Approaches and Stage Check Dos

Lots and lots of approaches. They use a custom approach to a radio tower for the NDB approach so I've been flying that along with ILS's into Elmendorf and Anchorage and the Big Lake VOR approach.

The Big Lake VOR approach is usually timed. This means the vacuum driven instruments that show your heading and attitude (the plane has an electric turn coordinator) are covered up. So all turns are made by making a standard rate (3 degrees per second) turn and timing it. Which means you have to do the math pretty fast in your head on how many degrees, and then how long, you have to turn. Just watching the compass won't work because it goes crazy when you're turning, so you time, turn, stop.... wait for the compass to settle down and then do it AGAIN, because it won't be perfect, and at the end it comes down to counting "one, two" in your head to get the last few degrees fixed, lol. I like timing the approaches but it's easy to get off course and it's easy to take too long getting on course and blow past the fix if you're close to it when you start. Any deviation from the standard rate turn (like not even 1/2 a needle width) will make a huge error in a big turn, so you have to really have the bank angle nailed. Hard to do in turbulence.

The ILS approaches can be tough because the localizer (horizontal guidance) is twice as sensitive as a VOR, so you have to really stay on top of it. It's almost like landing a taildragger - if you can tell it's starting to drift it may be too late :-) The ILS gives you vertical guidance also, and I've found staying on the glide slope has been pretty easy, really.

The NDB approach to the radio tower isn't all that hard, but it confuses me sometimes which way to turn to correct the course. Particularly outbound if the wind is blowing and you have to trial and error the heading correction. I do like the 'old school' aspect of it. They are phasing the NDBs out in favor of GPS approaches, which is too bad because there are a lot of them in AK and I can't afford a GPS, lol. This particular approach has an interesting hold - outbound from the NDB to a radial off the Big Lake VOR. Not hard but it's at a NDB/VOR fix and not a single navaid.

Then I had to take my 2nd stage check which went OK. I had a couple altitude issues but would have made all the approaches, if not to the checkride standards quite yet, at least without killing anyone :-)

Next we fly some cross countries and try to get my accuracy up for the check ride.

Small Aviation World

I have long been a fan of Greg Swingle's Ohio Bush Planes Videos and have watched them all so far. He has a great sense of humor and puts a lot of effort into fun flying videos. He turns out to be acquainted with my Uncle that I fly a lot with.

One of Greg's friends featured in the videos is John Graham and last summer I met my Uncle and some of his friends up on the Knik...

Then, while searching for more Greg Swingle videos, I came across one that had my 180 in it! It turns out that the 'guy' I flew up to the Knik with was THE John Graham :-) and had made a video of the trip Ohio Bush Planes meet real Alaska Bush Planes. He was a real nice guy and I'm pretty embarrassed I never put this together. Note the GIANT JG in his N-number.... duh. :-) And I don't remember landing at Eklutna either, but there's a nice shot of me on short final.

Foundation Repair Two

We're still working on repairing the broken foundation. I was going to just shore up the wall around the steps to the daylight basement, but the wall turned out to be in a lot worse shape than I thought. Taking it out will give me better access to the footer and allow us to enlarge the entry a bit anyway. It's not going to get done before winter so pretty soon I'm going to insulate and let it ride until Spring.

Here is the demo crew. Hanna didn't have too much fun. She doesn't like picking up garbage or handing out tools - she only wants to run the power tools she isn't big enough to even pick up, lol


Pulled the first bit of the wall off by impact hammering through it with my Dewalt SDS Max hammer drill. I think it hits with 8 lbs of force - works pretty good but there is a lot of dust. I used my supplied air respirator. It will drill a 5/8 hole through the wall in 15 seconds - it took 5 MINUTES with my 1/2" Milwaukee hammer drill. Which is why I went and bought almost the biggest hammer drill I could find :-)


The next wall had separated from the footer so bad that Jake and I shoved it over by hand.


I had to break it up a bit because it was too heavy to yank away.


The first piece was little too heavy but I planned on dragging it a bit. The rest I was able to drag without picking up.

Unfortunately I found the load limit, lol.


Hanna was giving me a standing ovation, :-)


It was easy to tip back up.



I've been dumping scraps in a ditch about 6 feet deep so I can build a road to access the South lot.

Holding

Today we did a VOR approach to Big Lake and some holds... (picture gets big if you click on it...)

Holding isn't "hard", but figuring out how to get into the hold (depends on which way you're coming from) can be. And you're fully engaged - you have to turn and time every minute so there's not really time to divert your attention.

One thing it took me a while to understand is when they tell you: "Hold Southwest of the VOR", they mean that the inbound course is SW of the VOR. I was confused for quite a while trying to keep the entire hold circuit on that side of the VOR (which in this case it is because I'm turning left, if I was making standard right turns it wouldn't be). Confused? Welcome to the club!



I didn't turn the GPS on until inbound on the procedure turn, so you see from the top left I was on course to the VOR and then flew the missed when about a mile from the airport. I got a little wonky flying back to the VOR... My instructor wants me to go direct to the VOR (as published) and I always want to intercept the outbound radial on the way, which is wrong but that's where we're going in the end anyway... lol. You can see where I was set up for the intercept when she said; "Where are you going?" so I turned right a bit and missed the fix. :-(

Then the holds mostly look pretty good. The last one we were looking for traffic and deciding what to do next while I wandered about, so it doesn't count, :-)

What I'm glad to see here is that I'm really not too far off - even the sloppy missed route back to the VOR is only off by 1/2 mile. So with a little more practice I should be able to stay on track.

Alaskan Off Airport Operations Guide

The FAA came through with a pretty good publication in this one. There's the usual "Duh?" sort of stuff... fly light, don't land if you can't take off, etc., but there is also some good food for thought or discussion:

• Practice at weight. I don't think a lot of us do this.... mostly because it's so much more fun to be light. But, I DO practice and I don't intentionally lighten the plane so that sort of counts, lol.

• Fly recon from 3 levels: high to plan the route in and out, medium for length, rollout, rock size and a couple low to check the surface condition.
  

• "Every recon pass should increase your comfort level", Art Warbelow. Goes without saying yes, but clearly articulated. How many times have you made another pass thinking "Man, I don't know?". Ideally, if you're not getting MORE comfortable (not just if you're getting LESS uncomfortable) you'd bail.

• You need 70% takeoff speed in the first third to clear a 50 ft obstacle. Good to know. And you'd still have time to stop. The only problem for me is that the airspeed doesn't read until 40 MPH and my Robertson equipped Spam Can will lift off at 44 (by the book).
  

• Chart for estimating runway length - good again, but all you have to remember is 70 MPH is 100ft/sec and scale from there.

• No brakes on rollout. That doesn't work for me... Good advice to be ready to cram the throttle open and to keep the stick back though.

• With a CS speed prop increase the runway length 12% per 1000 ft DA. That can really add up on a hot summer day at altitude and it's an easy rule-of-thumb I can remember.
  

I've got to thank the FAA for this one. It's worth looking at and they clearly listened to some real world experts and put some effort into it. Check it out - you'll take away some other information than I've mentioned, I'm sure.

Of course, the Fiddle Ass Association can't get everything right, so... since 3 of the 4 links in the publication for downloading this bulletin don't actually HAVE the bulletin and the fourth link is wrong... I've hosted it on my own site, flyingblogfeed.com: Off Airport Operations. If you print it out landscape, you can put it together like the booklet.

I was unaware of this site which the booklet mentions and has some very good information: Alaska Aviation Safety Foundation.

Oh, does anyone know where that strip on the cover is?