted the cloud, which is so much fun !!
With VORs, what you’re supposed to do is to TIT.
T une
I dentify
T rack
Once past Morpeth, Steve Tuned the VOR to St Abbs VOR, and we tried to listen to the morse code to Identify it was St Abbs and then we tracked some radial. This went fine. Conveniently, this led us to the plateau where we did a 180′ auto to a powered termination at 5 feet. By this time, the wind had really picked up. Over the plateau, it was showing as 20 to 30 knots, which makes for a much easier ending to an autorotation. It’s the first auto I’ve done which felt good – NOT perfect, but it felt good. We’d have been alive at the end of it, for sure, although Steve may have chipped one of his nails Would the helicopter have been ok, well, not too sure about that ?! 50/50 !
I felt I did the entering fine, the throttle fine, maintaining rotor rpm fine, hitting the spot fine, the flare went really well, AND the pop too. The only negative is once I’d done the final flare and POP (of the collective), I didn’t push the cyclic enough forward to get us level for the final (cushion to the ground). In hindsight, I think this is because I know we’re not going to land, so I’m doing it with a view to ending in a hover. But I need to do the steps as if we were going to do the final level and cushion that we would do if the engine quit for real. Will work on this next time.
With that done, we did a very entertaining 360′ turn. The wind doesn’t half make it hard !!! Steve spotted some fast jets in the distance. My mind was too much on the 360′ turn to see ANYTHING. We did another 360 and I could see them this time.
With them in sight, we headed off to do some confined area approaches. We did two, each to a different confined area. They went fine, although the surface wind was no quite turbulent, so it made for quite challenging moving around the confined areas once down.
With the confined areas complete, we headed back with a view to doing some more autos on the way back. Not one of the autos did I remember to do the fake Mayday call. It’s not that I forgot, more that I was concentrating on the actual flying of the autos. Will try and get the Maydays in next time.
These remaining autos were to a 500 feet recovery. We did two max range ones. That’s where we take rotor rpm to 90% (gulp) and maintain 75 knots. Slight change to the recovery in that Steve said to lower the collective, do a little flare to bring rotor rpm back up and then power away. Worked ok I think.
With all of that behind us, we side stepped back to the field and we rode the horse as it jostled us around the sky. It really was quite a ride. 
We were asked to do some orbits to allow Tower to get some flights away and 1 flight in. Here is a gps track of the whole flight and you can see the 2 orbits on the right hand side (just to the North west of Seaton Burn (bottom right). These were 2 turns in the air, but you can really see how the wind made them 2 turns in totally different spots. Shows the wind direction quite well.
Once the last flight was in, we headed closer to the field and did another orbit waiting for a departure and then we were given our cue.
The windsock, that was previously limp, was now horizontal and the wind was nicely down the centre of the runway (very kind of it), so it took about a minute (or two) to fly from one end of the runway to the end !!
The taxi’ing back from the runway to the parking spot was a riot !!!! You’d think I’d been drinking (it should be on the video !). It was like the helicopter had a mind of its own. But, Steve let me take it all the way back in and the landing wasn’t bad considering. 7/10, better than some of the ones I’ve done with NO wind (and they’re easier).
Great lesson. Felt like a lot of stuff really came together.
There may be a chance on Thursday of a cheap lesson as we pick up a brand new helicopter (for the school) from somewhere near Stratford and bring it up. Fingers crossed for that. Be nice to see a different part of the UK (from the air).
Lesson 31 – 15th September 2009 – 1005 – 1 hour – Total so far – 33 hours 22 mins
Wednesday, September 16th, 2009Another great lesson today.
We started with a discussion about what to do. It was clear I need to get my solo hours up as I’ve only got about 2.25. The prospect of going to X and back without landing didn’t really appeal to me, so I suggested a trip to Carlisle and back to land away and Steve said that was ok. Sadly, the weather precluded the trip, but it’s an exciting thought for the future
Instead we did some more instrument work (I need to get instrument hours up too) and some confined area landings which made out for an excellent and fun lesson.
Steve came out with me today to see how I was checking her over. That was good because it was some reassurance that I was doing 90% correct, but also reaffirmed and refreshed some of the names of helicopter parts and their function and things to check. I was quite surprised to find out that this isn’t tested in the General Flying Test (GFT). But, I expect it’ll be needed for the commercial test, so all is not lost and this is essential stuff anyway.
We started her up and we’re off to Foxtrot to hold for a 07 departure. Quite busy for departures so we held in the light aircraft warm-up area. Here I was presented with the choice of hover practice or putting her down. I felt the need for some landing practice, so whilst we waited, we did some landing/liftoff combos, probably about 3 or 4. I did a 10/10 one which always leaves me feeling warm inside, and a couple of 6/7′s. We were then asked to line up and wait.
No sooner had we “lined up” we were given the go and off we jolly well..….
Once at level flight, Steve had me don the instrument goggles so I could only see the instrument pedestal. He asked me to …..
- Hold a heading
- Climb 300 feet
- Descend 300 feet
- Turn 90′ to the left
- Turn 90′ to the right
- Do a 180′ descending turn
All on the way to the confined area.
It all went well.
Then we approached a different, more confined area than previously.
The wind was a Northerly wind, but the area was naturally west-east, which meant it was a bit of a challenge. The wind was also quite light about 5 knots, so given the direction that was probably a plus.
We did the powering back to 53knots level to find the available MAP. We had 6.5 in hand. This reminds me, before I forget, a joke from yesterday. We had the same amount of MAP available yesterday (6.5 inches).
Steve :- So, you have 6.5 inches in your hand, I mean “in hand”
LONG 5 SECOND PAUSE as dp is concentrating so hard.
The joke hits. Late laughter ensues !
Steve finds the time it took for the joke to work funny. I’m laughing at the joke etc etc…..We have a laugh for sure !
Anyway, back to today. After doing the S’s checks and with our 6.5 inches IN HAND, we were spoilt for choice for the approaches. We initially tried a west to east approach to make the most of a gap in the trees and the more lengthy runway-like shape of the confined area, but at the decision altitude, it didn’t feel right so I suggested going around. The wind was more northerly than forecast.
With the wind being so light, Steve suggested a southerly approach as there were less trees on the last few yards of the approach. This made it a downwind approach which always gets my heckles up, but Steve (as always) was bang on. The lack of trees (small shrubs instead) allowed us to get lower and use the confined area for more of a flare. It worked well.
So, once in the confined area in the hover, we did the “move to the right, turn right” routine and then taxi’ed to a point close to the edge of the area. We had enough power for a towering takeoff and Steve had me pick a 12pm, 3pm reference. Once I had them, we pulled 24.5 MAP and we shot up. Once clear of the trees, we transitioned away. It should look great on the video.
We did another orbit and approach and picked a different location in the confined area for the towering takeoff. For the second one, I started the transition a little early, but you live and learn.
We then headed back to EGNT. Steve did an “Engine Failure Engine Failure etc” on the way back. Did the “entering” fine, totally forgot the Mayday call which come to think of it, I forgot yesterday too. It was a 180′ auto, and the field I picked wasn’t as good as the one Steve had picked, so we changed to his one. It was a big field of newly harvested wheat awaiting the farmer to come round with his combine. Steve said to go to “powered termination” so we went right down to 5 feet or so. The flare went really well and the pop of the collective and subsequent recovery are a bit of a blur, but there was a lot of yawing, but we made it back into a hover. Still need lots of work on the powered termination and the Mayday call. But, I’ll get there. Steve looked back as we transitioned off and said we’d made a mess of all the nicely rowed hay and that the farmer wouldn’t be best pleased and we should give it some wellie. It made me laugh. We had made a big circle of hay. Hope it shows on the video.
We then headed back home.
I made the call to rejoin the Zone quite late (my bad), so we started doing an orbit as there was so much radio chatter going on, I couldn’t get a word in edge ways. But, half way through the orbit, we were cleared to join.
The trip back was uneventful. The landing was a 6/10.
Next lesson is Friday and I may be going solo to Carlisle (weather and machines permitting). Looking forward to the most expensive bacon buttie you can buy. That’s not because the cafe is expensive at Carlisle….It’s a poor helicopter costs joke.
While I remember, I’m already starting to put my training head on. When I used to be an IT trainer, I used to have to think of ways to get concepts across to students in an easy to visualize/remember way. Subconsciously, I’m already starting to think about how to get helicopter concepts across. I’m sharing this in case it will help others with a problem I had. Occasionally, we fly in the HP model of the R22. It lifts off and lands differently to the non-HP variant because of it’s more forward CoG. I was sharing this with Steve as it helped me get my head around the difference. To experience the difference, try the following…..
- Take your shoes off and put them together in front of you while you sit down, toes facing away.
- Grab both shoes with one hand in such a way that when you lift them gently and slowly off the floor, the toes of the shoes are the last thing to leave the floor.
- You now have your own R22 HP.
As you lift them off the floor each time, analyse the angle of the shoes. When the heels are 1 inch off the ground and the toes still touching, how would you get the shoes level again, what movement of your hand (cyclic stick) would be needed to get the (shoes) heli level.
Also, you can mirror the double landing of the R22 HP. Lower the shoes until the toes are touching, think about what movements are needed as you get the heels down, to stop the helicopter moving backwards. Hard to explain in a blog post, but have a play.
Here’s the video from yesterday’s confined area…….Today’s will be tomorrow.
Lesson 31 – 15th September 2009 – 1320 – 1 hour – Total so far – 32 hours 22 mins
Tuesday, September 15th, 2009Absolutely brilliant lesson – Loved it !!
Got a chance to listen in Rich’s helicopter debrief as I arrived (another student). It’s always good to chat to fellow pilots and trainee pilots and it’s quite reassuring to know that others face the same obstacles and hiccups. Good to know I’m not alone !
Once Rich had gone, Steve did an in-depth briefing on Confined Area Landings. I was glad of hearing it a second time, because it takes a few briefings sometimes for things to sink in. I was overwhelmed before the last lesson and during it, but today the briefing cemented my knowledge and the actual lesson felt really good – kind of like everything came together.
So, Steve booked out, as I went out to G-MAVI (Northumbria01), checked her over and started her up. The ATIS was not very healthy today. It gave the surface wind, temperature, dewpoint and that was about it. No runway in use, no pressure settings and no Information designator. So, I was thinking how I could get that across to Tower without rambling on for 2 minutes, but thankfully some other pilot was already reporting it and from that conversation, I could tell they already knew there was a problem too.
Startup Checks are starting to flow much better now. I’m not fluid, far from it, and still have to check the checklist, but I’m getting to the point where I’m checking a section heading and remembering the X number of things in that section. So, I’m getting quicker at it, without forgetting things, which is good.
With Steve onboard, we taxi’ed to Foxtrot and then a left hand turnout from a 07 departure. Normally, I climb to 2300′ but today that would have put us above the cloud, so we kept about 1500′. We still skirted cloud which is a lovely feeling, don’t ask me why !
Once out of the zone, we headed to a wooded area next to a prison. En route, we rolled the power back to see how much was required for 53 knots level flight and I think we had 6.5 MAP available (plenty) and we then started the first of two orbits around the confined area. Steve had said to keep the confined area at 45 degrees at all times. Not too sure I did that exactly, but after a few more attempts I’ll get that. Certainly, I circled it working out angles of entry and departure. We looked for the S’s.
- Site
- Surroundings (inner/outer)
- Surface
- Slope
- Stock (Livestock)
- Sun
and some other S’s I’ve forgot. But basically, a handy way of thinking about all the things you have to be aware of. There were some pylons on the approach, and some telegraph wires on the departure. But, it was like a mini runway as far as space was concerned and I was confident we could get in and out.
After 2 orbits around the confined area at about 500 feet, we made our approach. I’m not forgetting applying Carb Heat with any descents these days, but I am forgetting to cancel it at 500 feet, which is particularly important for confined areas where you need all the power available. Note to self !!
The approach to this confined area went much better than the previous ones with Scott where I had to abort the first one and it’s dawned on me why. When I did them with Scott, although we didn’t know it at the time, we were landing downwind (i.e. with the wind behind us). No wonder I struggled to slow it down and get it in. But, with the wind towards us today, it was so much easier. Once in the confined area (basically a strip of land surrounded by trees), we did some more of the turns where you move to the right, turn to the right, move to the right, turn to the right. They went fine. We then taxi’ed back to the trees at the downwind end, so we had ample space for the transition. I think we then did another power check and we had about 1.5 MAP available for the departure (again, ample for a vertical or towering takeoff).
And then we did a normal transition to leave the confined area and flew straight into another orbit (for practice). A second approach and hover concluded the second practice confined area landing. We didn’t actually land because….
- We’re not allowed to land away from a licensed aerodrome and
- The grass was so tall, the tail rotor would have been in the grass
So, with the second approach done, Steve suggested trying a towering takeoff. What a lot of fun. As the name implies, we pull full power (24.5 today) and then we zoom up and as we stop gaining height, start easing it forward and transition away. Awesome !
With that done, we headed back to the airport.
On the way back, Steve said we were going to practice an autorotation to a power termination. Basically
- full lowering of the collective
- throttling off the engine
- enter autorotation
- find a suitable field
- setup an approach
- Flare at the last second
- POP the collective and
- HOVER
The first one went well. I managed the throttle initially, all good, but as I stopped the rotor rpm from rising into the red (by pulling collective), the correlator told the engine to get back unto speed. So I learned that you have to HOLD the throttle off and stop it correcting itself. Good tip !!!
Steve later said that I’d done 95% of the whole thing. I was chuffed, ‘cos I’d put it more at 80%, but everything happens so fast, especially towards the end when you’re flaring 50 feet above the ground etc….
So, I thought we were all done. I made the call at Morpeth to ask for rejoin instructions and we’re heading back to EGNT. Totally to my surprise and completely OUT OF THE BLUE, Steve says “Engine Failure Engine Failure Engine Failure”. Well, without even thinking I instinctively lowered the collective, and turned into wind. I took a moment to think “what the hell” and then remembered to stop rotor rpm from rising into the red. I think I even remembered to hold the throttle off on this one. I did feel Steve do something at some point, maybe some minor throttle work, and then at about 300 feet we went around.
Loved it. It was a total surprise and a real test for the panic that would be there (but tenfold) were the engine really to quit. I was pleased that it was kind of instinct too. My only concern is if the engine really went and noone was saying outloud “Engine Failure Engine Failure Engine Failure” would I still lower the collective as quick. LOL.
Anyway, thinking the lesson over, we climbed and headed back to EGNT. We were asked to do a couple of orbits on left base for 07.
Here’s the GPS of the orbits over the Golf Course..….
With the landing aircraft down, Steve made a radio call and asked if we could do another auto onto the runway and that was ok with them, so we did another auto to a powered termination and that went well too. Steve said I did 99% of that one. I think he helped with the throttle on that one too.
So, brilliant lesson – one of my favourites so far and that’s with a landing rated 4/10 on the dp scale. The landing was safe, but one skid touched first and then when they both touched we clunked down, not graceful, but we made it
So, all good !!!
Here’s the trip we did..….
Here’s the confined area stuff in more detail..…The larger circles are the orbits and the more narrow oval things are totally rectangular circuits
Video to follow tomorrow if time permits..…
