Elite Sim Up & Running

Purchased and got it up and running. This is suppose to be THE IFR sim .. in a lot of ways it sure appears primative compared to MS sim .. anyway time will tell.

Plan of working thru 13 IFR lessons / scenarios which are included once I get my PPL ticket. Hopefully by the time AFIT shows up here I'll already have a good idea of what I need to do.

Solo: CRP / RAS / BBay / ALI / CRP

2 hrs .. tookoff about 8 AM .. Objective was to work Pilotage & VOR's .. and Maneuvers ..

Crossed CRP VOR and had buildup north and east .. had to climb to 4500' and intersect Island south of RAS .. the continued south at 4500' to BBay. Flew over our Jesuit location .. also some Exxon or HOC rigs .. then West.

Strong build-ups .. tops were climbing ( boy that happened fast ) .. too thick for Pilotage .. did lock in ALI VOR .. guided me to ALI .. dropped down under ceilings . setup for 17 .. landed .. slight Xwind ( 150 @ 10 on 17 .. 2 to 3 kts crosswind) ... got out but FBO was closed.

Smoked one .. started back up .. headed north .. picked up CRP VOR for 90 TO heading .. to a 13 heading .. came into CRP with slight Xwind ( 160 @ 10 on 13 .. what 5 kts cross) .. a little flat but very soft. .. not bad

Didn't get much done except VOR practice..

Did do some slips to lose altitude to get below ceiling into CRP .. pretty good job ..

Held alt and headings without AUTO on this trip .. it is true once trimmed the plane is pretty much hands off .. of course not much turb this early ...

Footnote: Yesterday I spent ALL day in Lee's boat touring Island land developments .. got beat up and sun burned .. it only took a few minutes to do the same thing in the plane .. Man I'd rather be flying any day!

IFR Training Scheduled w/ AFIT!

Got AFIT coming into Corpus late Sept to do all my IFR training .. get my ticket. Next two months gonna be action packed!

Gotta get PPL ticket (ckRide Fri Wk)
Gotta take IFR written
Gotta go to Bend for a week of training in the Columbia in late August ..
whew! .. I must be crazy.

Great Morning Solo!

Best day in my plane, ever!

Probably because it was my first morning solo flight, except the Hammond trip. Calm wind made the landings easy, and I did 4 good ones at CRP as a start.

Flew down the ship channel to downtown then to T43 . Did two T&G -very good, And my patterns are improving.

Flew to RAS and set up on 300, approach from the beach, a first, over some buildings, good landing, then South along the beach to Baffin Bay.

Flew over Jesuit Rig and Kings Inn, then turned north to CRP. Two downwind crosswind landings, first very ugly Because thought I had a headwind from other side.

Check ride prep with Tim

Flew over to ALI with Tim.

As we headed there we did some power off and power on stalls. Also did steep turn.

Got to Alice did first landing with Crosswind. The rest were short and soft landings and takeoffs. Did about 5 total , Tim said they were all good but seemed a little had to me.

Tim flew back and I landed back in CRP. ok.

Round Robin with Tres

First flight since I got my plane back after its unfortunant layover in Hammond. Need mojo recharge.

Met Tres at 11:00 AM on Sun morning. Left Crp to RFG (Refurio) did a couple T&G's .. landed and talked to the Glider Guys ... they have a club you can join and take free lessons.

Left RFG to Mustang ( RAS ) landed and had a burger at the Marina there. Left RAS flew south down the beach past the National Preserve .. beautiful! Navy wasnt very active yesterday.

Turned east and flew around Baffin Bay .. flew over the Jesuit drilling rig and King's Inn.

Turned north back to CRP .. did a right base into 13 .. slight X

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Things I'm doing better ..
Holding altitude and heading

Things to work on ..
Hold rudder on climbs
Flaring high .. not flying to end of runway