The ball is finally rolling / coordinated :-))

parmandjack

New Member
Hey,

Thought I'd update y'all with my latest. My other post noted that I'd finally made the move from Calgary Alberta, Canada, down here to Raleigh NC, as well as a few other items...

Well, after jumping through their hoops with fingerprinting, documentation, etc... last week I FINALLY got approvals from the TSA to begin flight training...

So on Saturday I went over to FlightGest here at RDU and signed up. I also picked up my Cessna PPL Ground School Training kit at the same time and spent all weekend on it and have already finished 4 labs. I have also scheduled 30 hours with my instructor between tomorrow night (Aug 12th) and Sept 30th, in one of the flight schools brand new Cessna 172S with Glass Cockpit. I've booked 4 hours per week across every Tuesday and Friday evening, 6pm - 8pm, between now and the end of September... in the hopes that this amount of time will quickly get me back up and ready to do the flight check. As some of you may remember, I'd tried it once before, but after an engine failure on my 2nd solo, no matter how hard I tried, it wasn;t fun anymore... well.. thats behind me now... so with the 52 hours I already have, I'm hoping the next 30 hours in rapid succession will help it all come back quickly, and then with 82+/- hours, will be ready once again to do the checkride. I'm restarting the training tomorrow, and with the schedule I've selected, hoping to have the PPL by mid-October.... lets see...

Cheers. :eek:
 
Hey,

Thought I'd update y'all with my latest. My other post noted that I'd finally made the move from Calgary Alberta, Canada, down here to Raleigh NC, as well as a few other items...

Well, after jumping through their hoops with fingerprinting, documentation, etc... last week I FINALLY got approvals from the TSA to begin flight training...

So on Saturday I went over to FlightGest here at RDU and signed up. I also picked up my Cessna PPL Ground School Training kit at the same time and spent all weekend on it and have already finished 4 labs. I have also scheduled 30 hours with my instructor between tomorrow night (Aug 12th) and Sept 30th, in one of the flight schools brand new Cessna 172S with Glass Cockpit. I've booked 4 hours per week across every Tuesday and Friday evening, 6pm - 8pm, between now and the end of September... in the hopes that this amount of time will quickly get me back up and ready to do the flight check. As some of you may remember, I'd tried it once before, but after an engine failure on my 2nd solo, no matter how hard I tried, it wasn;t fun anymore... well.. thats behind me now... so with the 52 hours I already have, I'm hoping the next 30 hours in rapid succession will help it all come back quickly, and then with 82+/- hours, will be ready once again to do the checkride. I'm restarting the training tomorrow, and with the schedule I've selected, hoping to have the PPL by mid-October.... lets see...

Cheers. :eek:
Congrats man!!!:nana2:
 
Congrats!

The more frequent you fly the more you will retain, I think you have a great schedule worked out. Oh engine failures are no fun, I had one during my commercial check ride. I passed!

Good Luck, and above all have FUN!!
 
Go and get it. Congrads. I also share the engine failure thingy with you at my first job as a commercial pilot. I think we should all be given glider ratings for free after these.
 
Well... last night was the 1st time back up in the drivers seat... what a blast :nana2:

My instructor has 6500 hours, and over 3000 hours as an instructor, so I felt in good hands... he's an old guy, seems somewhat absent minded as he asked me the same questions a couple of times, but boy, he knows his stuff...

After walking me thru the pre-flight to familiarize with the 172, he got me to taxi to the runway... once on teh runway he sez go for it... so I hit the gas figuring he was assisting... he then sez let her fly, so I slowly pull back the yoke and look over at him and he's sitting with his legs under him and his arms folded across his chest... i just took off myself for the 1st time in 10 years....

We get vectored by ATC out of and around Raleigh-Durham heading to Sanford... All my prior training came back to me and I had the plane upto and holding our altitude all trimmed out in staight-and-level flight in no time.... My instructor sez to me.. "take your hands off the control wheel"... so I did... the plane didn't even wobble.. he sez good.. continue on... then he starts inundating me with all the intricacies of the Garmin 1000, the autopilot, etc.... Then he sez to me about 10 mins into it.. "I can tell you've flown a plane before".. WOW... I took that as a huge compliment, as I was really nervous not having done it for 10 years... Anyway, we fly over the Sanford strip, turn around and come in for a landing... I brought the plane in to land easy enough, but I started my flare too early and he pushed the yoke in to prevent me from doing that, then took his hand off again and let me land it... then he had me apply full power as he wanted a touch and go.. I wasn;t expaecting that... but off we went again and headed back to RDU.

On the way back he again told me to let go of the control wheel.. and again, with the plane all trimmed out, it didn't even wobble... he sez.. continue on... whew... I was starting to feel good about this flying thing :cwm27:

We got approved for a straight in approach and cleared to land... this time I lined it up, and brought it in for a pretty decent landing... I then realized how much I'd been focusing on landing it, and asked him how much he'd helped me... and his response was none... I then saw that his arms were folded across his chest like before... and it struck me that after 10 years, I'd just landed a plane unassisted!!! :nana2::D:rawk: TOO COOL!!!! Its like riding a bike!

So, now I've got LOTS of practise to do on landngs and everything else to get ready again for the check ride. Once we were back in the office my instructor told me that he thinks I'm gonna do real well... He said that according to my signed log book all my work is done, and those hours count, so he's just going to get me back up to speed and verify everything with me... SO, I'm shooting for mid-October to do the checkride (hopefully).

So.. adding last nights flight to my time from 10 years ago... I now have a whopping 53.3 hours hahahaha :p

Later gang.
 
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