Lesson 56 - Brush Up your Crosswind

 

After my previous lesson, I wanted to continue to work on my instrument flying, and also if practical, work on my crosswind landings. At this point, every lesson should check off more and more of the requirements for my final check ride. Get those out of the way, then just polish the skills that need polishing (like landings). Then I'll be ready for my final exam, so to speak. I checked the weather when I woke up, which had the winds at 7 knots out of the west. That was perfect for working on crosswind landings. By the time left for the airport, the winds had picked up a bit. By "a bit," I mean 14 gusting to 20, and still out of the west. If I were flying solo, that would be a hard "no go" at that point. The club rules dictate a maximum crosswind of 8 knots, and I'm more than fine with that. 

I sat down with my instructor, half expecting to come to the conclusion that the winds were crap and we wouldn't fly today. Nope. Today I was flying with my secondary instructor who likes his students to really know how to handle crosswinds. The 8-knot rule is for student solo, not for students flying with instructors, and he saw this as a perfect opportunity. Gusty crosswinds, but still within the minimums for the plane itself. I couldn't come up with a reason not to have a go, because it's definitely something that makes sense to learn with an instructor sitting next to you. We figured we'd do a little navigation work under the hood and then see if ATC would let us do some touch-and-goes before calling it a day.

We got in the plane and got the latest weather, which indicated the winds had calmed down just a bit, now down to 10 knots gusting to around 17. We decided to switch things around and see if we could do touch-and-goes first since 10 gusting to 17 was preferable to 14 gusting to 20. ATC obliged, and we were soon up in the pattern setting up for crosswind landings.

I've written about this in the past. I've drilled crosswind landings in the past. Today, they kicked my butt. I was fighting the wind today. Part of it stemmed from my instructor having me fly these without setting any flaps, so my approach speeds were faster than I had done in the past. The challenge there is that instead of using the flaps to create drag to slow down, you pitch the nose of the plane up a bit higher to slow down. When you do that, you become a bigger target for the wind. The gusts were also more unpredictable than just a stable crosswind, so my adjustments were not as good as I wanted. Add to that I had a tendency on round-out to want to level the wings, which is not what you want to do in a crosswind situation. Still, I pushed through four crosswind landings, in which I did manage to set the plane down on the runway more-or-less in line with it, but definitely not on center. It was, however, a significant crosswind, so while I won't say I did good, I won't say I did horrible, either. Definitely something I will work on again (and again) as conditions allow. My fifth attempt at landing resulted in a go-around because ATC had me do a short approach which left me too high. I slipped down to the proper altitude, but I was too fast and unstable for comfort so I waved off. We then departed to the east for some instrument work.

Today, I wanted to work on dialing in and tracking VOR navigation signals. I knew I could do better than my last time up, and wanted to prove to myself that I actually did know how to do it. I was back under the hood instead of using foggles because that's what the desk had available. I much prefer foggles. The hood kept sliding down, causing me to have to crane my neck up a bit to see the instruments. But that's neither here nor there. I felt I did better today with things, but I don't think I was quite as task-saturated, either. I still need to get better at dialing in VOR and GPS information in small spurts so not to take my attention away from keeping the plane on course. That comes with familiarization with the navigation electronics on the plane, which I'm just now starting to play with. 

I tracked the VOR signal out to a small private airfield, arriving about a mile south of it, which in the grand scheme of things is pretty good. I switched to GPS navigation and followed that back to the airport. Along the way, my instructor told me to close my eyes while he put the plane in what pilots call an "unusual attitude." This is where the instructor (or examiner) takes the controls, puts the plane in a steep climb, bank, dive, or otherwise not ideal situation and says "fix it." You've got to quickly assess the attitude of your plane and the steps needed to correct it. Nose down too much, you've got to raise it. Nose up to high, you've got to lower it. Watch your airspeed. Level the wings. Work your way back to your course and altitude. I will admit this was fun, and I corrected us with relative ease. 

When the GPS showed me about 10 miles out from the airport, I called the tower, took off the hood, and flew the approach visually. By now the winds had shifted direction so they were coming more or less out of the north. Yay! No more crosswind!!! I set us down on the runway with comparative ease to my earlier crosswind endeavors, to the point where my instructor later called that landing "pretty much perfect." Coming from him, that's high praise indeed. When he says that about my crosswind landings, I know I'll be ready for my check ride.