Today's sortie was Climb & Descend 1. Again, taxying today included throttle lever, directional control and differential braking. The instructor commented that I need to see and feel on how much input I should apply to the rudder. Still need more improvement about that.

As for take-off just now, I did not repeat the stupid mistake like yesterday. This time I had my left hand at the control stick to rotate the aircraft. After safely take-off, we flew straight to the training area to conduct the air exercise. Climb & Descend 1 was basically on what to do when entering a climb/descent, during climb/descent and exiting climb/descent. Increasing power to max when entering climb, then pull the control stick backward and then maintain the climb, then refer to instruments, refer to attitude again and then trim. That is just an example. I did a mistake during descending, which is I relied too much on the Airspeed Indicator and spent less time looking outside to maintain steady descent. 90% of time should be allocated to looking outside and the remaining 10% for instruments. Besides, today was quite hazy, so the visibility was very much reduced until I couldn't see the horizon. So the instructor decided to request to land. Approached to land this time, I did a better trimming compared to yesterday. Today also did some RT which was position reporting and establishing communication with tower.

Yesterday was fifth day of my sortie called Straight & Level 2. This time I was allowed to control the throttle lever for taxying, climbing, attaining straight&level, maintaining straight&level, and making an approach back to runway.

Before started to taxy, as always I had to perform the pre-flight check. Not much problem. But I need to improve on my speeds. No point wasting 15minutes on the ground just for that. Fast and accurate is the answer.

During taxying, I felt it was kinda tough to control the throttle lever and the rudder pedals at the same time because previously it was the instructor who controlled the throttle lever and I controlled the rudder pedals. I also had to apply differential braking sometimes when the rudder became ineffective. There were times the aircraft went too slow as I focus too much on the rudder to ensure that the aircraft was traveling along the yellow line towards the holding point. Taxying requires fast walking pace. How fast is the 'fast walking pace'? Good question. I just have to watch and feel. Sounds easy. But to do it is tough, seriously.

Yesterday I made a little blunder during take-off. My right hand was on the throttle lever, slowly increasing the power to the max. Both feet were on the rudder pedals, to make sure that the plane stays on the centerline while it accelerates faster and faster. Now, where was my left hand and how to rotate the aircraft? To rotate means to lift the aircraft into the air once the rotation speed has been achieved. My left was still on my lap and I did not realize that I had control fully of the aircraft at that point of time.

My instructor asked "You still don't want to rotate the aircraft??". And I was like stunned for few seconds and then only realised that my left hand was not doing anything! Whoops!

During climbing, another funny incident happened. We were climbing and passing through a safe altitude. Flaps up. And kept on climbing. Wind was not that strong and climbing steadily.


And suddenly, the aircraft dropped few hundred feet.


Wooohooo! That was awesome man! It was just like playing the Space Shot at Genting Highlands. My instructor and I were like free-falling for 2 seconds before we regained our altitude. That was fun! And pretty scary too! =D

Anyway, we continue cruise climbing until we reached the training area. At around 1500ft, my instructor performed once to me about how should I maintain Straight&Level after the power or airspeed was disturbed. For an example, if I increase the power from cruising speed (70%) to 90%, the aircraft's nose will start to pitch up and start climbing as more Lift would be produced. So in order to fly straight&level, I had to push the control stick forward to the datum altitude, look to an instrument called Vertical Speed Indicator (VSI) for confirmation and then trim. One common error normally made by students is that they will normally "chase" the needle of VSI. For those who dunno about this instrument, VSI's reading will lag if the aircraft changes its attitude and will need few seconds before it settles down to the correct reading. It was a little tough as one hand was on the throttle lever, one hand on the control stick, both feet at the rudder and two eyes to scan the instruments and to look outside. All working at the same time. Sounds busy, right? That was just the beginning. More yet to come!

Anyway, when flying back to the runway for approach to land, I did not to enough trimming and hence it was a little bit hard to maintain the height during landing.

Just now 8.00pm had another briefing about Medium Turn. It was just a very short briefing of 30minutes which covers topic such as entering and exiting a climbing turn and descending turn, forces acting during a turn, etc..

Hmmm, my DCAT final exam result also out already.

Radio Telephony: 100%
Principle of Flight: 97%
Engines: 84%
Electricity: 90%
Aircraft Systems:100%

My score in Engines is the lowest among my batch mates. Surprised? Not really. I have done my best and managed to obtain two 100% out of five subjects. Not a bad performance from my own point of view. Well, now that the result is out, there is nothing much to worry about other than flying and..

avoid vomitting.. =D