which aspect of flight training did you struggle with most?

korben88

korben88

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I can honestly say that I'm a fairly bright guy. I can grasp most concepts easily, especially mathematical. Comes with the job as a machinist. However, I am really having trouble wrapping my brain aroun the whole weight and balance thing.

Wondering what ya'lls main struggle was. And maybe some pointers on understanding mine.
 
The bill at the end :D

For weight and balance, just think of it as a see saw at the play ground, move the fulcrom to where you want the CG to be, and make sure you have the same amount of weight on either side. and remember, moms over weight.
 
I had so many it's hard to pinpoint. But the one I see most is difficulty internalizing the relationship of pitch and power, the change from moving around in a 2D world of streets and roads into a 3D world of air.

For yours, more detail on what your issues are would help but perhaps you are simply focusing too much on the trees and missing the forest. All weight and balance really comes down to is a seesaw with an adult at one end and a child on the other. Move the adult from the end of the seesaw toward the pivot point/fulcrum and the balance between the two changes.
 
Getting all the memory stuff stored into my brain.

The concepts which involved logic, mechanics and whatnot were easy once understood.

It's the stuff that has to be rote memorized which is a PITA, not difficult just got to take the time


As far as the W&B I think of it as a wrench on a nut (with the nut being the tale) the arm is how long or short the handle is, thus resulting in how easy or hard the nut is to loosen, or how easy or hard the plane is to control.
 
Landing the plane without floating, ballooning, bouncing, wheelbarrowing, porpoising, or side loading. I did it all and sometimes in the same landing! Didn't think I would ever learn to land the plane.

Second would be holding altitude during steep turns.
 
Nothing in the PPL really stumped me. When I got to the IR, holds really screwed me up.
 
Mainly weather and regulation on the knowledge stuff. The flying (mostly) came pretty easy. Although my current instructor still chews on me for rudder use on my flight reviews, so what do I know?

John
 
For me it was steep turns. I used to struggle like crazy with them as a student pilot and was sweating them on the checkride. At some point after I got my PPL, it just clicked.
 
Why Va went up/down in relation to changes in weight.

Took a long time until it was explained in relation to AoA that I finally got it.
 
Probably the worst thing for me was learning fine control and trimming.

You've probably seen the cartoon pictures depicting center of gravity (weight) of the aircraft, the center of lift on the wing and the downward force from the horizontal stabilizer. You've read or been taught that the CofG has to remain in a particular area for all the forces to balance out. In a nutshell for little aircraft, W&B is just checking the location of the CofG relative to some arbitrary point. All the aircraft structure weight is already calculated for you so all you have to add is bodies, bags, and fuel. You aren't really moving anything, just calculating a distance. That's it.
 
korben88 said:
I can honestly say that I'm a fairly bright guy. I can grasp most concepts easily, especially mathematical. Comes with the job as a machinist. However, I am really having trouble wrapping my brain aroun the whole weight and balance thing.

Wondering what ya'lls main struggle was. And maybe some pointers on understanding mine.
Click to expand...

W&B is the same thing as Ohm's Law: E=IxR, but M=WxA instead. If you can do math, there ya go.

IIRC, I once taught a machinist who explained to me his "visual" on airplane control was from a point in space following the airplane, not from inside the cockpit. Worked great for him! Me? Not so much.

dtuuri
 
My struggle was that my initial instructor was scared of stalls and turbulence and it limited my training. My next instructor fixed that by taking me up into the mountains for stalls and slow flight on nasty blustery days.

Any pilot should download the Aviation Weight and Balance Calculator app. Load a template from the database or build your own. Play with loading and look at the envelope. It's the best app I have next to Garmin Pilot.
 
korben88 said:
I can honestly say that I'm a fairly bright guy. I can grasp most concepts easily, especially mathematical. Comes with the job as a machinist. However, I am really having trouble wrapping my brain aroun the whole weight and balance thing.

Wondering what ya'lls main struggle was. And maybe some pointers on understanding mine.
Click to expand...

The flare... the last 10 feet of landing. I solo'd at 17 hours because of it. But I had my ticket at 44 hrs..
 
For me, it was crosswind landings. I wanted to crab the plane in and straighten at the last minute, but my CFI wanted me to learn the forward slip and do it that way. Had a difficult time, usually not turning into the wind while slipping. Also, had trouble with understanding what to say and what to expect back from class B communications, and who to call at different points (clearance vs. ground control, approach vs. tower, etc.)
 
korben88 said:
I can honestly say that I'm a fairly bright guy. I can grasp most concepts easily, especially mathematical. Comes with the job as a machinist. However, I am really having trouble wrapping my brain around the whole weight and balance thing. .
Click to expand...

What in particular is causing you trouble here? There is more than one way to get this done, and one might work better for you than what you have been been using so far.
 
The knowledge part it was weather. It's so damn boring that I could not learn it for my life. I'm not talking about reading METARs and TAFs. I'm talking about fronts, cloud types, fog types, etc. Luckily, my DPE didn't get into any kind of depth with any of those things.

Flightwise... the landings as most other students. The flare was either too high (usually) and a thump, or not enough or too late and a small bounce.

Why do you ask? Are you training or looking to start? After the fact, I can say that it's really not that bad. Now, almost a month after my checkride, I wonder why it took me so long because it's really not that hard. It's easy to say that now once it all clicked, but when I was struggling, it seemed like it would never come together. I think most of all had moments where we considered if this is worth it or if we should just give up. I know I did.

If you are struggling with something, I promise you that it will one day just click, but stay with it. Don't get discouraged and don't give up. Practice makes perfect (or at least better). Good luck.
 
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For me, intercepting a VOR radial under the hood. Probably need more hood practice, too much of my brain needed to keep the airplane flying straight and not enough left over to work the procedure.

And probably because my instructor was results driven, so she kept jumping to the end rather than working out the process.
 
Speaking of VORs, I also had problems triangulating my position off two stations when there was only one VOR installed in the airplane.
 
dtuuri said:
W&B is the same thing as Ohm's Law: E=IxR, but M=WxA instead. If you can do math, there ya go.

IIRC, I once taught a machinist who explained to me his "visual" on airplane control was from a point in space following the airplane, not from inside the cockpit. Worked great for him! Me? Not so much.

dtuuri
Click to expand...

No offense, but that's a terrible analogy. Resistors add inversely when in parallel.

Specifically for a machinist, I'd point to torques. "Moment" really IS a torque (well, divided by the acceleration due to gravity, which we hope is a constant). Machinists understand torques reasonably well. And it's even measured in inch lbs. Well, a LOT of inch lbs.
 
Get the Angle of Attack thing down. After that, the rest is just muscle memory and memorizing junk.
 
For me at about 10 hours it was crosswind landings. Took until about 16 hours for it to click and the cross-control to make sense. Never bent anything learning, but I gave the runway edge lights a few good scares.
 
Everskyward said:
Speaking of VORs, I also had problems triangulating my position off two stations when there was only one VOR installed in the airplane.
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They installed a VOR in the plane? What did you learn in, a C-130? At least you always knew you were at the VOR...

:D
 
Regs. The damned FARs.

Everything about planning, flying the airplane, and navigation was challenging but I got it with due practice.

But the regs, then as now, are a byzantine bunch of bull**** -- as evidenced by the umpteen thousand reg fights on this board over the (you'd think) simplest of topics.

I figured out what I needed to know, don't get me wrong. But the OP asked what I struggled with most and the regs were the hardest (not least because I find that legalese language to be head-splittingly boring).

I've known a few student pilots over the years and I found that the unserious ones do fine with flying the airplane (the fun part) but quit once they have to take a written test.
 
My favorite parts of flight training were the radio and steep turns. I still enjoy pilot-speak. And doing steep turns. :D
 
Landing without side loading the airplane... aka getting my feet working.
 
Hovering. Learned on an aircraft that required both hands and feet was a pain. Get to my advanced aircraft that pretty much can hover itself.

I guess that's the way of aircraft evolution in all types. You first fly something that takes hand & eye coordination to move on to something later down the road that takes finger coordination.:D
 
The problem with weight and balance is a lot of instructors dont know, or dont like to do them. There are two steps. Understanding the manual and do.ing the math. For the math you make a chart. Then you need a calculator to do the multiplication and addition. Do 10 of them. Do ALL the weight and balance problems in the test database. It REALLY helps to have a test database with ability to separate the problems all of one kind. Its just multiplication and division. Where you measure from is arbitrary. Usually its the firewall. Its best if its well ahead of any possible balance point.
 
I think a basic understanding of reference datum, arm and moment goes a long ways to understanding W&B. After that, it's just plugging in the numbers on a chart and doing simple math. Either old school with paper and calculator or a computer program. Takes me about 30 secs to do a W&B on the computer.
 
MAKG1 said:
No offense, but that's a terrible analogy. Resistors add inversely when in parallel.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I wouldn't expect a software engineer to get it. :tongue: Not enough information to occupy the mind.

dtuuri
 
Velocity173 said:
I think a basic understanding of reference datum, arm and moment goes a long ways to understanding W&B. After that, it's just plugging in the numbers on a chart and doing simple math. Either old school with paper and calculator or a computer program. Takes me about 30 secs to do a W&B on the computer.
Click to expand...


Agree with this. Seeing a diagram of the airplane with the stations and datum sketched out might help too. We don't know what or how the OP has been taught.
 
It's been about 40 years, but one thing I remember getting chastised for was under-controlling the aircraft.

I so wanted to be smooth and professional that I would not take aggressive enough action to correct airspeed or altitude or whatever.

I think that affected the way I fly now - making quick corrections even if it sacrifices a bit of smoothness - and what I promoted in students.

IOW, if you can't be accurate AND smooth, go for accurate and the smoothness will come with time. Vice versa seems harder to accomplish.

Back on point, W&B seemed pretty straightforward, though I think (know) I'd struggle now with some of the Commercial questions involving how much weight to move from one station to another to move the MAC x% and that sort of thing.
 
korben88 said:
I am really having trouble wrapping my brain aroun the whole weight and balance thing.

Wondering what ya'lls main struggle was. And maybe some pointers on understanding mine.
Click to expand...

Getting low enough on a buzz job over the nudist colony to hide my N-number;)

I hated ADF questions ....
 
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