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6 - Up, down and around
24th Apr.
Last week's lesson was cancelled because of the weather, but I took the Air Law exam instead, and passed it with 92%. Yay!!
As always the lesson is divided into two parts, with a touch-and-go at Wellesbourne in the middle. Alistair gave me a cheat sheet for the RT conversations we would be having, starting with Enstone Radio for the initial radio checks and take off, then changing to Wellesbourne Information, requesting an overhead join, doing the circuit for the touch and go, then changing back to Enstone and landing.
Once more I had the opportunity to do the take off - first time in the Katana. I have to admit I was a bit wary to start off with, because I'm still not all that good at taxying using differential brakes, but by starting over at the right-hand side of the runway I managed to get into the air before arriving at the left side of the runway. Still not enough right rudder, but I guess that will come with time. Also Alistair had to prompt me to get to full powe quicker. Again, something I need to get used to. On the out leg we revised climbs and descents that we'd started on the aborted climbout,, and added climbing turns and descending turns to the mix. Alistair would give me altitude and heading and I'd have to get us there, straight and level and nicely trimmed.
At Wellesbourne I got to do quite a bit more of the circuit, from the overhead join, descent dead-side, turn onto crosswind straight across the numbers, then turn downwind and turn onto base. Then Alistair took over for the T&G, and gave control back to me at about 100 feet AGL, so I had to get the plane in trim, sort out the flaps and climb us out.
On the way back we did some Vne dives and max rate descents; not so much dropping out of the sky as vacating it expeditiously, and great fun! The G- forces were a bit uncomfortable on entry and exit, but only for a few seconds. Alistair showed the roll-entry into the dive (just like in the old war movies) and it was hard not to start yelling "Daka Daka Daka Daka..."! You still got the +ve G coming out of the dive, but there was no -ve G going in.
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