Flight Log-2015-04-12

Well, I now have 2 flights in this calendar year (a flight review and an IPC) and am again IFR current (though the picture below shows I am very rusty and in need of more practice).  Another 1.6, 1.5 of it under the hood, so no sightseeing today.  The weather was finally beautiful, after having the 1st 3 attempts cancelled due to weather.  Temp 16°C, winds calm to 160@04, alt. 30.16, clear.  It was a little bumpy at times at altitude which contributed to some of my difficulty hand-flying these approaches, but the later ones got better.  First ILS22@KZZV including once around the hold after parallel entry, followed by VOR4@KZZV, followed by VOR22@KZZV, and finishing up with GPS27@KVTA. 

Takeoffs & landings: 1
Approaches: 4
Time: 1.6
Total time: 226.0

Flight Log - 2015-01-05

After more than 14 months without flying, I finally got back in the air today and completed a flight review, so I am again legal to act as pilot-in-command and carry passengers.  It was pretty dang cold, temp -9°C, winds 270@10, alt 30.51, clouds clear (at start, high clouds were moving in by the end).  I need to knock some rust off, but Harold (the instructor) actually complimented me on the smoothness of 2 of my 4 landings (the other 2 were fine, too, just not as nice as the 2 he commented on).  Not bad after so much time off.  Next month I'll get an IPC (instrument proficiency check) and become instrument-current again, too.

Takeoffs & landings: 4
Time: 1.0
Total time: 224.4

Flight Log - 2013-10-04

I had every intention of a making a much longer flight, but by the time the plane was free and I got to the airport, there were showers and possible embedded thunderstorms moving in our direction, so I decided to just do the requisite 3 trips around the pattern to be current and go back for the previously planned flight another time.  Temp 28°C, winds 270@04, alt 30.05, few at 4500, overcast at 6500 when I started, lower than that when I finished, just 25 minutes later.

 

 

Takeoffs & landings: 3
Time: 0.4
Total time: 223.4

Flight Log - 2013-08-15

Got a little cross-country flying in on Thursday.  Temp 22°C, winds calm (at surface, a little bumpy at altitude), alt. 30.14, clear.  Added 2 new airports, I10 (Noble County) & 4G5 (Monroe County).  Hand flew most of the flight, the auto-pilot still seemed a little squirrelly (it couldn't hold a course at all when I last flew --in June-- with Harold).

Flight log - 2013-06-12

Finally after almost 11 months, I finally went flying again.  It was a pretty nice day, though it got rather warm toward the end.  Temp 30°C, wind calm, alt 29.92, very hazy, 1.6 on the Hobbs.  Hold at APE, followed by 3 approaches VOR-A@KVTA, GPS28@KLHQ, GPS27@KVTA, with 2 landings at KLHQ and 2 landings at KVTA. Happy to be back in the air.  Hand flew nearly all of it, the auto-pilot appears to be on the fritz.  IPC completed, so I'm legal to rent, legal to carry passengers, and legal to fly IFR.  KVTA is in the top middle with the red, yellow, and green (landings and trips around the pattern).  The hold is the purple loop at the top left.  KLHQ is at the bottom left (landing and trip around the pattern).  That little bump in the middle was when I turned on the autopilot heading back to do the GPS28@KVTA and it tried to do S-turns around the actual GPS track.  Harold is going to have the auto-pilot looked at by the maintenance people.

Yup, I'm still alive

As I commented last year, I don't tend to post here much lately, but I am still alive.  As you can see from the sidebar, I've started riding again this year (about a month earlier than last year, though I have no plans at present for a century this year), but have not flown in far too long, I hope to rectify that this week.  I still do plan to start posting more stuff here, but have had some issues with motivation that I hope to explain shortly.

Flight log 2012-07-13

Flight review complete. Temp was a very pleasant 23°F, but the wind got ugly for the final 2 landings. Winds 140@13G22. Alt. 30.19. Did the GPS28@4I3, cirle to 10, followed by 2 touch and goes, followed by VOR-A@KVTA, circle to 9, touch and go, and full stop. I used Foreflight on the iPad for the approaches, no paper plates in the cockpit.

Flight log 2012-05-18

I got checked out on the new G1000 C172 (I last flew the old one 3 or 4 years ago) today.  Next flight I'll have Harold help me get used to using the iPad with ForeFlight on the cockpit.  Temp 24°C, wind 100@07, altimeter 30.11, clear.  Just local flight, but the plane was up at Knox County (4I3) while they resurface the runway at KVTA.  1.0 on the Hobbs, beautiful day to fly.  The AMOD didn't lock on before take off, so I don't have the Google Earth track this time.

Flight Log 2011-09-23 and 50@50 update

Sorry it took so long to post this.  In Sep, I visited my 49th state, Hawaii.  We had a wonderful time.  We spent most of the week on Maui, but we went to Oahu for a day, most of which we spent at Pearl Harbor.  Our last day there, I rented a C172 and flew around Molokai, Lanai, Molokini, West Maui, etc.  Temp 26°C, wind 050@15, alt 30.09, a few clouds @ 4000.   Alas, I didn't turn the GPS on to get the flight track.

Lanai from our timeshare the first morning

Honolua Bay

Arizona Memorial

USS Missouri

2 Pearl Harbor survivors, ages 91 & 95

With BGen Jerome Hagen, USMC(ret), author of War In The Pacific series

Sunrise at Haleakala

Elephant Island (off Molokai)

Molokai

Molokini

Bay on the way to Hana (don't remember the name)

Sunset over the surfers near Ho'okipa Beach

Flight Log - 2011-08-23

I was due for some flying anyway, so I decided to get some night flying in.  It turned out to be a beautiful evening for it (though it was starting to get a little hazy by the end).  Temp 21°C, winds 190@06, alt 29.96.  I decided to fly over to KZZV where I discovered that the beacon is messed up (not flashing blue, only white), then on to KLHQ, then followed 33 for a while and tried to see the house in the dark, then finally back to KVTA for the requisite 3 take-offs and landings to full stop.  I am again legal to carry passengers at night.  Here is the track.

Why I've been quiet, etc.

As I've mentioned before, I don't write much here anymore.  What little I do write I tend to put on twitter or facebook (other than my flight logs which continue to go here).  What I haven't mentioned is that I also have another blog over at myfitnesspal.com which is strictly devoted to my exercising/weight loss efforts.  I joined the local gym on my last birthday with the intent of getting stronger/healthier (and by getting stronger boost my metabolism to dispose of some excess tonnage).  I may eventually link that here, but haven't done so yet.  On my last birthday, I was up to a higher weight than I've seen in about 2 years.  Since that time I have gotten stronger (though not at the pace I had hoped for) and lost some weight (also, not quite at the rate I had hoped for), but I'm not where I expected to be.  Part of it is due to timing and injury (the trip to Scotland was great, but did through a bit of a monkey wrench in the workout plans).  I also made plans to compete in the Columbus half-marathon in Oct, however, very shortly into beginning training for that I had the aforementioned injury (knee) that has thrown those plans into doubt (I will post on that here soon though)  That being said, I expect to consolidate some of that stuff back here (and/or double post) on this blog in coming weeks, so if there is anyone other than bots from search engines reading this, I really will be updating soon (as soon ans I feel I can take the time from my SANSFIRE talk prep).

Flight Log 2011-06-13

This flight was intended to be an almost-IPC.  Since it had been more than 60 days since I had flown, I had to go up with an instructor to get a refresher to rent at KVTA, so I figured I might as well get some better use out of it and get instrument current, too.  Plus, I got a break on my renter's insurance this year because of getting some dual instruction last year, so I figured it couldn't hurt.  However, when I did the run-up, the oil pressure gauge was pegged at the top of the gauge.  I put the squawk on the sheet and we taxied back in and switched from N785SP to N20626.  Of course, when I got that preflighted and fired up, we had radio problems.  I couldn't hear Harold through headset.  We went with the speaker and hand mike and decided we'd just do 3 times around the pattern.  On the first one, I was too low and slow on final and made one of my poorest landings in a long time.  On the second time around, Harold realized that the radio problem was that someone had flipped the ISO switch on the comm panel.  The second and third landings were much better.  I very nearly grounded both planes though.  The pilot's left brake was very soft, though Harold claimed his wasn't, so...  Anyway, I'm current to carry passengers again, but I'll try to schedule something later in the summer to get instrument current.  0.3 hours and 3 takeoffs and landings.

Flight Log 2011-03-03

Sigh... I didn't get the flight track data because I was looking at the wrong button on the side of the device.  Oh, well.  Beautiful day for flying.  A little windy, but it is March, so not really unexpected.  Not bumpy at all, which came as a surprise given the wind.  Just takeoffs and landings.  Temp -4°C, alt 30.57, wind 090@09 (windier at altitude, around 25kt), clear.

Flight Log 2010-12-23

Matt is home this week (until Christmas morning), so it seemed like a good time to go fly. When I reserved the plane, it looked like it was supposed to be clear and sunny, but that isn't what we ended up with. Temp -1°C, alt 30.35, winds 300@09, clouds few @ 2500, overcast @ 3600. Matt actually spent most of the flight on the controls (except for in the pattern). He needed to knock some significant rust off, he did lots of steep turns, S-turns across a road, etc.  Since I haven't flown over snow in a while (a year or more, obviously), I had forgotten how difficult it is to pick out Buckeye Lake when it is covered with ice and snow.  Ah, well, as the say "a bad day flying beats a good day doing just about anything else."  1.2 on the Hobbs and some good crosswind landing practice.

Flight Log 2010-11-03

Just out to APE, then the GPS 27 and around the pattern.

fun with Google Earth

Flight Log 2010-09-10

A beautiful day to go flying.  Temp: 19°C, winds variable @ 03, altimeter 30.07, clear.  It was a bit windy at altitude, but still a great day.  The purpose of today's flight was to get some instrument practice with the autopilot.  I've used the autopilot en route before, but I've never actually flown a complete approach with it, I always hand flew from the FAF.  Today, I finally flew a coupled ILS (though there was a button pushing problem with me on the first one, so only the second ILS was actually coupled).  2 x ILS22 @ KZZV followed by the GPS27 @ KVTA (circle to land on 9).  A very productive 1.6 hours.  Unfortunately, I didn't get the tracker started (and up on the glare shield) so I don't have the track on Google Earth which I hope to start doing on future flights.  I still need to work on my checklist discipline a bit.  Ah, well, a great day flying.

Flight Log 2010-07-15

Instrument practice with a safety pilot. Temp 29°C, wind 220@06, alt 30.08, hazy and hot. I was originally going to go "in the system" and do some practices into KLCK or KCMH, but when I looked at the NOTAMs, the glide slope was out of service at LCK, one of the runways was closed for a few hours at CMH, the APE VOR is still out of service (though the TACAN should be back in at the end of the month), so I decided to do the ILS22 @ ZZV including the DME arc (it has been years since I did one of those) and the full missed approach procedure including hold, then another ILS22, then the GPS27 back into VTA. By that time, I was starting to get nauseated and was very hot, so I called it a day there. It was clear that I need more practice. I hand flew everything, my scan was pretty sad, I failed to hold altitude a couple of times and heading a few more. On the approaches themselves, I didn't go full deflection, but I did over-correct a few times. Had it been actual conditions at my personal minimums, I would have gotten in, and I didn't bust anything so bad that I would have failed an IPC or checkride, but I must get more practice before I fly again in (hard) actual IMC.

Flight Log 2010-06-29, etc.

Tuesday was a very busy day, but one of the results was a successfully completed flight review. My hour of ground was actually kind of fun. Harold had a couple of quizzes for me that I did pretty well on and we reviewed some of the FAR/AIM that I haven't looked at recently. Then we went out for some air work. Temp was 22°C, altimeter 30.03, wind at the surface was reported as 070@06, but was closer to a 90° crosswind as we got going and about 100 feet up it was probably closer to 20 knots. We did the GPS27 approach and circle to land on runway 9, then actually ended up spending most of the hour on crosswind landings (which is not a bad way to spend an hour). One thing I discovered is that I'm much more comfortable landing (or taking off) with a crosswind from the right than I am with one from the left, so it was good practice with this one coming from the left. Ended up with exactly the required 1.0 on the Hobbs, so I've jumped through that hoop for the FAA and I'm good for another two years.

Tuesday was also Erin's 22nd birthday and my parents had called the previous week to say they were bringing my nephew up to visit Cincinnati, so we all went to see the Reds play at Great American Ballpark. It was a pretty good game, but not the outcome I would have preferred. Joey Votto hit a 3-run homer in the bottom of the 9th to tie the game, but then Arthur Rhodes had his first bad outing really of the season and gave up 3 runs without retiring a batter in the top of the 10th, so the Reds lost to the Phillies (I suppose my baby sister was probably happy about that). Oh, well. So, all-in-all, a mostly enjoyable day. We did the traditional birthday meal at a (new) Japanese steakhouse on Wednesday instead and that was also nice.

On Wednesday, I finally (after 6 years) got my online logbook working the way I had envisioned it from the beginning, so it now pulls from the database dynamically rather than just showing static pages that I had to manually update everytime I updated the database. Unfortunately, I haven't configured the widget at the left here to do so yet, maybe next year.

Flight Log 2010-06-10

Another beautiful evening for flying.  This time it was an opportunity to take my sister, brother-in-law, 2 nephews, and 2 nieces flying.  The first time in a private plane for all the kids.  Temp 27°C, winds 310@06, altimeter 29.98, and clear at the start, calm and 22°C by the time I got back to KVTA.  I also got night current while I was at it (although the cockpit lights in 626 suck).  So, a total of 7 take-offs and landings.  Now, I have my medical in 2 weeks and need to schedule my flight review (and if I can get some approaches in with a safety pilot or instructor, I'd like to get instrument current again, too).

Flight Log 2010-04-17

Very windy day, but I really needed to fly.  I wish I had been able to fly earlier in the week when the weather was so beautiful, but alas, it was not to be.  Not to say today was bad.  It was just chilly and really windy.  This was another of the proverbial $100 hamburger flights (and this time I really did eat a hamburger at KPHD).  I very nearly didn't go.  After the preflight, I was sitting in the cockpit listening to the ASOS and watching the wind sock.  They were reporting winds 320@20G32 and N785SP was really trying to move even with the engine off.  The wind died down a little and I decided to go ahead and go.  Winds at takeoff were 320@14G21, alt 30.02, temp 6°C, dew point -1°C, and clear.  I took off and departed the pattern to the northeast.  It was a little bumpy, so I decided to go up to 5500', but when I got there the cloud bases were at about 5600, so to have VFR cloud clearance I had to come back down some.  When I got the KPHD weather, they were reporting ceilings of 3800' (AGL, which would make it about 4700' MSL), so I decided it was time to descend to 3500'.  I called 10 miles out and another pilot was also inbound.  He saw me and said he was lower and would get in before me.  I didn't actually pick him up until he turned final to runway 32.  Anyway, I followed him in and parked over by the restaurant.  The burger was okay, but you can't beat the price.  Their Saturday special is $0.99 burgers and $0.99 fries, so that's what I had (and then a slice of pumpkin pie for dessert).  I walked over to the FBO, but there wasn't much happening there, so I got back in the plane and flew over to KTSO where I did a touch-and-go, then down to 6G5 for another touch-and-go.  My original plan had been to also fly down to I10, but looking at my watch, I decided I had done enough.  I added 3 new airports to the list.  So, back to KVTA.  Final total was 2.3 on the Hobbs.  The touch-and-go at 6G5 and the final landing at KVTA (runway 27 at both) were pretty serious crosswinds for me (340@14G25) since I hadn't practiced any in a while, but they went very well.