Congratulations! Great feeling, isn't it?
I started about 6 weeks ago, in a 152, and had a very similar experience...
Didn't do any stalls on the first flight, but I was kind of shocked when he had
me do the taxiing and the takeoff by myself. (Maybe that's the difference
between an intro flight and lesson 1.) He did nothing but the radios. (Class D
airport - KORH) I lost a lot of altitude on my first turns despite the fact I
knew enough to expect to have to add back pressure... A 60 degree bank is one
*steep* turn. For a PPL in the states, they ask you to demonstrate steep turns,
but at 45 degrees. If I remember correctly, a 60 deg turn causes a 2G load on
the wings.
I was absolutely mortified when my instructor didn't take the controls on final
approach. He actually expected me to land it! I was under strict voice
control... "Carb heat on, reduce power to 1500 RPM, keep it lined up, add some
power, steady.....steady.... drop the nose a bit, power all the way out....
No, really, all the way.... keep the nose down.... MATT! LET THE NOSE
DOWN.... That's it.... Yes, we do want to reach the ground.... level out....
a little more back pressure..... LIFT THE NOSE! keep it steady.... [THUD]
Beautiful! Flaps up, and steer with your feet." About 20 seconds of sheer
terror. And in retrospect, I've got about 25 landings under my belt, and that
one was actually pretty good, although I didn't like it at the time....
In any case, it really is a blast, and I too highly recommend an intro flight
(if not lesson 1...) for anybody who enjoys flying a sim (or playing around)...
(Do not ask to flight beneath bridges...!)
Martin, if you decide to continue on for you PPL, I can recommend a good ground
school program in "Cleared for Takeoff" by King Schools. (Resold by Cessna,
too.) It's something like 26 CDs; you simply watch the video, and answer some
questions. It's windows based, however, and very much geared to the US, which
may or may not be useful to you...
Any how, good luck! And welcome!
-Matt
Martin Spott wrote:
> Inspired by others on this list I had my first flight with controls in my
> hands on a C172. This was the first flight I ever had on such a small plane.
>
> I once sat in a BN2 as a passanger but I must admit that sitting in a 10
> seater, even though it was a great excitement sitting behind the co's seat
> (no co present on this flight), wathing everything that's going on, was far
> not that much a great experience as the flight yesterday.
>
> The Instructor took of from EDLN runway 13 and handed the controls over to
> me after reaching 1500 feet. I had about 10 minutes time to head south and
> get the feeling how to fly at a constant altitude - I didn't really 'manage'
> it but it worked quite well for the first time ("watch the horizon" !).
>
> After reaching the 'playground' over an open mining of brown coal we had
> time for a little 'programme'. Standard turn right (I overshot by about 15
> seconds), standard turn left, another standard turn (much better than the
> first one). The next excercises were shown by the instructor before I had
> the chance to do them myself - I had to handle carb heating and throttle,
> the instructor dealt with the mixture.
> So I had a few narrow curves with 60 degree bank (how would you call this in
> English ?) and two stall recoveries ("hey, you lost only 100 feet !").
> _This_ was really a pretty nice experience after all. During our programme a
> pair of Tornados came by way below us, VFR at about 150 feet.
>
> After 25 minutes I headed for the airport the instructor took over for
> approach. EDLN is an airfield with (small) airline traffic, so you have to
> follow certain procedures that are quite new to me. But I think I'll be able
> to learn that stuff.
>
> Hey guys (and gals), do that yourself, it is really worth it ! And don't
> forget to watch out, especially remember the position of the horizon
> anytime,
>
> Martin.
> --
> Unix _IS_ user friendly - it's just selective about who its friends are !
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