02Dec00

     Monday I learned that two BIs in one day isn't fun. My first one was at 0700 and I had a guy who seemed really nice. He was old and fat and laughed a lot. The problem with him though was that he didn't grade well and asked for the wrong things. He would get procedures mixed up with techniques and said I didn't know my procedures. He also asked me about unsafe gear position indications and told me i was wrong and said the procedure for an unsafe gear door indication. I showed him in the NATOPS book, but he just went right next to my EP and showed me the one he just stated which wasn't what he asked and wasn't even on the discuss items list. Whatever. As I was flying around in the sim doing my thing, he would correct me the moment I got a little off and wouldn't give me time to correct it on my own. This was my BI-4 which was the end of block and I wasn't too happy that I had gotten this guy at the end of the block. I just kept telling myself that this is pass/fail so I wouldn't get pissed off. In this flight we did the S-1 Vertical thingy which is just going up and down twice at the same rate. No biggie. The other thing we had to do was the Penetration which is pretty fun. Things start happening fast and you have to keep track of 3-4 things at the same time and react when they occur with a descent rate of 4000 FPM.  They never tell you what these procedures are for and so no one knows why we are doing this. Ask your instructor how it all ties in so that you can see that this actually has a real life purpose. All the altitudes, headings, climbs and descents are actually all variables in real life even though we use the same numbers all the time in BIs. I felt good about the flight but during the debrief he pointed out the smallest imperfections and it just went in one ear and out the other. He was being way too picky. He gave me my grades which were actually worse than when I was sick and I didn't even bother saying anything. I thought it was hilarious how I didn't say an instrument gas and oxygen report on the last event and got a 2 on in-flight checks. I missed ONE! Usually that's a 4 with a 5 for getting them all. Anyway, I studied a little for the next ride and met my next instructor. He was pretty cool and let me correct any small deviations without saying anything like they are supposed to. I let the other flight get to me and I felt this flight actually went a lot worse. I just wasn't concentrating. In this sim I had to perform an approach pattern which is basically a shallow and slow penetration. They are both to get you set up for an approach when intercepting the IAF (initial approach fix) which is a VOR or a TACAN station (or VORTAC). I also had to do a BAC (basic approach configuration) which is just putting your gear down and going over the landing checklist. Having experienced the horrible grading by the previous instructor, I thought I was going to get below MIF grades on this one since it was worse. This guy however said I flew great and gave me a bunch of 4s. Now I was back up to how I had started on the first two flights. I realize why this is just pass/fail....each instructor grades so differently that there is no standard.
     Tuesday I had my 6th BI sim and I got really lucky on this one. I had looked on the schedule the day before and saw that I was on for 2020. A friend of mine called me to go practice at 1600 and I took my helmet bag which I never bring to practice. I didn't know why I was bringing it. We got to the building and my friend wanted to go check the schedule for the next day so we went and looked and I saw that I was on for 0820 the next morning and started wondering why they were breaking the 12 hour crew rest rule. My friend happened to look at the current schedule and saw that another one of our friends had his name crossed out with my name to replace his. The time for that event was 1620. It was now 1610! They had changed the schedule and I was there only 10 minutes prior to the event. I couldn't believe it. I was coming to get 2 hours of practice and now I only had 10 minutes to read over the procedures. I hadn't even looked at the partial panel procedures for that day. I quickly looked over everything and was so happy that I had brought my helmet bag (we need our helmet gloves and kneeboard). I met my instructor who was a retired USAF pilot, and explained my story. He was very understanding and was happy that I had made it also. We went over some of the procedures and went into the sim. I missed a step on two of the procedures which I had never done before as I was still in shock that I was doing this for real rather than practice. This instructor was very understanding though and just corrected me calmly. We had to do partial panel flight which was not bad at all and he showed me how unusual attitude partial panel was going to look like the next day. It wasn't too bad either. When we finished he said I did great and just pointed out the two steps I missed but said not to worry about it. My grades were about the same as last time.
     On Wednesday morning, the light was on. I got in there and did everything almost flawlessly. The only problem was that I got off my heading in the S-1 by about 10 degrees. Other than that it was good. The only new thing was the partial panel unusual attitudes which I had been shown the day before. We only have to get a 1 to pass so you can just sit there stare and drool and you still pass it. I don't know if I've mentioned it before, but a 1 means you saw it, a 2 means you couldn't do it, a 3 means its done fairly as in you made some errors and took a while to fix it, a 4 means you made some errors but you fixed them quickly before they made a real difference and a 5 means you did perfectly. Its funny to see a 2 as the MIF (grade needed to pass) for some events. It means that to pass you have to at least be UNable to do it.
     Thursday I had my first BI flight which was a nightmare at the beginning. It was a hot seat flight which means the two students brief together, one waits while the other flies, and when its time the for other student to go, the plane parks in front of the line shack with the prop feathered and the students exchange places. Well it was my turn to go second and it was going to be a night flight. I ran out there and when I got in, I couldn't find my straps. The other guy had gotten out and just thrown it all around. The night time wasn't helping anything with the vision. After I finally got strapped in, the IP (who wasn't my onwing) started talking to me really fast and rushing me which started getting me nervous and pissing me off. I hate being rushed. I hadn't flown in 2 weeks and he wasn't helping. After we took off and got away from the base, he told me he was going to give me the controls and I got my hands in position. He had to make a couple of fast corrections and the stick hit my hand and he thought I had taken the controls. BIG mistake.  The plane started going down and he asked me what I was doing. I told him I didn't have the controls  because we never had the 3-way "You have the controls, I have the controls, You have the controls" There have been pretty bad accidents because each pilot thought the other was flying. Luckily the plane wasn't trimmed so we were able to notice quickly. I was just relieved it was his fault. I didn't feel like messing up this early in the flight. We climbed into area two and stayed below 8500 feet. We usually go into the MOA above 10,000 feet but he didn't want to. I was frustrated that my power settings that worked so well in the sim didn't work in the plane at all. I constantly needed lower power settings for everything. It wasn't until after the flight when I could actually think that I realized it was because we were 6000 feet lower than normal. Another thing that was messing me up was him making me do half standard rate turns at 120 knots instead of 150 knots like we are supposed to. I couldn't stay with the clock on that one, but he wasn't even paying attention anyway. At least the trim worked well. Its so much easier than the trimulators. We only did the turns and climbs using the clocks, the approach pattern the S-1 and the GCA. That's all. I don't understand what the rush was before. He told me after we were done if I waned to practice anything. I asked him if he thought I should and he said no, I did fine. So I told him to head home. The cool part of the flight was him showing me and explaining how to come home on instruments and do a TACAN approach. Its pretty different than any approach I had ever done before in cessnas. I'll be studying it next year when I get into radio instruments. After we got back and shut down, the IP came out and told me I had done fine and gave me two 3s and the rest 4s. He said I had consistently drifted off course by 10 degrees. I thought I had done much worse so I was really happy after that. 
     Friday I had my second BI flight which was another hot seat but I got to go first this time which is much much better. You get it over with, you have more of the day, and you don't have to sit around waiting for the other guy to come back. This flight was during the day and I had to put the hood on in the back seat. This time we went up to the MOA so I had to use my O2 mask also. I still haven't gotten used to the mask and it still seems hard to breathe. At some points during the flight I found myself almost hyperventilating just because I wasn't used to it. I had to consciously make myself pause before each breath sometimes. It would be perfect it I could stick it on emergency so it forces air in. Anyway, I had a different IP again and he made me do EVERYTHING in this flight. It was like 2 hours long. This time the light was on. I did everything almost perfectly except for my headings. The rudder trim in the plane wouldn't be centered when the ball was centered and I couldn't find the actual center for some reason. So I once again had a drift problem. It was only bad on my approach pattern where I drifted 20 degrees after the initial turn because of the power reduction. There I too busy thinking about what i was supposed to be doing next. The other area I messed up in was the partial panel. He wanted me to turn 180 degrees without attitude gyro or the heading indicator. We can't use the mag compass throughout the turn because of its problems so we time our turns. On partial panel if you are turning more than 30 degrees you do a 1/2 standard rate turn for 2/3 * the degrees. So for 180 degrees it was going to be 120 seconds or two minutes. It actually came out well, but I had gained about 250 feet in altitude which isn't a big deal on partial panel. The problem started when he wanted me to get back down. As I was trying to make the plane go down I concentrated so much on the stupid VSI I missed the bank on the turn needle and wound up getting myself into the next maneuver we were going to practice: the partial panel unusual attitude. He told me later that I had managed to get myself into 60 degrees of bank. I'm sure he was laughing.  I recovered nicely after a little while but I had managed to turn right back around to 270 which was 180 degrees from where I was supposed to be. But for some reason I was at the exact altitude he had wanted me at. Go figure. We then had finished up and it was time to go home. To get home I had to do a penetration maneuver which is the 4000 foot per minute descent with turns and timing and all that in between. By this time my O2 mask was hurting to much I thought I was about to start bleeding. I was happy to be getting below 10,000 feet so I could switch to the boom mike. The penetration went pretty well and then he took over, I removed the hood and mask and just sat back and watched him fly home. Its nice to be able to sit back and look around I haven't been able to do that before since I was trying to learn everything. It was a great feeling. Especially watching the whole pattern from the backseat. After the flight we stopped by the line shack and he debriefed me while in the plane. I ended up with 3 3s 35s and the rest 4s. He said it was excellent overall so I felt pretty good. Now I just have my BI checkride on Monday and I'm back to FAM flights until I solo. If I fly everyday, I will solo around the 18th. I really would like to get the solo over with before Christmas. After my solo I'll ask my onwing  to take some pictures with my digital camera while in the air and I'll post them here. I hope to get some cool pictures during the form flights. But that's all next year. 
     Here is a good post I copied from the forum I link to on this site. Its for those who say they want a fighter or nothing.