Tim's Flying Adventures

Thursday, February 9, 2012

2012-02-14T15:40:00.000-08:00

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Aircraft: N4971W

Flight: UAO-MMV-UAO, 1 landing, 1.4 hrs day, 0.8 hrs simulated instrument, 0.3 actual instrument

This was my third flight for G1000 training. Today and the remaining 2 flights would focus on IFR flying. Since my plane had undergone maintenance following the pre-purchase inspection that included an update of the G1000 software, the autopilot had not been functioning. After carefully reading the autopilot user manual, I decided to carefully monitor the startup process to determine if any faults were being shown. What I found was that all steps of the preflight test completed properly, but the autopilot still would not allow me to set the barometric pressure. Following the flight I communicated this information to the technician that had performed the G1000 update. He later told me that he had performed the update without the latest documentation. Now he claims it is fixed. We’ll see when I fly the plane next.

For this flight, we planned to fly to the Newberg VOR and perform some air work before performing an instrument approach into the McMinnville airport followed by an instrument approach into the Aurora airport. The clouds were at about 1000 ft AGL at both Aurora and McMinnville. As a result, I filed an IFR flight plan.

We took off using runway 35, and shortly after turning to the west, we climbed into the clouds. During our climb towards the Newberg VOR, I put on the view limiting hood. At this point, my instructor, Jon, attempted to obtain a block of IFR space south of the Newberg VOR in order to perform air work. Unfortunately, ATC was too busy to accommodate us; instead, they told us to hold south of the Newberg VOR on the 180° radial with left turns and stay within 10 nm of the VOR. Jon asked me what kind of entry I planned, and I informed him that I would perform a parallel entry. This meant that I would turn left to 180° after passing over the VOR and when I turned back toward the VOR, I would turn left 210° in order to intercept the 180° radial.

After passing over the VOR, I turned left to 180°, and once established on the course, I set the CDI for our inbound course of 360°. Jon tried to get me to set it to 180°, but I correctly explained that for a holding pattern, we would need to fly a heading outbound and track a course tied to the CDI inbound. He agreed that I was right. We made 2 or 3 circuits of the holding pattern before Jon requested setup for an approach into the McMinnville airport. They offered vectors, and we accepted.

Jon tried to talk me through the programming of the GPS for the approach. I let him offer his advice, but I already knew how to program the GPS for the approach. After several heading and altitude adjustments as directed by ATC, I was given a final heading for intercepting the ILS for runway 22. I flew both the course and glideslope with good precision. We started the approach on top of the clouds, and Jon let me raise the view limiting hood I had been wearing since shortly after takeoff. We soon entered the clouds, and I immediately brought my focus to the instruments and blocked any attempt to look at the clouds. While we were in the approach, Jon handled the radio calls. When we were allowed to change to the McMinnville CTAF, he began communicating with another plane that was performing touch-and-go landings just under the clouds. We exited the clouds at around 1000 ft AGL, and as we got close to the decision altitude, I looked up to find us lined up nicely with the runway and in a good position to land.

I executed the missed approach procedure, and we checked in with ATC to get vectors for the RNAV 17 approach into the Aurora airport. This approach went as smoothly as the one into McMinnville. When ATC gave us permission to change to the Aurora CTAF, we had the airport in sight and were able to cancel IFR. I was a bit high and tried to accelerate the descent by first lowering the flaps. On the ground, Jon advised that it is better to reduce power to 1500 rpm first and slow down before starting to add flaps. This way you can maintain your ideal 3° descent that keeps you on the RNAV glideslope. I completed the approach for an OK landing.

Following our debriefing session, we agreed to 2 more IFR flights to complete the G1000 training.

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

2012-02-14T15:38:00.000-08:00

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Aircraft: N4971W

Flight: UAO-MMV-UAO, 4 landings, 1.6 hrs day, 0.5 hrs simulated instrument

This was the second flight of my G1000 training. Today we practiced landings, emergency procedures, and started some instrument work. To kick things off, I successfully updated the GPS with the latest navigation database from Jeppesen. I then programmed the GPS for flight to the McMinnville airport via the Newberg VOR. The plan was to use radio navigation to the VOR and GPS navigation to McMinnville. After programming the GPS, I performed a check on the navigation radios, tuning both into the frequency for the Newberg VOR and determining the direct course shown by the instruments. The variance between the 2 readings needs to be no greater than 4°. Fortunately, there was no variance. Thus, we were legal to go.

After completing the run-up checks, I set the navigation mode to VOR1 and verified that I was receiving the signal from the Newberg VOR by listening to the Morse code identification. With the G1000, I could also observe that the system had automatically received and identified the VOR transmission, displaying UBG next to the frequency. I then took the runway and headed towards the VOR. I quickly had the plane turned west and aligned with the desired course to the VOR. Once on course my instructor, Jon, took the controls to allow me to put on the view limiting device for simulated IFR operation.

When I was less than 0.5 nm from the VOR, the GPS directed me to turn to a new course that would take me to the McMinnville airport. I switch the horizontal situation indicator used to track our course from VOR1 to GPS mode. During the flight over to the airport, Jon told me to descend to various altitudes as he tried to get me setup to landing. As we approached the airport, I listened to the weather and determined that runway 04 would be the preferred runway with the wind generally out of the north. I had also heard other planes taking off and landing on runway 04. As we approached the airport, though, I heard another plane announce plans for landing. The voice was that of an elderly woman with a high screechy pitch. She sounded old school and was obviously not interested in a crosswind landing. She was opting for landing on the much shorter crosswind runway. She claimed to be over the airport, but Jon could not see her. At this point, he let me raise the hood to look out. We were too high and close to the airport for a normal approach. So, I opted to turn 360° to buy time for descent. He tried to get position information from the other plane who said she was over the museum. At that point we spotted her. She wasn’t over the museum but was approaching the museum and was no factor for us.

I completed the turn and descended to a normal landing pattern altitude in time to turn onto the 45° for landing on runway 04. I completed an OK landing but still didn’t flare enough for Jon’s liking. I did, though, do a nice job of handling the crosswind and landing straight on the center line. I completed a stop-and-go landing because we wanted to make sure the old lady didn’t try to taxi or takeoff in front of us. When she appeared to be no factor, I applied power and took off, announcing that I was going to stay in the pattern and perform another landing. This time Jon took the controls to show me how to land. Well he may have performed a slightly better landing than me, but not that much better. He stopped the plane and turned the controls over to me, and I took off.

This time I headed over to the practice field west of the Aurora airport. I put the hood back on and performed a number of turns, climbs, and descents as Jon directed me to perform various heading and altitude changes, maintaining specific airspeeds and climb/descent rates. He determined that the airplane would perform a 100 kt, 500 fpm, no flap descent with a power setting of 2000 rpm, would remain level at 100 kts with 10° flaps with a power setting of 2300 kts, and would remain level at 100 kts with no flaps with a power setting of 2250 kts. I would commit this to memory for future approaches.

We then headed back to Aurora to perform a couple more landings. One was just fine but on the last landing, I ballooned a bit as I flared but recovered nicely by adding a bit of power and then allowing the plane to slowly sink. This resulted in a greased landing, the best of the day. So, ended flight number 2 of the G1000 training.

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

2012-02-03T14:49:00.001-08:00

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Aircraft: N4971W

Flight: UAO-4S9-UAO, 3 landings, 1.1 hours day

This was my first flight as owner of N4971W and the second session of my G1000 training. My CFI, Jon, is new to Aurora Aviation but has significant experience with the G1000 system. We started the training the previous week with a ground session that included using a ground power unit to allow us to get our hands on the actual G1000 hardware. Today, though, we took to the air.

Jon followed me on the preflight walk-around, and much to my surprise, he had a number of valuable suggestions for improving the inspection process. He advised that as an owner, I should pay particular attention to the walk-around and notice any changes in order to address issues early. With the walk-around completed, we climbed in the plane and started the engine. Before I started the G1000 system, I inserted an SD card I had prepared at home with the Jeppesen updates for the navigation database. Unfortunately, the update did not work with the G1000 system reporting that it couldn’t read the card. Following the flight I investigated the G1000/SD card issue further on the Internet and discovered that the particular G1000 system in my airplane is unable to read SDHC cards. Because it is hard to buy the older low capacity SD cards, I obtained a couple of older SD cards from my brother who doesn’t appear to throw any old technology away.

After abandoning efforts to update the navigation database, I prepared for the planned VFR flight. I listened to the weather broadcast and determined that we would takeoff using runway 17. I programmed the GPS with a flight plan for a direct flight to the Portland Mulino airport. I then taxied up the narrow inside taxiway to a spot away from the ramp to complete the run-up tests. Everything checked out fine, and I proceeded to taxi to runway 17. In my confusion over the new G1000 system and other comments/suggestions I was receiving from Jon, I announced my departure over the CTAF indicating that I was taking off on runway 35, which is the runway in use most of the time since it is the calm runway. Jon caught the mistake, and I retransmitted my takeoff call with the correct information.

We took off and at 1000 ft MSL, I turned to the west towards the Mulino airport. Our plan for this flight was to focus on VFR operations. Jon guided me to keep my eyes outside the plane as much as possible during the takeoff and climb portion of flight. Once we were close to the Mulino airport, I announced over the CTAF that I would be performing maneuvers in an area southwest of the airport at 2000 ft MSL. I performed a couple of steep turns, again focusing on keeping my eyes out of the plane. I then setup for landing at the Mulino airport by turning onto the 45° for the right pattern for landing on runway 14.

While I was setting up for landing, Jon adjusted the G1000 system so that the primary flight display (PFD) and multifunction display (MFD) were not visible to me. I would have to use the limited set of backup steam gauges (airspeed indication, attitude indicator, altimeter) for the landing. I would not have available the tachometer for establishing precise power settings. Instead, I would have to rely on my ears for judging the engine rpm. I was surprised that I was close in terms of judging the correct rpm but typically higher than what I was targeting. One reason for this is that this airplane has extra sound proofing than the Skyhawk I had been renting.

My first pattern was OK, but while I managed to get the plane centered on the runway, I experienced a bit of a bounce on landing because I flared too high. We came to a stop and taxied to the start of runway 14. We took off and stayed in the pattern to attempt another landing. This one was much better with a smooth landing, but Jon advised that I basically made a 3-point landing and didn’t properly set the plane down on the rear tires first. I advised him that I never felt I was provided good instruction on landings and asked him to help me improve this area. We taxied back to runway 14 and took off again. This time we headed back to the Aurora airport where I performed a good landing, setting the plane down on the rear tires first with the plane in the center of the runway. We taxied back to the Aurora Aviation ramp, and concluded the flight.

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

2011-12-14T16:47:00.000-08:00

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Aircraft: N4971W

Flight: UAO-PWT-UAO, 3 landings, 3 hrs night

After several days waiting for the seller’s broker, Doug, to communicate the status of a written sales agreement for the purchase of my first plane, he finally came through with the agreement. In the early afternoon, he called Bruce and told him that he would be delivering the plane to Aurora Aviation for the final inspection. The plan was for Bruce and me to fly him back Bremerton, WA in the plane and use that flight as my test flight. Normally, a test flight for a plane purchase is a short flight in the local area. This would be a 3 hour round-trip.

At 2:40pm, Doug called Bruce and informed him that he was performing the preflight inspection of the plane before departing for Aurora. By our estimates he would arrive a little after 4pm. This would allow us to depart in sunlight with a return trip at night. I arrived at the Aurora airport at 3:50pm. We checked the online flight tracker and discovered that he actually departed 45 minutes later than he said. Thus, we didn’t start out for Bremerton until around 5pm. This was going to be exciting. Not only was I flying my new airplane for the first time, I was using a G1000 glass panel for the first time. In addition, I had not flown at night since the 2 flights I took as part of my private pilot training in the summer of 2007.

Doug and Bruce had experience with glass panels, but both were rusty on the details of the G1000. We managed, though, to work our way through the details. Doug walked me through the startup process. Bruce sat in the back and went through the airplane’s maintenance logbook on the flight up. Fortunately, the plane looked clean from the logs. The plane started easily. After getting the weather, I taxied to the run-up area for runway 35. We carefully went through the run-up tests, and Doug programmed the GPS flight plan. At least I thought he had. As it turned out, it was incomplete, and I would fix it after we were up in the air.

I took the runway and found that the airspeed digital readout was an easy adjustment. We hit 55 kts, and I slowly pulled back on the yoke. It was very dark outside. So, I treated this like an IFR flight, making sure I kept a close eye on the instruments. It was a good introduction to the G1000 system. It was a bit overwhelming at first, but I quickly adapted. The only difficult time I had with the takeoff was finding the skip/slid indicator. I finally remembered where it was located from my review of the G1000 manual and adjusted the pressure on the right pedal to keep the ball centered. Doug operated the radio on the flight up and Bruce on the flight back. This allowed me to concentrate on flying the plane. Doug contacted Portland Approach and requested VFR flight following. I entered the squawk code they provided.

The flight plan as entered by Doug had us heading to Bremerton directly. Upon hearing that, Bruce suggested that we fly over the center of PDX in order to avoid mixing with landing traffic. Doug suggested I use the “Direct-to” command to get us on the direction to PDX. I did that while he tried to adjust the flight plan. He managed to finally get the flight plan set up as KUAO-PDX-BTG-KPWT. I continued hand flying during the climb and keeping the plane on course. After we reached our cruising altitude of 8500 ft, I activated the autopilot. I would let the autopilot fly the plane until we were well into our approach into Bremerton.

As we approached the Olympia area, Doug noticed that the GPS was showing that there was a temporary flight restriction (TFR) in place along our path. Apparently, 2 helicopters collided and crashed yesterday. The TFR was in place to support the search-and-rescue operation. We decided that it would be best to avoid the TFR area by adjusting our flight plan to fly first to the Olympia VOR and then direct to Bremerton. Instead of having Doug adjust the flight plan, I took the initiative to make the change.

When we reached Olympia, I started our descent. When we reached 2500 ft, I disengaged the autopilot and hand flew the rest of the approach. Since I was unfamiliar with the Bremerton airport and hadn’t landed in the dark in a long time, Doug talked me through the approach. There was another plane that took off from the Bremerton airport during our approach, and the pilot would not acknowledge our radio calls. To ensure we didn’t get too close to them, Doug told me to stop the approach and make a 360° turn to provide spacing. Once I was turned around, we entered the 45° for landing on runway 19. I flew a standard left pattern and brought the plane in for a good landing.

We taxied to Doug’s offices, and I shut down the plane. While Doug collected his stuff from the plane, Bruce and I used the facilities so we would be in good shape for the return flight. We quickly said our goodbyes to Doug, closed the door, started the engine, and taxied to the run-up area for runway 19. I completed the run-up tests and also programmed the flight plan into the GPS. I then took the runway, and we were off on the return flight.

Bruce contacted Seattle Approach and obtained VFR flight following for us while I hand flew the plane to our planned cruise altitude of 7500 ft. At 7500 ft, I engaged the autopilot and made use of it until we were well into our approach into Aurora. As we were passing by Seattle, we noticed that the lights were all getting fuzzy. We quickly realized that we were entering clouds. Bruce told me to turn on the pitot heat, and we decided to switch from VFR to IFR. Bruce contacted Seattle Approach and obtained our clearance. They told us to descend to 7000 ft. I programmed the autopilot accordingly, and we were soon cruising on the IFR flight plan. They provided a quick series of waypoints and airway directions for us to fly. Bruce adjusted the flight plan and asked me to dig out the IFR paper chart to verify we had things programmed as directly. We did, and now were set for the return flight. Our return flight path was KPWT-OLY-BTG-PDX-KUAO.

As we approached the Battleground VOR (BTG), Portland Approach directed us to descend to 5000 ft. They then asked what approach we wanted to make. Because the skies had cleared, Bruce told them that we wanted to cancel IFR. They cleared us to do that and told us to maintained 3500 ft over PDX. We had great views of PDX and the lights of downtown Portland.

After we were well clear of PDX, I started a 500 fpm descent. When we had the Aurora airport in sight, I adjusted our heading to setup for the 45° entry to the left pattern for runway 35. I also disengaged the autopilot and hand flew the remainder of the approach. We agreed that I would perform a stop-and-go landing and make an additional takeoff and landing in order to complete 3 night landings on this flight. This would make me current for carrying passengers at night. The requirement is to complete 3 landings to a full stop at night within 90 days of carrying passengers. My first landing was smooth as silk. The next landing was fine but not quite as smooth. After the last landing I taxied toward the Aurora offices, and Bruce took the controls in order to taxi the plane to one his hangars. I shut down the engine and started gathering my stuff while Bruce opened the doors to the hanger. Bruce obtained the tow par from the back of the plane, and we hand pushed the plane into the hangar. The flight was over, but I was still flying high. I was now very close to owning my own plane.

Thursday, December 8, 2011

2011-12-08T16:49:00.000-08:00

Thursday, December 8, 2011

Aircraft: N172JV

Flight: UAO-AST-UAO, 2 landings, 2.1 hrs day

It had been nearly 2 months since my last flight and with multiple days of fog, I didn’t think I would be able to fly today. Much to my surprise, though, the skies opened up early from Aurora to the north and west. The fog remained in place to the south. With skies clear to the north, I decided to fly to Chehalis. After completing the preflight and starting the engine, I started creating the flight plan in the GPS. I hadn’t flown the C172 since last September. So, it took me a minute to remember how to setup the flight plan in the GPS. I finally extracted the needed knowledge from deep within my brain and had the flight plan in place.

I completed the run-up checks and took to runway 35. I was soon in the air and climbing to my initial altitude of 4500 ft. I would later climb to 6500 ft. Once I had the plane level and on course to Chehalis, I engaged the autopilot and started taking pictures. All the peaks were in view, but you could see a haze over the valley from just south of Aurora and extending to the north. From just south of Aurora and as far as you could see to the south, the rest of the valley was under low cloud cover.

As I approached the Columbia River and had Kelso in view, I noticed that there was a layer of clouds to the north. I quickly tuned into the weather transmission for Chehalis and discovered that their clear skies had given way to an overcast ceiling at 2000 ft. I decided to change my flight plan and seeing clear skies to the west, I tuned in the Astoria weather transmission which was reporting clear skies. I programmed the GPS for a direct path to Astoria and turned as directed. The flight would take me down the Columbia River to the Pacific Ocean.

With winds from 040°, I decided to use runway 31 for landing. When I was 10 minutes out, I started my descent. When I had the airport in sight, I turned to the southwest in order to get into position for a straight-in landing to runway 31. On the radio, I could hear a lot of traffic taking off and landing behind me at the Scappoose airport, but there was only a single Coast Guard helicopter landing at Astoria. It was on the ground before I turned to line up with runway 31. I completed my approach and made a satisfactory landing. After raising the flaps, I applied throttle and was soon airborne again.

I climbed over US 101 and out over the bay, passing overhead of a cargo ship entering the bay. I climbed to around 3000 ft and turned around to head south. This provided lots of picture taking opportunities even though I was hand flying the plane. I could have used a third hand, but I managed any way. I continued south climbing to 7500 ft and turned direct to the Newberg VOR when I was just north of Cannon Beach.

The air was amazingly smooth over the coastal mountains on the return trip. When I was 10 minutes out from the Newberg VOR, I started my descent. The remainder of the approach was by the book. After the VOR, I made a few degree turn to the left and was on the 45° entry for the left pattern for runway 35. I followed one other plane that was just a few miles in front of me. The remainder of the approach was by the book concluding with a good landing and a conclusion to another successful flight.

Wedesday, October 12, 2011

2011-10-17T13:14:00.000-07:00

Wednesday,October 12, 2011

Aircraft:N425JV

Flight:UAO-CVO-S30-UAO, 3 landings, 1.6 hr day

Summer is gone and winter flying isaround the corner. It’s time to startdodging the storms and waiting for the fog to lift. I selected the date for today’s flight basedon the 10 day forecast on www.accuweather.com. As typical for the winter months, my 11am targeteddeparture would prove to be too early to allow the weather to clear. I had decided up front that I wanted to takea leisurely VFR flight today, and thus I was prepared to wait for the weatherto clear. With no other renters waiting to take the plane up today, time was onmy side.

When I checked the weather at 8am, clearskies were reported over the Aurora airport, but by 9am low clouds had movedinto the area and the ceiling was no higher than 800 ft. I waited until the 10am weather update wherethe ceiling was still low before I called to delay my flight until 1:30pm. Fortunately by 1pm, the clouds were breakingup, and the Salem forecast confirmed the trend. I also discovered that Corvallis wasreporting clear skies. I was ready to gofor it with a planned takeoff around 2pm with destinations of Corvallis andLebanon before returning to Aurora.

The plane was ready and fueled when Iarrived. I quickly but carefullycompleted the preflight checks and started the plane. I programmed the GPS for the flight toCorvallis via the Newberg VOR. Thisroute would keep me clear of the Salem Class D airspace which was important asI expected I would need to fly at or below 2500 ft in order to avoid the Salemairspace limits which are from the ground up to 2700 ft.

I took off via runway 35 and headednorth on runway heading until reaching 1000 ft where I turned west towards tothe VOR. I leveled off at 2000 ft inorder to remain 500 ft below the clouds. The clouds appeared to be lower as I approached the VOR. So, I turned toward the south in order tointercept the direct line path between the Newberg VOR and the Corvallisairport. Thanks to the GPS I could viewmy progress intercepting the desired route. I ultimately descended to about 1500 ft in order to stay well below theclouds. When I intercepted the desiredcourse, I turned south onto the course and programmed the GPS for the directpath to the Corvallis airport. While Iwas already on this course, I wanted the GPS to understand that my nextdestination was the Corvallis airport so that it would provide me with accuratedistance information.

After I passed Salem, the clouds startedlifting, and I was able to climb up to 2000 ft. Prior to my climb, though, I was able to watch the GPS warning me of thelow terrain I was approaching. There isa small ridge on the south end of Salem that extends to the west. I could have flown around the ridge, but Iwas able to judge that I had plenty of clearance staying on the direct course Ihad established. After the ridge, I hadthe city of Corvallis in sight as well as the airport that lies south of thecity. I proceeded on the direct coursefor a few more minutes and copied the weather. The wind was calm. Thus, runway17, the calm wind runway, was the one I would use. I was hearing over the Corvallis CTAF thatthere was another plane on approach from the south that planned to use runway35, but I judged that he would be on the ground long before I was ready toland.

I turned to the southeast in order toget positioned properly to enter the traffic pattern on the 45° for the leftpattern to runway 17. As I wasapproaching the point to turn, I heard the landing plane confirm he was down whileanother plane announced his takeoff from runway 17 with a plan to headnorth. I quickly called my position andintentions over the CTAF in order to make sure the plane taking off would belooking for me. The other plane took offand made its turn north while I turned onto the 45°. By this time, I had the other plane in sightand confirmed he would not be an issue for my landing. I made a normal approach and one of thebetter landings I have made at Corvallis. It was a touch-and-go landing. So, I was quickly back up in the air and turning east to head for theLebanon airport.

It takes less than 10 minutes to get toLebanon, and you spend most of your time heading out of your way to setup forthe 45° entry to the left pattern for landing on runway 34. Landing at Lebanon is a little tricky becausethere is a pretty good sized hill to the southwest of the airport right at theend of the downwind leg. With theintimidating hill in front of you, there is a tendency to remain at a higherthan normal altitude when turning onto the base leg. I used 25° of flaps for the landing and cutback power more than normal to lose the extra altitude, bringing the plane infor a good landing on this short and narrow runway. Due to the length of the runway, I made thisa full stop landing rather than a touch-and-go. I taxied back to the start of runway 34 and lined up for takeoff. I decided to use a short field takeofftechnique. I set the flaps to 25° andheld firm on the brakes while I applied full power. I released the brakes and started moving downthe runway. I lifted off at 65 ktsrather than the normal 70 kts. When Iwas well established in a climb, I raised the gear and flaps. I turned 10° left of runway heading to abideby the noise abatement protocol and after passing by the town, I turned directto the Aurora airport.

I climbed to 2500 ft for the flight upto Aurora. My path would keep me east ofthe Salem airspace. When I was about 10miles south of the Aurora airport, I turned to the northwest towards theNewberg Hills to setup for the 45° entry for left traffic to runway 35. As I approached the Hills, I heard a Skyhawkannounce that he was turning onto the 45°. I would be following him and because the Piper Arrow I was flying is abit faster than the Skyhawk I delayed my turn to head for the 45° entry pointjust a bit. I turned onto the 45° aboutthe same time the Skyhawk turned onto the downwind leg. He ended up flying an unusually wide pattern,and as a result, I guessed it must be a student from the Willamette Aviationflight school. In my training, we weretaught to fly a tight pattern, but I always noticed that the other schoolalways flew wide patterns. My guess wasconfirmed after they landed and announced they would be taxiing to WillametteAviation. I stayed clear of the otherplane and made a good landing, ending my nice leisurely flight over theWillamette Valley.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

2011-09-27T15:24:00.000-07:00

Tuesday,September 27, 2011

Aircraft:N425JV

Flight:UAO-SLE-UAO, 3 instrument approaches, 1 landing, 1.2 hr day, 0.2 hr actualinstrument, 0.8 hr simulated instrument

I completed 3 instrument approachestoday while under the hood and thus satisfied the requirements for maintaininginstrument currency for another 6 months. Fly again with Chase, I completed 2 approaches at Salem and one to afull stop at Aurora. We had some weatherin the area and thus were able to get some time experiencing instrumentmeteorological conditions (IMC). Withthe wind out of the south, I taxied to runway 17 to complete the run-up checksand obtain my clearance. Every flight Ihave taken to Salem in the past has always started out by heading towards theNewberg VOR. Today they wanted me tohead direct to the Salem airport and from there I was told to expect vectorsfor the first approach.

With my clearance in hand, I waited foranother plane to takeoff before contacting Portland Approach for myrelease. Soon I was in the air andheaded due south towards Salem. Afterconfiguring the plane for the climb, I turned over the controls to Chase andput on the view limiting hood. I took thecontrols back and checked in with Portland Departure who quickly turned me overto Seattle Center. I continued direct toSalem and leveled off at 4000 ft.

When I was over the Salem airport, I wasissued the initial vector to set me up for the first approach, which would bethe Localizer Back Course 13 approach. This approach went smoothly. Istayed well ahead of the airplane, getting the navigation and communicationradios set well before needed, hitting altitudes step downs with precision, andstaying on course. The only minormistake I made was to not start a timer when passing over the final approachfix. This is only needed in the rareevent that I lose the GPS and the distance information it provides. I flew the plane down to the minimum altitudeof 600 ft and held that for the brief time until passing over the missedapproach point. There I applied power,raised the gear, and established the plane in a climb.

Before I had a chance to report themissed approach to Salem Tower, they passed me over to Seattle Center whoquickly gave me an initial vector that turned me east of the runway course inorder to clear space for other planes making approaches and landings. After establishing the plane in a climb, I programmedthe GPS for the next approach, the ILS 31. At least I thought I had successfully programmed the GPS. When I looked down at the GPS, it was insuspend mode, which is used for holding patterns and also where the GPSsequences when you pass the missed approach point. Chase quickly determined that the GPS hadsomehow decided we had already missed the next approach. He reprogrammed the GPS, and we were back inbusiness.

I leveled off at 4000 ft as directed byATC. I checked all the settings of thenavigation and communication radios as well as the CDI to ensure we wereconfigured for the next approach. ATCdirected me to report back when I had the updated weather information forSalem, which I completed promptly. I wasprovided a series of vectors and finally given my final turn to establishcourse with the localizer. At this pointwe entered the clouds. I got a bit aggressivein making the final turn, and Chase calmly reminded me to only use standardrate turns. I corrected, and we weresoon lined up perfectly with the localizer. I descended to 2100 ft where I held altitude until we intercepted theglideslope. When the CDI showed theglideslope was in the middle of the scale, I lowered the gear and started a 500fpm descent. I kept the course andglideslope nicely near their center points for the remainder of theapproach. When I reached the decisionaltitude of 414 ft (actually I used 420 ft because it is easier to read on thealtimeter), I started a climb, raised the gear, and announced the missedapproach to Salem Tower who immediately turned me back to Seattle Center.

I climbed to 4000 ft and leveledoff. As we approached the holding pointfor the missed approach, we were told to turn direct to the DUBMY waypoint, whichis an initial approach fix (IAF) for the RNAV 35 approach at Aurora.

I programmed the GPS for the RNAV 35approach, selecting DUBMY as the IAF and turned as directed. ATC told me to report passing over DUBMY,which I did in just a few minutes. I wasnow cleared for the approach and to change to the Aurora CTAF. Because there were still clouds between usand the airport, we did not cancel IFR at this point. I held course fine and hit the altitude stepdowns as required. Shortly after passingthe CIGRU waypoint, which is the final approach fix, we were below the cloudswith the runway in sight, at least according to Chase. I was still under the hood. He contacted ATC and cancelled IFR. I descended to the minimum descent altitudeof 700 ft for the circle-to-land maneuver and held that altitude until Chasetold me to look up and complete the landing.

At this point, we were headed north, butthe wind was out of the south at 7 knots. This meant that we needed to land to the south on runway 17. I turned slightly to the east keeping theplane above 700 ft and below 800 ft as I turned onto a tight downwindpath. When I was in position to turnbase, I added 10° of flaps and turned base. I was on base just briefly before I turned final and set the flaps to 25°. I brought the plane around to the runwaycenter line and slowed to 75 kts, maintaining a steady descent. I held this until the flare point and thenslowly pulled back on the control while simultaneously pulling back on thepower to bring the plane in for a smooth landing. I taxied back to the Aurora Aviation parking andshut down the plane. I was satisfied tohave completed 3 good approaches and a smooth landing.

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

2011-09-20T16:11:00.000-07:00

Tuesday,September 20, 2011

Aircraft:N425JV

Flight:UAO-MMV-UAO, 3 instrument approaches, 1 hold, 1 landing, 1.3 hr day, 1 hrsimulated instrument

The target for today’s flight was towork on renewing my instrument currency which is set to expire at the end ofthe month. I scheduled a CFII, Chase, toserve as my safety pilot. Chase and theplane were ready upon my arrival. Todaywas a beautiful day with clear skies in all directions. Because of the good weather, we chose to notfile an IFR flight plan and to also make 2 approaches at the McMinnvilleairport and one to a landing at the Aurora airport. Specifically, I would fly the ILS 22 approachat McMinnville to the missed approach point and then establish us in a holdingpattern at the LUSEY waypoint. After onecircuit of the holding pattern, I would proceed to the initial approach fix,COGOK, for the VOR DME-B approach at McMinnville. I would execute this approach to the missedapproach point and then head to the initial approach fix, DUBMY, for the RNAV35 approach into Aurora.

I quickly completed the preflight checksand found the plane down a quart of oil and also past the 50 hour oil change by1 hour. Chase was aware of the 50 houroil change and said it was OK to continue with the flight. The plane was apparently scheduled for theoil change later in the week. Hecontacted the ground crew on the radio to get them to add oil and was told thatthey couldn’t help us immediately but told him it was OK for him to add oilhimself. So, with my help (I held thedip stick), Chase added the oil, and we were on our way.

After I started the engine, I programmedour flight plan in the GPS and activated the ILS 22 approach intoMcMinnville. This included establishingthe CDI for the course to the initial approach fix OZIER. I also set up the navigation andcommunication radios for the approach. Ithen taxied to runway 35 and completed the run-up checks.

I let one plane pass in front of me andtake-off before I took the runway and started our flight. After I established us in a turn towards theOZIER fix, Chase took the controls in order to allow me to put on the view limitinghood. I took back the controls and soonhad us on course to OZIER with a 90 knot climb to our initial altitude of 2900ft. While in the climb, I copied theweather for McMinnville and made a slight adjustment to the altimeter to alignwith the barometric reading at McMinnville. I verified that that we were dialed into the ILS by listening to theMorse Code identification transmission.

Shortly after leveling off at 2900 ftand completing configuration of the plane for cruise, I found us quicklyapproaching OZIER and needing to make a left turn to our final course of 218°. As we completed the turn, I started a descentto 2500 ft where we would remain until the next waypoint, UNECE. At UNECE, I descended to 1900 ft where Iwould remain until capturing the glideslope, which occurred just before Ireached the final approach fix LIYEV. Atthis point I decreased power to 15” of Hg and established a 500 fpmdescent. Chase reminded me to lower mygear. I also forgot to start the timer,which wasn’t a big problem since the GPS gave me all the distance information Ineeded. The timer is only a backup inthe case that glideslope is lost as well as the GPS. On the approach, I held track with good precisionbut seemed to always be below the glideslope. I eventually got the plane on the glideslope at the end and was in goodposition to land when I reached the decision altitude of 361 ft and startedexecuting the missed approach procedure. Throughout the flight, Chase made all radio calls but left me with theresponsibility to configure the correct frequencies into the radio. This was a big aid. It allowed me to concentrate on flying.

I executed the missed approach procedurewith good precision. Normally, one wouldlevel off at 3000 ft for the holding pattern, but since we planned to executethe VOR DME-B approach after the hold with a required initial altitude of 4000ft, we decided to climb to 4000 ft for the hold. After I reached the LUSEY hold fix, I starteda turn to the outbound course of the hold while still climbing. Part way through the turn I reached 4000 ftand leveled off, setting the plane for cruise with a power setting of 18” of Hgfor a slower speed in the holding pattern.

After one circuit of the hold, Iprogrammed the VOR DME-B approach into the GPS and turned the plane towards theCOGOK initial approach fix. After weplodded along at a slow pace because I had left the plane configured for theslow speed from the holding pattern, Chase suggested we might try a higherpower setting. I pushed the throttleforward to 22” of Hg, and the GPS showed us that we would now be arriving muchsooner at COGOK.

I completed the brief for the approachand prepared for the turn at COGOK that would establish us on an arc that is 23nm from the Newberg VOR. We made theturn and followed the arc to the next waypoint OBDAE. At OBDAE, we turned onto our final course of014° and set the CDI to the navigation radio that was tuned into the NewbergVOR. I started an 800 fpm descent to 2400ft at the final approach fix BERNI. Atthis point, I lowered the gear and started a descent to 1260 ft to the HIXURwaypoint. We reached HIXUR just above1260 ft and continued the descent down to our final minimum descent altitude of840 ft where we stayed until the missed approach point that nearly coincidedwith reaching the minimum altitude. Theinstruments showed that I remained on course through the approach, and Chasetold me after the flight that I was in good position to land upon reaching themissed approach point.

I executed the missed approach procedureand after establishing our course to the hold fix COGOK, I setup the GPS forthe final approach into Aurora. Iclimbed to 3600 ft and established a direct course to the initial approachpoint DUBMY. Well before DUBMY I leveledoff and configured for cruise. At DUBMY,I executed the procedure turn that would allow us to get established on thefinal course for our approach. At DUBMYI turned onto a course of 169° where I would remain for about 45 seconds. I then turned right to a course of 349° usinga steeper than normal turn to ensure we didn’t fly through the final course.

Once we were established on our finalcourse, I waited until we reached DUBMY and then started our first descent downto 2500 ft. At the next waypoint, HITAK,I descended down to 1700 ft where we would remain until reaching the RNAVglideslope at the final approach fix CIGRU. At CIGRU, I lowered the gear. Imaintained good precision on course and better tracking of the glideslope thanthe ILS approach I made earlier. When Ireached the decision altitude of 500 ft, Chase told me I could look up. I was perfectly aligned with the runway buthigh. I added 25° of flaps in 2increments and pulled power to idle. Wemade our way down to the runway, where I executed a descent landing.

Back in the office, Chase provided someconstructive feedback and presented an overall positive view of myapproaches. With 3 approaches and 1holding pattern completed, I said goodbye until next Tuesday when I would flyagain with Chase in order to complete the final 3 approaches required tomaintain IFR currency.

Friday, September 2, 2011

2011-09-04T17:25:00.001-07:00

Friday, September 2, 2011

Aircraft: N425JV

Flight: UAO-RBG-UAO, 2 landings, 2.5 hrs day

I considered multiple options for this flight including to the coast (either Astoria or Newport), up the Gorge and around Mt. Hood, and north to Kelso and Chehalis. When I checked the weather in the morning there were clouds in the way to each of those destinations, but much to my surprise it was clear skies from Salem on to the south. I immediately thought of a new destination, Roseburg, for this VFR cross country. Lou and I got in the car, picked up Sue, and headed to the Aurora airport.

I completed signing the dispatch paperwork and headed to the plane. I parked the girls outside by the tail of the plane while I went inside to get my stuff organized and start the preflight. One of the line crew approached and asked if I needed fuel. I wasn’t sure but a quick sight check indicated fueling was in order. While the line crew member fueled I checked the oil so that I could get him to add a quart if necessary, which it was. While the line crew member completed his work, I performed the preflight checks that didn’t involve the fuel and oil. After he left, I completed the rest of the checks and got everyone loaded in the plane.

With only one door on the passenger side of the plane, loading is a complicated affair. I entered first and had Lou who would sit in the back on the left side enter next. I got her organized in her seat with seatbelt attached and headset connected and then asked Sue to enter. We got her belted and headset connected, and then I asked her to close the door. I reached over her and secured the 2 latches and explained to both of my passengers how to open the door in the event of an emergency. Finally, I adjusted my seat and fastened my seatbelt. I grabbed the checklist and started preparing for engine start. In a few quick minutes, I had the engine started, GPS programmed for the direct flight to Roseburg, and local weather copied down. My mic seemed to be cutting in-and-out, but if I talked loud enough it worked. Later I discovered that I just needed to be more careful on the positioning to clear up the problem.

We taxied to the run-up area for runway 35, and I completed the run-up checks. I then taxied to the hold short line and waited for 2 planes to land before we took off. Once I reached 1000 ft, I turned to the west and made my last call over the Aurora CTAF. There were scattered low clouds in the area. So I leveled off at 2000 ft and turned to the south and established us on the direct course to Roseburg. I maneuvered around to find a whole through the clouds which wasn’t too hard, and we were soon able to continue our climb and make our way above the clouds. We were approaching 4000 ft as we neared Salem airspace, which is well above the 2800 ft ceiling for that class D airspace.

We climbed to 5500 ft where I engaged the autopilot and sat back and relaxed for the remainder of the flight down to Roseburg. By Salem the sky was clear with no clouds in sight. We had great views of the city, airport, and the mountains to the east including Mt. Hood, Mt. Jefferson, and the Three Sisters. The girls snapped lots of great pictures. I helped them see our progress by showing our position on the sectional charts. We passed over Albany and Eugene, and I pointed out Corvallis and Lebanon in the distance as we passed close to them. We had a strong tailwind on the way down with the GPS showing a groundspeed of 140 kts.

When we were 10 minutes out, I disengaged the autopilot and started our descent. I pointed out the runway in the distance. The Roseburg airport sits in a valley with a ridge on the east and west sides of the runway and hills directly off the runway centerline to the north that continue to the west to meet the west ridge. When you take off, you need to move slightly to the east to shoot the gap through the hills on the climb. To land, you need to start on the west side of the ridge and setup on a blind 45° entry. This is not as hard as it sounds with the help of a GPS. I had flown into Roseburg once before. So, I had a good idea of how to make the approach, but it is still challenging and a lot of fun.

I descended to 2000 ft and turned onto the 45° entry, announcing my position over the golf course on the west side of the ridge. There were no other planes in the pattern. As I approached the ridge, I turned to the south to enter the downwind leg. I was now at the pattern altitude of 1500 ft, and I lowered the gear. On both the 45° and the initial portion of the downwind leg, the runway was not visible due to the ridge west of the runway. When we reached the south end of the runway, the ridge dropped away, and we could see the runway. I cut back power to 15” of Hg, added 10° of flaps, and slowed to 90 kts. I then turned base, setting flaps to 25°, slowed to 80 kts, and completed landing configuration (fuel pump on, full prop rpm, full lean mixture). I turned final, slowed to 75 kts, and completed a touch-and-go landing.

I established the plane in a climb, raised the gear, and as we cleared the end of the runway, I slipped to the east slightly to avoid the hills at the end of the runway. Sue got a little nervous as we climbed out because the GPS was flashing a “Terrain” warning. I ignored the warning because I could see and avoid the hills that were the cause for the warning. I was glad I wasn’t making this takeoff into instrument meteorological conditions (IMC) but had clear skies. As we continued our climb another plane, a King Air turboprop, took off behind us. We soon established that we were both headed to Aurora. We stayed in touch to by radio so that he understood my position and altitude in order for him to keep us in sight. He easily passed well over us. I explained to the girls that he would get to Aurora in about half the time it takes us. In fact after about 30 minutes we could hear him announcing that he was on final into Aurora.

On the trip north, I leveled off at 6500 ft and engaged the autopilot. We saw all the same sights but from a slightly different perspective. We now had strong head winds with a ground speed of 115 kts. After we were north of Eugene and the hills had dropped away I descended to 4500 ft but found the winds to be no better. When we were 8 minutes out, I disengaged the autopilot, started our descent and turned towards the Newberg Hills to setup for the 45° entry for landing on runway 35. As I approached the Hills, I heard N172JV, the plane in which I did most of my IFR training, announce that they were setting up to land and were approaching from the west. They had departed the McMinnville airport. I scanned the skies to the west and found them. I announced that I had them in sight and would follow behind them. The remainder of the approach was by the book. We had a little bit of a crosswind to make the landing a little more challenging. The temperature had increased significantly from our departure, and as I flared the heat off the runway helped push me up causing the plane to balloon up. I added a little power and flared a second time to bring the plane in for a little bump but a relatively good landing. My birthday flight was over and both girls were thrilled to have taken part in the ride. Now it was time to head to lunch which was my unofficial payment for the flight.

Monday, August 22, 2011

2011-08-23T15:27:00.001-07:00

Monday, August 22, 2011

Aircraft: N425JV

Flight: UAO-SPB-UAO, 2 instrument approaches, 3 landings, 1.5 hrs day, .2 hr actual instrument

I was hoping for clear skies so that I could make a long cross country to Bend. Unfortunately, after a week of sunny days, the clouds moved in as a result of a passing front. The clouds would break up later in the day, but they hung around for my flight time. I decided to forget the cross country and use the cloudy day to get in some instrument practice. I had not flown an IFR flight since June 10^th. I decided to take a familiar route and fly to Scappoose.

I quickly completed the preflight checks, started the engine, setup the flight plan in the GPS, and taxied to complete the run-up checks. With everything in order, I obtained my clearance and was immediately dispatched for takeoff. After I was stabilized in a climb and on course for the Newberg VOR, I engaged the autopilot and checked in with Portland Departure. At this point, I entered the clouds but would remain there briefly as the layer was not very thick and I was soon on top. I clarified my approach requests and was given a vector to take once I passed the VOR. I leveled off at 4000 ft before the VOR but was later told to climb to 5000 ft where I would remain until I started my descent into Scappoose. The remainder of the flight up to Scappoose was uneventful.

After I was well past the Scappoose airport, I was told to descend to 3500 ft. At this point, ATC advised me when I should expect to break through the clouds for landing. I realized at this point that they forgot that my intention was to perform a low approach and not land. I clarified my intentions and got us back on the same page. I was given a couple of vectors to turn me onto a path for intercepting the localizer and was cleared to change the radio to the CTAF and cleared to land after given the last vector. I did a reasonably good job of keeping the plane on course and hit the step down altitudes, but I was challenged because there was local air traffic flying under the clouds and setting up for landing while I was making my low approach. While monitoring my course and altitude changes, I had to make frequent radio calls about my position having to do the math to figure out my distance from the runway from the approach chart that only gave distances between the waypoints. It is simple addition, but when you are bouncing around and trying to keep the plane precisely positioned horizontally and vertically, it is amazingly difficult to perform simple addition.

I was successful in completing the approach and hitting the missed approach point where I started a climb and once stabilized turned towards the Battleground VOR. I engaged the autopilot and checked in with Portland Approach. I noticed the plane was established in a steeper than normal climb angle and the airspeed was falling. I quickly adjusted the autopilot to reduce the climb rate and quickly saw the airspeed increase and accent angle decrease to a more reasonable 5°.

ATC started giving vectors and advised that they would be turning me direct to the MOKIY waypoint, which is the initial approach fix (IAF) for the RNAV 17 approach I was planning to use for my approach into the Aurora airport. After I was turned towards MOKIY, I was turned over to a different controller handling another sector. This controller thought I was making the LOC 17 approach, but I quickly figured that out and clarified that I wanted to make the RNAV 17 approach.

The remainder of the approach went smoothly. I was cleared to land and change to the Aurora CTAF while still in the clouds. Once I was well below the cloud layer and could clearly see the airport, I contacted Portland Approach and cancelled IFR. I completed the landing but was not satisfied with it. Once I cleared the runway, I taxied back to the start of the runway and after waiting for another plane to land, I took off to practice landings. I was pleased with the results of the 2 circuits I made in the traffic pattern where I made 2 more landings both of which were much better.

Friday, July 29, 2011

2011-08-01T14:08:00.001-07:00

Friday, July 29, 2011

Aircraft: N425JV

Flight: UAO-ONP-UAO, 2 landings, 1.8 hr day

Family friend Greg Zinn went with me on this cross country to Newport. I wanted to take Greg to the coast and was originally planning to fly to Astoria and then follow the coast south to Cannon Beach, but the weather would not permit a VFR flight. Before giving up on the coast, though, I checked the weather forecast for Newport and much to my surprise found it to be clear. So, Newport was the plan.

I met Greg at the Fred Meyer parking lot in Tualatin and drove him to the Aurora airport. I completed the dispatch paperwork, and we proceeded to the plane to conduct the preflight checks. I took my time in performing the checks as it had been 10 weeks since I had flown the Piper Arrow. With the checks completed, I jumped in the plane and organized my stuff before inviting Greg inside. It was hot outside, and I knew that as soon as he got inside I would have to secure the door and it would get very hot quickly. Unfortunately, I discovered that the mic cover on my headset was gone. I looked all over the plane and couldn’t find it. Oh well, I could still fly, but my transmissions would not be as clear as if the cover was in place.

I invited Greg inside, secured the door, and provided him with a preflight briefing. I quickly started the engine, programmed the GPS, and started taxiing to the run up area. I completed the final checks and took the runway. After we reached 1000 ft MSL, I turned towards Newport. I hand flew the plane until we reached our cruise altitude of 6500 ft. I used the autopilot until it was time to descend for landing at Newport.

The weather in Newport was clear with strong, gusting winds out of the North. I completed the descent well north of the airport and flew out over the ocean in order to setup for a 45° entry to the left traffic pattern for runway 34. There was a helicopter in the pattern performing touch-and-go landings but using a non-standard right traffic pattern for landing. I announced when I was on the 45°, and at that point, the helicopter was on final. When I turned base, he was on the downwind leg of the right pattern and announced he would be number 2 for landing. It started to get a little exciting when I turned base as I could really feel the wind pushing our light plane around. As I turned final, we were getting bumped pretty hard and a downdraft was causing us to lose altitude faster than I wanted. I added power and got us back on a standard descent rate. I kept a close eye on the airspeed and descent rate and had a plan to execute a go around if the buffeting didn’t lesson as we approached the flare point. Fortunately, the plane stabilized long before flare, and I performed a quick touch-and-go. With the winds gusting, I wasn’t interested in holding a long flare to obtain a smooth landing. I wanted to get down and back up quickly.

We were back in the air climbing. I headed northwest to get us out over the ocean and give Greg a good view of the coastline. I climbed to 5500 ft and followed the coastline until we reached Lincoln City. I then turned the plane east and headed direct to the Newberg VOR. When we were on course, I engaged the autopilot and let it fly until it was time to start our descent into the Aurora airport.

The wind at Aurora was variable at around 5 kts with runway 35 in use. Once over the VOR, I headed straight to the airport, which put me on the 45° entry for the left pattern into 35. The landing at Aurora was by the book except that I ended up just a little off the center line as the variable wind ended up by a good breeze out of the northeast that pushed me off a little bit once in the flare. We taxied back, secured the plane, and I went inside to pay.

On the drive back to Fred Meyer, Greg complimented me on my landings. I welcomed the praise, but I didn’t feel worthy as they were not the greased landings I would have liked.

Friday, July 15, 2011

2011-07-15T16:45:00.000-07:00

Friday, July 15, 2011

Aircraft: N172JV

Flight: UAO-MMV-UAO, 3 landings, 1 hr day

With the conclusion of today’s flight, I completed the necessary requirements of the biannual flight review (BFR). Every 2 years private pilots are required to complete a BFR. It is not really a test, but it is intended to force all pilots to spend a minimum of 2 hours with a certificated flight instructor (CFI), reviewing rules and regulations and basic flight operations. I originally planned to use Michael, the CFI who took me through my private pilot and instrument rating training. Unfortunately, he left Aurora Aviation shortly before I was required to complete a BFR. I thus scheduled with another Aurora Aviation CFI who subsequently cancelled on me, pushing me onto a third CFI, Chase, who performed the BFR.

Originally, I was scheduled to complete the BFR on Tuesday. The first CFI reminded me that the BFR was not a test and told me not to study but instead identify any areas I wanted to review. When I showed up on Tuesday, Chase, the second CFI, had a different view of the BFR. He treated it as a test and for a little over an hour he grilled me with questions. Fortunately, I ignored the guidance of the first CFI and did a little reviewing of the rules and regulations before showing up. Thus, I had no problem handling the questions. With the ground portion completed, we made our way out doors to complete the 1 hour of air work. Unfortunately, the cloud base was too low to perform maneuvers such as stalls. As a result, we rescheduled the flying portion to Friday.

Friday was a good choice as the sky was mostly clear with a few puffy clouds hanging about at 4000 ft or higher. We immediately proceeded to the plane, and Chase followed me as I performed the preflight checks, asking me questions the entire time. I answered most of these satisfactorily, and with the checks completed, it was time to climb in the plane and take to the air.

Following takeoff, we headed southwest to the practice area. The first maneuver was a steep turn. That is a turn at 45°. It is a challenging maneuver and requires significant back pressure and throttle management with close attention to airspeed and altitude. I lost 100 ft in performing a right turn but held altitude on the left turn. Next I performed the slow flight maneuver. I slowed the plane and put it into a landing configuration. I was told to maintain 45 kts. This is an interesting maneuver because you keep hearing the stall warning during the entire maneuver and as you get close to 45 kts you need to add power in order to hold altitude while the speed drops to 45 kts. The controls are very sluggish at this point. Initially, I let the altitude drop 100 ft but after I got us back to altitude I was able to hold speed and altitude and make the necessary turns.

Next up was stalls. First I performed a takeoff stall. With the plane in takeoff configuration, I added full throttle and started pulling back on the control until the plane started a stall. Recovering from this stall is easy. You just let the nose drop a little bit, and the stall is broken. Next was a landing stall. Once again, I configured the plane for landing. I then pulled back on the control until the plane stalled. At this point, I let the nose drop a little and applied full power. At this point I was careful to avoid letting the nose jump and cause a secondary stall. I also started raising flaps.

Once the flaps were up, Chase pulled the power and told me that I had just lost the engine. Now it was time to perform an emergency landing. I immediately worked to put the plane into a 65 kt glide and identified a farm field to use for landing. I picked an area below me and started a slow circle over the field. I then demonstrated the checks I would perform to try to get the engine running again. With a little prompting from Chase, I explained the emergency radio call I would make as well as setting the transponder to 7700. After making several turns, I started adding flaps and setup for final. At this point, Chase told me to recover and put the plane in a climb.

Now he told me to fly to McMinnville. I knew the general direction to fly and turned that way. I then used the GPS to identify a specific path to the airport. I then started looking at a cheat sheet I carry with local airport runway and radio information in order to setup the radios. Chase jumped in and showed me how to pull up that information from the GPS. With the radios setup, I listened to the weather and confirmed that we should land on runway 22. I turned the plane to setup for a 45° entry to runway 22. I completed a touch-and-go landing that was relatively smooth but turned just slightly off center as pointed out by Chase.

Following takeoff, he told me to head back to the Aurora airport. He programmed the GPS, and I turned toward the Newberg hills, knowing that that is the place to start the 45° entry for runway 35. I checked the weather, confirming that runway 35 was the proper choice. There were a bunch of planes arriving at the same time. Since most of the planes were behind me, Chase advised that I keep my speed up and maintain near full throttle. As I turned base, Chase advised that I needed to perform a touch-and-go landing because we were still below 1 hour air time. I performed an OK touch-and-go and proceeded to go around the pattern one more time.

This time I would make it a full stop. My approach was good, but I got a bit aggressive after the flare and pulled back too far on the control. I leveled off, applying a little power and tried again. This time the plane settled down for an OK landing. None of the landings were my best. It always seems to be hard to perform good landings with a CFI evaluating them in the right seat.

Regardless of the landings, the flight was completed, and Chase endorsed my log book for the biannual flight review.

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

2011-07-06T12:14:00.001-07:00

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Aircraft: N172JV

Flight: UAO-KLS-AST-UAO, 3 landings, 2.1 hr day

Brian flew with me on this flight. The skies were clear in all directions, and thus we decided to fly to the coast. To make it a little more interesting I selected a route that would take us to Kelso via the Newberg VOR and then on to Astoria, following the Columbia River to the Pacific Ocean. Just before departing for the Aurora airport, I made one last check of the weather and found that Astoria was still reporting clear skies. I grabbed my flight bag and an extra headset for Brian, and we headed for the airport.

After completing the dispatch process, we went to the plane where I quickly checked the fuel level and determined that we needed more in order to provide a safe cushion. While we waited for the fuel truck to show up, I completed the rest of the preflight checks. When fueling was completed, we jumped inside the plane and prepared for engine start. Brian was quick to get his seatbelt fastened and door secured. I helped him connect the headset and explained how to open the door and window in the event of an emergency as well as how to activate radio transmission.

I then started the engine, programmed the GPS for the flight to Kelso, copied the weather, and taxied to runway 35. Following the run up checks, we took to the runway and were on our way. Brian used my camera to capture a few pictures to document the flight. All the peaks were visible including the 3 Sisters. We had great views of downtown Portland, PDX, and the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia Rivers.

It was a warm day, and we didn’t reach our cruising altitude of 4500 ft until we were within 3 nm of the Newberg VOR. I hand flew the plane until we had passed the VOR and were established on the course to Kelso. I was then able to sit back and enjoy the scenery with Brian. I pulled out the sectional map and explained the route and how we avoided controlled airspace around the Hillsboro airport (we were above that airspace) and PDX (we were west as well as above that airspace). I also explained how I leaned the fuel mixture once we were at cruise. As is normal with the Skyhawk, the left tank empties quicker than the right tank when the fuel selector is on both. Thus, for much of the cruise flight I moved the selector to draw only from the right tank in order to maintain a balance.

When we were within 15 nm of Kelso, I turned off the autopilot, started a descent, and turned slightly to the west in order to get positioned to turn onto the 45° for runway 30 at Kelso. I reported over the CTAF when we were established on the 45° over the Columbia River. The approach was going just fine until I turned base, and we were hit with a strong gust of wind that started to force the plane into a steeper bank. I corrected and got us back on track. I fought the crosswind as we descended on the final approach and had the plane aligned with the center line. As we approached the flare height, the wind started swirling, pushing us in various directions. While we were pushed off the center line, we were well onto the pavement and pointed down the runway. We had a little bump on landing, but we were safely down. I made this a touch and go landing, and quickly started raising the flaps. When they were up, I applied power, and we were quickly airborne again.

While we were in the climb, I programmed the GPS for a direct flight to the Astoria airport. After we reach our cruising altitude of 4500 ft, I engaged the autopilot. At this point I was watching the time. We needed to get the plane back by 3pm, and I wasn’t sure if we could make it if I performed a touch-and-go landing at Astoria. I finally decided that we could just barely make it as long as I didn’t waste time on the landing.

When we were about 15 minutes out, I turned off the autopilot and started our descent. Because there were no other airplanes in the pattern, I decided that it would be safe to make the approach by going over the airport at midfield and turning onto the downwind leg for landing on runway 31. The wind was strong and gusting but mostly down the runway. It was a fun approach and landing, flying over the airport and making some quick turns to expedite the landing. It was also my best landing of the day. Once we were established in the climb out over the ocean following the touch-and-go landing, I programmed the GPS for the return flight to the Aurora airport via the Newberg VOR. Once the GPS was set, I turned the plane back and established a direct course to the VOR. Once we reached our cruising altitude of 5500 ft, I engaged the GPS.

I cruised at 2500 rpm and with a little help from a tailwind had a ground speed of 124 nm. When we were 6 minutes from the VOR, I turned off the autopilot and started a descent, but I kept the throttle open in order to maximize our speed. I announced our position over the CTAF once we were established on the 45° into the pattern for runway 35. After we crossed over the Willamette River another plane announced that it was behind us. I completed the approach, shortening the downwind leg in order to not delay the plane behind us. We quickly cleared the runway, and parked the plane. We grabbed our stuff and were out of the plane at 3pm. We just made it.

Thursday, June 23, 2011

2011-06-29T14:30:00.001-07:00

Thursday, June 23, 2011

Aircraft: N172JV

Flight: UAO-CVO-S30-UAO, 3 landings, 1.9 hr day

Next month I am required to complete a biannual flight review with a CFI. Prior to this flight, I decided that I wanted to complete the flight review in the Cessna Skyhawk vs. the Piper Arrow I normally fly. The Skyhawk is a simpler airplane, and thus it allows me to focus on standard flying skills and not worry about the additional tasks required for a complex airplane. Thus, I chose to take this flight in N172JV, the Skyhawk I used to complete my instrument training. My focus on this trip was to increase my familiarity with the controls and systems of this plane that are a little different from the Piper Arrow.

The weather allowed a VFR flight with the cloud ceiling 3500 ft or higher. I decided to make a short cross country trip to Corvallis with a planned touchdown at the Lebanon airport on the return flight. To avoid Salem airspace and also provide experience intercepting and tracking a navigation airway, I programmed the GPS to take a route to Corvallis via the Newberg VOR.

I completed preflight, and started the engine. It didn’t start on the first try. So, I primed the engine a second time and tried. That didn’t work either. At this point I figured I had flooded the engine. So, I pushed to full throttle and started cranking. The engine started immediately, and I quickly pushed in the mixture control to full rich and backed off the throttle to avoid high rpm. I nudged the throttle to 800 rpm and completed the rest of the startup activities.

The winds were light and variable. This normally means the calm wind runway should be used, but other pilots seemed to be using runway 17. Instead of causing problems, I went with the flow and taxied to runway 17 and took off. After takeoff I turned towards the Newberg VOR using the GPS as the guide. At this point, I realized I forgot to set the heading indicator on the ground. The Piper Arrow I normally fly has what is called a slaved horizontal situation indicator, which doesn’t normally require initialization on the ground. While not setting the heading indicator is a mistake, it wasn’t a big problem. I waited until I was flying straight and level at 2500 ft and then set the heading indicator to match the magnetic compass. It was only off by 5°.

Once I was turned south and on the airway to Corvallis, I engaged the autopilot, which I used for most of the trip to Corvallis. When I was 10 miles from the airport, I turned off the autopilot and hand flew the plane for the rest of the flight. While hand flying during the entire trip, I was satisfied with my skills in maintaining heading and altitude. I made a descent approach but flared a little late on the landing causing a little bump. It wasn’t a big deal, but not to my liking. I completed a full stop landing and taxied onto the taxiway where I stopped the plane and programmed the GPS for the short flight to the Lebanon airport.

There was another plane on the ground ready to takeoff ahead of me and another plane in the air turning onto the 45° for landing on runway 17. I was planning to takeoff on runway 17, which was the appropriate runway because the winds were calm. Much to my surprise the other plane readying for takeoff announced that it was going to use the crosswind runway, which would put it on a collision course with the plane turning onto the 45°. The latter plane announced again rather nervously that he was turning onto the 45°. The plane on the ground seemed to ignore this call and started his takeoff roll. He did announce after takeoff that he would keep separation from the plane on the 45°. It was now my turn to takeoff.

After reaching 1000 ft, I turned east and headed to the Lebanon airport. Because the winds were calm, I used runway 35. This is an interesting approach because you fly a downwind leg that has you headed straight towards a rising hill, requiring you to get fairly close before turning base and completing the approach to runway 35. My landing on this narrow and short runway was good, and I was feeling a bit better. For no particular reason, I turned left onto the narrow taxiway rather than the larger taxiway on the east side of the field. This took me close to a group of hangers with a couple open where people were working on their planes. They looked up and waved to me. One had a plane out front and to maintain safe clearance I moved to the left side of the taxiway as I passed.

To provide practice for the flight review, I performed a short field takeoff maneuver. I set the flaps to 10°, held the brakes, and applied full power before releasing the brakes to start the takeoff roll. At 50 kts, I pulled back and started climbing. After I was well established in the climb, I raised the flaps. I leveled off at 3500 ft and headed straight to the Aurora airport.

As I approached the Aurora airport, I obtained the weather. The wind was still light and variable. This meant that runway 35 should be used. Everyone seemed to be following this plan. When I was 10 miles south of the airport I turned slightly left and headed to the Newberg hills to setup for the 45° entry to the runway 35 landing pattern. While another plane was landing on runway 35, I heard a plane on the ground announce his intention to taxi to runway 17. I quickly announced my intention to make an approach to runway 35. After I announced my turn onto the 45°, the plane on the ground again stated his intention to takeoff on runway 17, which would have him heading straight for me when I was landing. Fortunately, he acknowledged that he understood my intention to use the correct runway and said he would wait for me to land before he took off. I made a standard approach, nicely holding the standard landing airspeed of 65 kts. As I was getting ready to flare, the winds quickly changed, and I noticed my airspeed drop quickly. While the stall warning didn’t sound, I quickly applied power and got the airspeed back to 65 kts. I then brought the plane back down again for a second try at the landing. I flared but rushed the landing and suffered a little bounce on the landing.

This flight was over. I was pleased with my skills tracking airwaye and maintaining heading and altitude. I was not pleased with landings. So, that will be the focus on the next flight.

Friday, June 10, 2011

2011-06-10T16:04:00.001-07:00

Friday, June 10, 2011

Aircraft: N172JV

Flight: UAO-HIO-UAO, 2 instrument approaches, 1 landing, 1.0 hr day, .4 actual instrument

The weather forecast on Thursday was for clear skies and a beautiful day. In fact, the forecast on the day of the flight called for clearing skies. That never happened. The ceiling remained low. It never got higher than 3000 ft. When I departed Aurora, the ceiling was reported to be 1800 ft. I had been looking forward to taking a VFR cross country flight into Washington with planned landings at Kelso and Chehalis. The stubborn low ceilings told me that a new plan was in order. I toyed with the idea of cancelling. It had been a month since my last flight, and I had to change planes at the last minute from the Piper Arrow I prefer to fly to the Cessna Skyhawk. If I was going to fly, I would have to make an instrument flight. It had been a very long time since I had made an instrument flight in the Skyhawk. So, I was not sure if I should go ahead with the flight. Since we were planning to go to Cannon Beach for a week starting next Tuesday and Monday’s weather was forecasted for rain, I decided I really needed to go for a flight today. I don’t like to go more than a month between flights.

I filed an IFR flight plan for a short flight to Hillsboro. My plan was to make a practice instrument approach using the ILS 12 approach and return to Aurora where I would make another approach, GPS 17, to a full stop landing. There was very little activity at the Aurora airport when I arrived. I signed the dispatch paperwork and quickly went to the plane to complete the preflight checks. Having been away as long as I had been, I was very slow and deliberate in the process.

Having completed the preflight checks, I strapped myself in the plane and started it up. With calm winds, I taxied to runway 35 and completed the run-up checks. I contacted Portland Clearance and at their request I informed them of my practice approach plans. They cleared me for immediate departure, and I was soon on my way.

Shortly after turning west towards the Newberg VOR and checking in with Portland Departure, I entered the clouds. I would stay in the clouds for nearly the entire flight up. I only had a couple of holes where I could look down to the ground, and they were brief. In my climb, ATC provided me with an initial vector for the approach. At this point, I realized that I had not set the heading indicator on the ground. I have been flying the Piper Arrow almost exclusively, and you don’t need to set the heading indicator on that plane. After leveling off at my cruising altitude, I double checked the heading indicator with the magnetic compass, and I fortunately found it to be off by only 5°. Thus, there was no big problem. I got lucky I guess.

The rest of the flight to Hillsboro was uneventful. I was soon turned onto the final path to intercept the ILS localizer. I used the autopilot on the flight up but turned it off to make the approach. I found it relatively easy to stay on course and glideslope as I hand flew the approach. At least I hadn’t forgotten how to do that. I was allowed to fly to minimums but had a little excitement as Hillsboro Tower allowed a small business jet to take off straight towards me. They climbed fast and turned quickly in order to avoid me, but it was still kind of fun watching it.

I executed the missed approach and was told to switch back to Portland Departure, and I was requested to report the cloud bases to them. Portland Departure told me to climb to 3100 ft and gave me an initial vector. I entered the clouds at 3000 ft and reported the base height to ATC. I was so focused on passing along the base height information that I forgot to level off at 3100 ft. ATC reminded me of the altitude, and I quickly descended back to 3100 ft.

The rest of the approach into Aurora went smoothly. I remained in the clouds until I was well passed the final approach fix and had been cleared to change frequency to the Aurora CTAF. When I had the airport in site, I contacted ATC and cancelled IFR. They wished me a good day, and I thanked them for the help. I switched back over to the Aurora CTAF and heard that even though the wind was calm and runway 35 is the calm wind runway, the few planes in the pattern were using runway 17. That suited me fine. I made a call over the CTAF giving my location and intention to make a straight-in landing, which I did and a smooth one at that.

I decided to call it quits at this point even though I had originally planned to make a few practice landings on this flight. I was tired from the IFR flight and decided it was best to stay safely on the ground.

Wednesday, May 11, 2011

2011-05-11T15:32:00.000-07:00

Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Aircraft: N425JV

Flight: UAO-CVO-S30-UAO, 3 landings, 1.7 hr day

A front was moving into the area, but the forecasts showed the clouds lowering to 2000 feet and lower by 2pm. I decided it would be possible to make a VFR cross country flight to Corvallis with an additional stop at Lebanon on the return trip. When I arrived at the airport, they were fueling my plane. I presented my renewed medical certificate, which is good for 2 more years, and signed the dispatch papers. I grabbed my stuff and headed to the plane.

The winds were out of the south. After programming the flight plan in the GPS, I taxied on the narrow taxiway to complete the run-up checks. I then turned onto the main taxiway, turning in behind another prop plane and before a Citation jet to await my turn for takeoff. Within a couple of minutes, I was taking the runway and turning towards the Newberg VOR. In order to avoid Salem airspace, I programmed the GPS to take a route to the VOR and then direct to the Corvallis airport.

I originally planned to cruise down at 3500 ft, but as I approached 2000 ft, I noticed I was getting close to the clouds and decided to level off. The closer I got to the VOR, the lower the clouds. I eventually had to drop down to 1500 ft. As I approached the VOR sitting on top of the Newberg Hills, the GPS started giving me a terrain warning. I didn’t need that as I could see the hills in front of me. I decided to turn away from the hills and intercept the southern course from the VOR to Corvallis. This did the trick. I stayed at 1500 ft and kept below the clouds. I monitored the GPS to ensure I intercepted the second leg of my flight plan. Once headed south on this leg, the clouds lifted a bit. I was able to fly down to Corvallis at around 2000 ft.

As I approached Corvallis, I listened to their automated weather forecast. Unfortunately, their automated system was down. I listened instead to the Salem weather and made a slight adjustment to my altimeter. I could tell the wind was from the south by looking at the difference in my ground speed and air speed. This told me that I would need to plan on runway 17. For the latter part of the trip to Corvallis, I used the autopilot in order to free my hands to take a few pictures. When I was over the northern part of the city, I turned to the southeast in order to get into position for turning back onto the 45° for landing on runway 17.

There was another plane in the area ahead of me. As I turned onto the 45° and announced my position, I could hear their faint transmission, saying they were on downwind. I started looking for them and heard no further transmissions from them. I continued my approach and turned onto the downwind leg. I turned on my landing lights in order to be more visible to other planes in the area. I kept looking for the other plane. Finally, when I turned base, I could see the other plane taking off after completing a touch-and-go landing. I turned final and tried to get the plane lined up with the runway. It was at this point that I could see I was in for a tricky cross wind landing. I banked the plane to the right in order to hold the center line and used left rudder to straighten the plane out. I came down fine but held the flare a bit too long. The result was that the wind pushed me to the left, and I landed to the left of the center line. I completed the touch-and-go landing and was soon airborne.

I turned to the east and programmed the GPS for the brief flight to Lebanon. I leveled off at 2000 ft, and when I had the airport in sight, I descended to 1300 ft, pattern altitude. I flew over midfield and turned onto the downwind leg. I faced another crosswind landing but this time did a better job of landing on the center line. Due to the relatively short runway, I chose to perform a full stop landing. I let the plane coast down to the end of the runway and turned back on the east taxiway. As I approached the north end of the airport, I noticed that the taxiway was blocked ahead with orange cones. I performed a back taxi on the runway to get into position for takeoff. I then performed a short takeoff maneuver. To do this, I set the flaps at 25°, held the brakes tight, and applied full throttle. When the engine RPMs were high, I released the brakes and rotated at 65 kts, which is 5 kts slower than a normal takeoff. I raised the gear and then lowered the flaps before turning to the east and then to the north for the return trip to Aurora.

It was a quick trip back to Aurora with the wind behind me. At one point I noticed I had a ground speed of 145 kts. When I was 7 nm south of the airport, I turned to the northeast to setup for turning onto the 45° for runway 17. I performed a greased landing, hitting the runway centerline. This was a good way to end this flight.

As I taxied back to the Aurora Aviation parking area, I noticed that there were no parking spots available that would allow me to taxi into the spot. I would need to pull in front of a spot, shut down the engine, and use a tow bar to push the plane back into place. I had done this before. So, I had no concerns. After shutting down the engine and fetching the tow bar, I discovered that there had been a modification to the nose gear that prevented the tow bar from being attached. I tried to push the plan back, but the plane wasn’t directly in line with the parking spot and thus ended up at an angle from the proper position. The clerk that always checks me in/out could see I was having some difficulty and radioed one of the ground crew to come over and help me. He used their electric tow to properly position the plane, and I went inside to pay the bill. Now the flight was over and time to head to Starbucks for my post flight reward.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

2011-04-27T15:21:00.001-07:00

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Aircraft: N425JV

Flight: UAO-SPB-UAO, 2 instrument approaches, 3 landings, 1.6 hr day

I had to study the weather data for a long time before determining that it was safe to make the flight today. I had already planned an instrument flight to Scappoose in anticipation of IMC conditions, and that plan was confirmed by a low level flight briefing. There were scattered clouds at 2500 ft and various cloud layers at 3500, 4000, and 5000 ft. The clouds didn’t bother me as much as the forecasted freezing level just under 4000 ft. I finally decided it was safe to fly since there appeared to be lots of breaks in the clouds. Thus, if I managed to pick up ice, it would be easy to fly to an area with no clouds and let the ice clear. With the IFR flight plan filed, I headed to the Aurora airport.

They were all ready for me with the plane fueled and parked out front and the dispatch paperwork ready for my signature. As I left for the plane, I passed Jim, the senior instructor, who upon hearing my flight plans confirmed that he didn’t think I would have any issues with icing.

I quickly but carefully completed the preflight checks and climbed into the cockpit. With the door secured, my kneeboard in place, and the approach charts for Scappoose and Aurora pulled and inserted below the notepad of the kneeboard, I was ready to start the engine. It took a few more cranks than normal to get the engine started. I guess it must be as cold outside as it feels. I programmed the GPS for the flight to Scappoose and copied down the Aurora weather broadcast before I taxied to the run-up area.

The winds were out of the south. So, I would be using runway 17 today. I completed the run-up tests and taxied to the hold point for entering the main taxiway. I stopped at this point to get my clearance from Portland Clearance. As per usual, it took 2 calls to get Portland Clearance to respond to me. I was cleared as filed and told to contact Portland Departure when I was ready to takeoff.

I taxied to runway 17 and with no one on approach, I contacted Portland Departure for my release. Instead of being released, I was told that I would need to hold for approximately 2 minutes. As I waited for my release, I could tell that the controller was quite busy with approaches into Hillsboro, McMinnville, and Troutdale. After about 8 minutes of waiting, I noticed that the controller was not busy with any other planes and still not releasing me. I figured that he forgot about me. So, I contacted him again and asked for my release. I was immediately released and pushed the throttles forward to taxi onto the runway.

Once airborne and turned toward the Newberg VOR, I contacted Portland Departure. The controller told me to expect vectors to Scappoose and shortly came back and told me to turn to 030° and maintain 3000 ft. I complied but after a couple of minutes, the controller told me to turn direct to the Newberg VOR. I complied but then queried him about what he wanted me to do after Newberg. He told me to climb to 4000 ft and turn to 330° at the VOR. I guessed the initial vector was to provide spacing with some other plane in the area.

I monitored the outside air temperature on the climb out and turned on the pitot heat when the temperature fell below 5°C. I left the pitot heat on for the remainder of the flight. As I climbed through 3000 ft headed for 4000 ft, I engaged the autopilot. Shortly after I passed by the Newberg VOR, I was told to climb to 5000 ft. I found the freezing level was at about 4000 ft and -1°C at 5000 ft. I kept an eye on the wings for any signs of icing. Fortunately none appeared.

I was in and out of the clouds on the flight up to Scappoose. I setup the communication and navigation radios for the approach and copied the Scappoose weather. After what seemed like a long time but probably just 20 or 25 minutes, the controller started letting me descend from 5000 to 4000 and finally to 3000 ft. I was finally turned on a course to intercept the localizer and cleared for the approach. I turned off the autopilot and hand flew the remainder of the approach.

I quickly captured the localizer and centered the plane on the final approach course where I would keep it for the rest of the flight. I also managed to hit the various step downs in altitude for this approach. Some of these require a steep descent, but I was very focused on hitting each descent precisely. While I kept the plane aligned with the final approach course and hit all the altitude step-downs, I forgot to lower the landing gear. It was a good thing I was only performing a low approach. Normally, I would lower the gear to simulate landing preparation and also slow down for the approach. Not a fatal mistake but one all the same. I bet I never do that again.

Once I passed over the end of the runway, I executed the missed approach procedure. I started a climb and sequenced the GPS to take me to the Battleground VOR. Before I had a chance to report the missed approach to ATC, they contacted me. They asked for my next request, and I responded that I wanted to execute the GPS 17 approach at Aurora to a full stop. I was cleared to Aurora via vectors and told to climb to 4000 ft. I was initially turned east and finally turned south on a course that would take me just off the west end of PDX. I completed setting up for the approach into Aurora, and with the plane on course and level at 4000 ft, I engaged the autopilot and took a few pictures of PDX, downtown Portland, and the Columbia River. After passing over PDX, I put the camera away and started focusing on the approach into Aurora.

ATC cleared me for the approach via the MOKIY waypoint. I quickly reprogrammed the GPS for the approach via MOKIY rather than via vectors and turned the plane towards MOKIY. After passing MOKIY, I turned to the final approach course and started a descent to 2500 ft where I would intercept the glideslope at the final approach fix (FAF). Before I got to the FAF, I was cleared to change to the Aurora frequency and told to cancel IFR either in the air or on the ground. I had the airport in sight. So, I cancelled immediately.

After I passed the FAF, I started my final descent into the airport. Before I could broadcast my landing intentions, I heard a couple of other planes in the pattern. They were having difficulty seeing each other and communicating their intentions. I decided that I better not add to the confusion and attempt a straight-in landing. I broke off my approach and turned to the left towards Canby. I would perform a standard left pattern landing to runway 17. In fact I performed 3 landings, 2 touch-and-go landings and 1 to a full stop. These first and last were OK landings, but the middle one was as smooth as glass.