Redefining the word "Suck"

It happens with anything you are trying hard at your next flight will be
probably be a pearler

"The OTHER Kevin in San Diego" skiddz "AT" adelphia "DOT" net wrote in
message ...
I'm going to put it very bluntly. I flew like crap today. Absolutely
horrible. Couldn't hover, couldn't do approaches, couldn't stick my
altitudes/airspeeds while in the pattern.. I sucked.

It'd been 8 days since I last flew. Partially because of some
personal commitments and partially because of the flight schedule
getting jacked up earlier in the week. I was supposed to fly Wed, Thu
and Saturday this week. Tuesday, I get a call from Q asking where I
am and am I going to fly or not? I know I checked the schedule late
Sunday night like I always do and entered the dates/times/ship numbers
in my Palm Pilot.

Evidently something changed between Sunday night and Tuesday morning
because the "current" schedule didn't mesh with what I had recorded.
I wasn't the only person who "missed" their block because of schedule
"oddities" that day.

So anyway, I'm on the schedule at 10 (as usual) in a ship that's just
received a freshly rebuilt Lycoming 4-banger. I hadn't flown this
ship in a couple months and wasn't sure if I was going to be solo or
dual so I worked up weight and balance at home and promptly forgot to
bring the worksheets to the field. (an omen perhaps??)

Not a huge deal as I arrived at the hangar a little after 8 and had
plenty of time to work up new W&B before I joined Q at the cafe' for a
cup of coffee. ($1.66 for crappy airport coffee.. I should have hit
7-11 on my way in and got decent coffee for a buck twenty nine...

Q tells me I'll be going solo today and I ponder my destination
choices over the aforementioned lousy coffee and decide to just fly
patterns locally. I need to work on my approaches and figure I'll get
in a couple dozen of 'em in my 2 hour block.

Halfway through my preflight my ground school instructor walks over to
chat. He tells me I have a "fan" that's a friend of his who has been
reading this stuff. Nifty. I either have a stalker, or someone who
really needs to get out more.

Q walks up as I'm getting ready to strap in and asks if I want to take
the right door off. School policy is solo student must leave the left
door on and I usually fly with the right door off. I thought I'd try
with both doors on today so sent him on his way.

I strapped in and started the ship up, keeping the right door ajar to
get some air in the cockpit as I waited for the temps come up. Once
the ship was warmed up and I got all my pre takeoff checks completed,
I picked up very slowly and once hovering, checked the MAP gauge. A
tick over 18 inches for a hover in ground effect. This new engine is
putting out some power. I'm usually closer to 20 inches when I'm
solo.

I hover taxi the 20 yards to the hold short line and call the tower.
I want to run patterns and I'm told to standby. Ok no biggy, I can
hover for a bit. Yeah, right. I was all over the place. No major
excursions, but I wasn't nearly as steady as I know I can be and the
tail seemed to have a mind of it's own. I attributed it to "rust" and
went ahead and took off once I'd received my clearance.

To make a long story short, I think I forgot how to fly helicopters.
Takeoff was ugly and I couldn't hit my numbers to save my life. The
1st approach I came down final at mach 3 and had to really steepen it
up to hit my target. 2nd time around I was too low and too slow and
the 3rd time around I was way too high. Just crappy flying all
around.

I was frustrated and sweaty. BAD idea to leave that right door on. I
felt like I was in a sauna and decided to try a little hover work.
Normally, I can hover with the wind coming from any direction and do a
respectable job even with a tailwind. Not today. Even pointed in to
the wind I couldn't stay in one place and my altitude went from 6
inches to 3 feet.. Absolutely horrible.

I went back to patterns and continued on my path to frustration. I
think the only thing I did right the entire flight was a left 360 I
had to do to allow a really nice looking RV8 to take off from the
runway I was shooting approaches to. At least I stuck it at 700 feet
and 60 knots all the way around. The approach following that was
supposed to be a steep approach and I ended up well short of my
intended landing point.

I was getting annoyed with myself by then and took a few moments to
collect myself, take a deep breath and mentally fly a pattern while I
hovered. Once I went over it in my head, I told the tower I was on
the go again and off I went. Still can't hit my airspeeds but I
managed to almost nail the altitude. About halfway through the
downwind leg, I smelled something funny in the cockpit (no, it wasn't
me. hehe) just as the tower cleared me to land.

I'd been smelling oil since I first started the sip, but expected that
because of the new engine. This smelled electrical. I quickly
scanned the panel and didn't see anything abnormal and called the
tower and told them I was smelling something odd in the cockpit and
would like to change my approach to land back at the ramp.

I was approved immediately and made the one good approach of the
entire flight, but once in the hover, I was back to flying like a
2-hour student instead of a 30 hour student. Set down at the pad was
ugly as hell and I had to pick the ship back up and move it forward on
the pad to get it positioned properly. I dialed up the school's
frequency and reported the problem. Q, who was with another student,
was monitoring the radio and asked what the problem was. I explained
the smell and he had me defer to the A&P once I got the ship shut
down.

I couldn't find the A&P so had to leave a message with the front
office to have him and/or Q check it out. Normally, I hang out at the
field for a bit, but was so annoyed with my crappy performance, I
filled out my logbook and took off. 1.1 on the books, but the way I
was flying, it felt like 3 hours. I'm hoping this was just one of
those bad days and not a bad slide like I had just before I soloed.

Hopefully tomorrow's hop will be better otherwise I'm going to change
my name to Hoover.

Agreed! You've been doing so well the last few flights you've made, it's
about time you backslid a little. ;-)

Don't sweat it, relax (I know, easy for me to say!), and have fun. :-D

Fly Safe,
Steve R.


"Rod" wrote in message
...
It happens with anything you are trying hard at your next flight will be
probably be a pearler

"The OTHER Kevin in San Diego" skiddz "AT" adelphia "DOT" net wrote in
message ...
I'm going to put it very bluntly. I flew like crap today. Absolutely
horrible. Couldn't hover, couldn't do approaches, couldn't stick my
altitudes/airspeeds while in the pattern.. I sucked.

It'd been 8 days since I last flew. Partially because of some
personal commitments and partially because of the flight schedule
getting jacked up earlier in the week. I was supposed to fly Wed, Thu
and Saturday this week. Tuesday, I get a call from Q asking where I
am and am I going to fly or not? I know I checked the schedule late
Sunday night like I always do and entered the dates/times/ship numbers
in my Palm Pilot.

Evidently something changed between Sunday night and Tuesday morning
because the "current" schedule didn't mesh with what I had recorded.
I wasn't the only person who "missed" their block because of schedule
"oddities" that day.

So anyway, I'm on the schedule at 10 (as usual) in a ship that's just
received a freshly rebuilt Lycoming 4-banger. I hadn't flown this
ship in a couple months and wasn't sure if I was going to be solo or
dual so I worked up weight and balance at home and promptly forgot to
bring the worksheets to the field. (an omen perhaps??)

Not a huge deal as I arrived at the hangar a little after 8 and had
plenty of time to work up new W&B before I joined Q at the cafe' for a
cup of coffee. ($1.66 for crappy airport coffee.. I should have hit
7-11 on my way in and got decent coffee for a buck twenty nine...

Q tells me I'll be going solo today and I ponder my destination
choices over the aforementioned lousy coffee and decide to just fly
patterns locally. I need to work on my approaches and figure I'll get
in a couple dozen of 'em in my 2 hour block.

Halfway through my preflight my ground school instructor walks over to
chat. He tells me I have a "fan" that's a friend of his who has been
reading this stuff. Nifty. I either have a stalker, or someone who
really needs to get out more.

Q walks up as I'm getting ready to strap in and asks if I want to take
the right door off. School policy is solo student must leave the left
door on and I usually fly with the right door off. I thought I'd try
with both doors on today so sent him on his way.

I strapped in and started the ship up, keeping the right door ajar to
get some air in the cockpit as I waited for the temps come up. Once
the ship was warmed up and I got all my pre takeoff checks completed,
I picked up very slowly and once hovering, checked the MAP gauge. A
tick over 18 inches for a hover in ground effect. This new engine is
putting out some power. I'm usually closer to 20 inches when I'm
solo.

I hover taxi the 20 yards to the hold short line and call the tower.
I want to run patterns and I'm told to standby. Ok no biggy, I can
hover for a bit. Yeah, right. I was all over the place. No major
excursions, but I wasn't nearly as steady as I know I can be and the
tail seemed to have a mind of it's own. I attributed it to "rust" and
went ahead and took off once I'd received my clearance.

To make a long story short, I think I forgot how to fly helicopters.
Takeoff was ugly and I couldn't hit my numbers to save my life. The
1st approach I came down final at mach 3 and had to really steepen it
up to hit my target. 2nd time around I was too low and too slow and
the 3rd time around I was way too high. Just crappy flying all
around.

I was frustrated and sweaty. BAD idea to leave that right door on. I
felt like I was in a sauna and decided to try a little hover work.
Normally, I can hover with the wind coming from any direction and do a
respectable job even with a tailwind. Not today. Even pointed in to
the wind I couldn't stay in one place and my altitude went from 6
inches to 3 feet.. Absolutely horrible.

I went back to patterns and continued on my path to frustration. I
think the only thing I did right the entire flight was a left 360 I
had to do to allow a really nice looking RV8 to take off from the
runway I was shooting approaches to. At least I stuck it at 700 feet
and 60 knots all the way around. The approach following that was
supposed to be a steep approach and I ended up well short of my
intended landing point.

I was getting annoyed with myself by then and took a few moments to
collect myself, take a deep breath and mentally fly a pattern while I
hovered. Once I went over it in my head, I told the tower I was on
the go again and off I went. Still can't hit my airspeeds but I
managed to almost nail the altitude. About halfway through the
downwind leg, I smelled something funny in the cockpit (no, it wasn't
me. hehe) just as the tower cleared me to land.

I'd been smelling oil since I first started the sip, but expected that
because of the new engine. This smelled electrical. I quickly
scanned the panel and didn't see anything abnormal and called the
tower and told them I was smelling something odd in the cockpit and
would like to change my approach to land back at the ramp.

I was approved immediately and made the one good approach of the
entire flight, but once in the hover, I was back to flying like a
2-hour student instead of a 30 hour student. Set down at the pad was
ugly as hell and I had to pick the ship back up and move it forward on
the pad to get it positioned properly. I dialed up the school's
frequency and reported the problem. Q, who was with another student,
was monitoring the radio and asked what the problem was. I explained
the smell and he had me defer to the A&P once I got the ship shut
down.

I couldn't find the A&P so had to leave a message with the front
office to have him and/or Q check it out. Normally, I hang out at the
field for a bit, but was so annoyed with my crappy performance, I
filled out my logbook and took off. 1.1 on the books, but the way I
was flying, it felt like 3 hours. I'm hoping this was just one of
those bad days and not a bad slide like I had just before I soloed.

Hopefully tomorrow's hop will be better otherwise I'm going to change
my name to Hoover.

"Rod" wrote in message ...
It happens with anything you are trying hard at your next flight will be
probably be a pearler


You kill me. LOL :-)

Bryan

"The OTHER Kevin in San Diego" skiddz "AT" adelphia "DOT" net wrote in
message ...
I'll do the "story" later. Mom wants to take me out for a nice hunk
o' cow flesh and some good Scotch in celebration cough of my
impending 40th.. (I think she just wants to give me **** for getting
old. heeh)


Looking forward to it and Happy Birthday Kevin!

Fly Safe,
Steve R.