Things we don't teach you when you're getting your Private Pilots License

Most flight instructors teach stick and rudder skills for the Private and Instrument ratings. In those courses we also provide some dual cross country training for our customers. However there are some common sense things that get overlooked in rating training and I became aware of them while talking to a new pilot the other day. 

This gentleman had asked me about flying to Florida in the spring for the Sun and Fun in his airplane. I told him that I had made that trip about eight times  and provided him with some advice about flying a long cross country in a light airplane. I then realized that this information is generally not taught and only acquired through the school of hard knocks.

When to Travel

Travel during the week-Monday through Thursday is best. If you’re looking for a long weekend leave Thursday and come back Monday if possible. There are a few reasons for doing this but the primary one is that should anything on the airplane break, parts via overnight delivery is generally only available until Friday and generally unavailable during the weekend.  If you fly an older aircraft it may take a bit of time to locate parts (read days) and the more time they have before the weekend the better off you’ll be.  Additionally mechanics like their weekends off too, and getting one to agree to come in to fix your bird after five pm on Friday through Monday at eight am might be difficult and most surely will be more expensive than during normal business hours.

Plan your route and fuel stops to places where there are rental cars, hotels and things to do, if the weather or the airplane isn’t cooperating with your plan.  Cleveland's Burke Lakefront is a much better place to get stranded than say Toledo or Akron. Chicago Midway beats Gary Indiana or Rockford Il.

Prior to fuel prices skyrocketing over the last  few years I would normally suggest using major airports where a commercial flight home could be possible if hard return dates had to be observed.  

These days I say plan to a location that is within driving distance to one of those airports in case you need to buy an airline ticket home. (e.g. Hampton Roads Virginia (KPVG) vs. Norfolk (KORF) Charleston Executive (KJZI) vs.  Charleston International (KCHS))

Additionally the smaller airport will likely have the services to match your equipment.  Even though there may be lots of piston airplanes on their ramps most major airports don’t have mechanics with a lot of recent experience with piston singles or twins.

I had a bad spark plug on the ramp at Greater Buffalo Niagara International two summers ago The mechanic at Prior Aviation wasn’t knowledgeable about servicing the iridium plugs in my airplane yet kept servicing the same one over and over again. It would run fine on the ramp but out at the run up pad it was fouled with a dead short. The mechanic insisted that it was our magneto that had gone bad not the plug.

I made a call to our mechanic in Danbury who emphatically told me not to let him touch the magneto. Fortunately for us we had four spare plugs in the back of the plane from when we swapped them out with iridium replacements.

After the third go around I asked him to replace the plug with the best one from my collection of spares. The problem was solved.  Speaking with him for the two hours we were together he admitted that he was the on call night mechanic who  hadn’t worked on a piston airplane in years.

Naturally I'm not saying don't fly on weekends, rather if you are on a trip of some length (covering a few area forecast regions) you're in much better shape from an options standpoint if you travel during the week.  

The Battle of Dunkirk - Or why I finally finished my instrument rating

After receiving my private pilot's license in September of 1986. I immediately started training for my instrument rating. In retrospect, as a new pilot I was fearful of flying alone and by continuing with another rating provided a convenient excuse to fly with an instructor.

Working out a barter deal with a flight school over in Waterbury Oxford (OXC) I agreed to write them a point of sale system and install it on a new multi station computer network I configured, in exchange for receiving instrument rating training.

At the time I was a naïve 26 years old, dealing with a wily old retired airline Captain, notorious for getting the better of people in business situations related to aviation.

Needless to say I received a good portion of my training but when push came to shove, and it was time to actually get the rating the good Captain invalidated our deal.

I bought an airplane after that and continued training with a CFII buddy of mine. I sold the airplane a few years later still not having received my certificate.

Life got in the way and I stopped flying aside from biennial flight reviews from 1993 until 2000. At first it was difficult to stop flying, but ultimately it became easy to stay away from the airport as I started making different excuses not to go.

Renting an airplane after you've owned one is difficult so after a while I decided to do something else with my spare money.

Turning 40 I found myself working away from home for extended periods of time mostly based in Quincy Massachusetts.  Judy started to complain about me being gone all the time so I pitched her again to let me buy another airplane and this time she relented.   We bought the Mooney and started flying it crossing a lot of real estate- always VFR.

If the weather was bad or the flight service briefer stated VFR was not recommended we just didn't go.

The speed of the Mooney had us taking longer trips. Some of those crossed weather boundaries and ultimately we started getting stuck in places.  During my first trip to Airventure Oshkosh in 2001 the mixture cable on the airplane let loose after we shut the airplane down at Fond Du Lac so I flew home commercially on a round trip ticket from Milwaukee to LaGuardia. 

I cajoled Judy into letting me buy her a one way ticket from LGA to MKE and we flew out to retrieve our airplane.

We rented a car at MKE and drove the two hours to central Wisconsin. After paying the mechanic at FDL we headed out to fly VFR around the Chicago Bravo airspace. There was a broken layer at 3800 so we stayed below 3000 and cruised VFR around  Chicago across South Bend, Toledo, and Cleveland, finally calling it a day in Erie PA as it got dark.

We stayed at the airport hotel and walked to the chain restaurant where everyone had lots of flair and suspenders on.

We awoke to good weather in Erie and our plan was to head northeastward towards Buffalo where Judy's family lived.  The weather in Erie was good VFR but there was low ceilings and fog along the eastern shore of Lake Erie that the flight service briefer had warned us about.   He suggested that with the weather being clear both in Erie and Buffalo perhaps we could get up on top for that area in between.

I took the advice that I liked and consulted Judy. My conversation was "Lets head up to Buffalo, its only 92 miles,  it's clear here and there,  all we have to do is climb above the clouds and when we get to Buffalo we'll make a normal descent and land. Judy was reluctant but ultimately said "you're the pilot if you think it will be ok let's go".

We departed Erie in the clear and climbed to our planned cruising altitude of 5500. Our route had us flying Victor 14 to Dunkirk VOR (DKK) then to Buffalo (BUF). At five thousand five hundred we looked down and saw the low clouds and ground fog the briefer had told us about.  Crossing over Dunkirk we noticed the clouds were getting higher so we climbed first to seven thousand five hundred then nine thousand  five hundred  yet we couldn't get on top of the clouds.

Fifteen miles northeast of DKK almost halfway to Buffalo we were at eleven five and surrounded by towering canyons of cumulus. I looked over at Judy and instead of seeing her smiling and offering encouragement; she was looking straight down staring at her feet.

The airplane was really struggling to climb so thirteen five wasn't an option even with the RAM air door pulled open.  I knew I was in trouble and realized it was time to confess.  I called up Buffalo approach and told them of my predicament. The controller came back with an incredulous ' let me get this straight you're a non-instrument rated pilot flying at eleven thousand five hundred- currently in the clear bur surrounded by clouds'. I sheepishly agreed with his grim assessment.

The controller handled a few more airplanes and after what seemed an eternity finally quipped   "Mooney 58 Victor did it ever cross your mind to do a 180?"  In all of my recently adrenaline soaked moments I had not even consider that.  I agreed that turning around was the best idea and negotiated the course reversal while managing to stay out of the clouds. When I asked him for vectors to the closest VFR airport he gave me a course to fly leading to Dunkirk. At that time Judy spotted a hole in the clouds that led to the surface so we chopped the power and started our descent down and landed safely at DKK.  

We landed at Dunkirk and it was clear to everyone on the ramp and in the FBO that we were spooked. They gave us the keys to their crew car and told us of a place where we could get some lunch.

We ate and headed back waiting on the ramp for the weather to clear. Finally an instrument instructor who was taking a client on a session said he would radio back the current conditions for the 32 miles between DKK and BUF. We received the radio call, headed out and picked our way into BUF arriving in time for another hotel , dinner and rental car. Launching the next day we made it to Utica before banging into the back side of the system that had caused us the grief a day earlier. We waited on the ground in Utica until the ASOS from Albany said they were VFR and we picked our way down there. Landing in Albany I shut down got gas and checked the weather. It was a continuous improvement but when it was time to start the airplane to depart vapor lock kept the engine from starting. We engaged a mechanic who also was unable to start the airplane. At that point frustration set in and we rented a car at Million Air and drove the balance of the trip back to Danbury. On Wednesday of that week I took the Amtrak to Albany, grabbed a cab to the airport and flew the airplane back to DXR.

Judy met me at the tie down as I taxied into Business Aircraft Center just as the sun was going down. As I got out of the airplane I vowed to have the rating by the time I flew to Oshkosh in 2002.

I earned my Instrument rating after finishing up with Paul Whittaker then took my practical ride with Ray Nobel early in 2002. While we still cancel trips for weather and somtimes get stuck at distant airports, having the rating allows us to get additional utility out of the airplane.