orange
Line Up and Wait
This morning (Oct 7th), I passed my private checkride. I had 151.7 hours, and that doesn't even include the last prep flight I took last night to get the rust out since I hadn't flown in about 9-10 days. If you're wondering why I had some many hours, search my past threads started to read about my SODA, landing issues, and 4 instructors, etc. Perseverence pays off. So if any of you are struggling, don't doubt yourself, keep at it and you'll make it.
My checkride was scheduled for Sunday (Oct 4th), but the storm that never made it to the Northeast brought crappy weather anyway, 2000' ceilings and 18G29 winds. And I had the flu over the weekend, so it all worked out. I am still recovering but not bad.
I took a plane out last night solo just to go thru the manuevers and do some short and soft landings. This was the first time that I tried the manuevers solo, I always did them with the CFI. It didn't go well. My manuevers sucked. I was afraid to stall the plane. Slow flight and steep turns were a little off but not too much, within PTS. My short field landings have always been on point (I have to concentrate to not land short
). The soft landings have always been a challenge because to due my vision issue in my left eye, it's a little hard for me to judge height over the runway.
But today, I have to honestly say that the manuevers were on point. Not just within PTS limits, but spot on. The only issue was in slow flight which has typically been my best manuever, I was not keeping enough power and started losing about 50-75' of altitude but I quickly added some power and corrected.
He had me do all the manuevers, then (relatively) a lot of work under the hood (VOR, unusual attitudes, just a lot of turns and descents and climbs to alt and heading) then had me take off the foggles, do S-turns, simulate engine out emergency (which he said I handled very professionally), this isn't required but he had me simulate what I would do if one of my passengers had a medical emergency (very new and he said I did well), then we came back and did 3 landings (normal, soft-which I surprisingly greased
, and cross-wind; the wind actually kept shifting so the timing was good), a go-around, and a forward slip.
As we were taxing back to the ramp, he extended his hand and said "congratulations pilot". It was a good flight and I actually learned some new things which was pretty cool.
Overall, it was a very relaxed day, even though I have to admit being a little tight at first but the DPE made me feel at ease right away. He gave me his career history and we talked a little about why I'm flight training and that really relaxed me, and the oral went awesome, I answered every single question accurately and completely, except for one about "what's the maximum baggage compartment weight that you can carry in a Cherokee?" I didn't know there is a limit, so I first said as much as you can carry as long as you stay under max TO weight and with the CG within limits. But he said, where could I find the answer, so I looked in the POH and it turns out that there's a 200lb max in the baggage compartment. Who knew.
My checkride was scheduled for Sunday (Oct 4th), but the storm that never made it to the Northeast brought crappy weather anyway, 2000' ceilings and 18G29 winds. And I had the flu over the weekend, so it all worked out. I am still recovering but not bad.
I took a plane out last night solo just to go thru the manuevers and do some short and soft landings. This was the first time that I tried the manuevers solo, I always did them with the CFI. It didn't go well. My manuevers sucked. I was afraid to stall the plane. Slow flight and steep turns were a little off but not too much, within PTS. My short field landings have always been on point (I have to concentrate to not land short
). The soft landings have always been a challenge because to due my vision issue in my left eye, it's a little hard for me to judge height over the runway.But today, I have to honestly say that the manuevers were on point. Not just within PTS limits, but spot on. The only issue was in slow flight which has typically been my best manuever, I was not keeping enough power and started losing about 50-75' of altitude but I quickly added some power and corrected.
He had me do all the manuevers, then (relatively) a lot of work under the hood (VOR, unusual attitudes, just a lot of turns and descents and climbs to alt and heading) then had me take off the foggles, do S-turns, simulate engine out emergency (which he said I handled very professionally), this isn't required but he had me simulate what I would do if one of my passengers had a medical emergency (very new and he said I did well), then we came back and did 3 landings (normal, soft-which I surprisingly greased
, and cross-wind; the wind actually kept shifting so the timing was good), a go-around, and a forward slip.As we were taxing back to the ramp, he extended his hand and said "congratulations pilot". It was a good flight and I actually learned some new things which was pretty cool.
Overall, it was a very relaxed day, even though I have to admit being a little tight at first but the DPE made me feel at ease right away. He gave me his career history and we talked a little about why I'm flight training and that really relaxed me, and the oral went awesome, I answered every single question accurately and completely, except for one about "what's the maximum baggage compartment weight that you can carry in a Cherokee?" I didn't know there is a limit, so I first said as much as you can carry as long as you stay under max TO weight and with the CG within limits. But he said, where could I find the answer, so I looked in the POH and it turns out that there's a 200lb max in the baggage compartment. Who knew.
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