My Flight Journal

Sunday, August 22, 2004 3:37pm

Yeehaa, another 1.5 in today before the T-storms hit. Just putzed around the local area, looking for a big enough hole in the clouds to get some alt so I could play. Ended up just tooling around and not doing any sort of maneuvers. Nearly busted Orlando's class B but caught myself before I entered it. Came back to the airport and did T&Gs for a while.

I just can NOT get the hang of that new airplane. It just doesn't want to stop flying. I round out, bleed off a ton of speed (at 65 to start with), raise the nose ever so slightly and it friggin climbs. I never had the chance to peek at the ASI, but I'd swear it was climbing at 40kts - with full flaps and idle throttle. Bouncy, bouncy, bouncy. On one of my landings I started to porpoise and had to power out of it. It's really friggin frustrating.

On one landing I thought I'd really nailed it. Beautiful round-out, nose up ever so slightly and a very gentle sink until I felt the mains set down ever so softly. Was a thing of beauty. Carb heat back in, slap the flaps up, and the fooker dropped 3 inches onto the runway. I had been skimming along barely above the surface, so slow that I was sure I was rolling.

There was also ZERO wind today. Not even a wisp. Smoke from all the brush fires (hurricane cleanup) was going absolutely straight up until it dissipated. This also meant that every tiny patch of concrete was pumping thermals like crazy. It was bumpy as hell today.