Good Things Come to Those Who Wait...and Wait, Right?

RIGHT!
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The checkride actually happened today. I feel like I won the Powerball jackpot. The stars were aligned. Whatever. It happened. It's over. I feel good.

Last night, I wanted to make sure everything was set for the checkride. I drove over to the airport, did a pre-flight and practiced emergency and maneuver flows. It was a few hours well spent. Feeling better prepared allowed a good night's sleep.

The checkride was scheduled for 9, so I got there around 8 to do W&B, performance and get the paperwork in order. That was a good thing. He showed up 20 minutes early and asked if I was ready. Yes I was.

He briefed the checkride: normal takeoff straight out, head towards Coolidge Airport (P08) and climb to 5,500. After reaching 5,500', 2 steep turns, slow flight and stalls. After that, VMC demo, emergency descent to Coolidge and pattern work. Depart Coolidge to the north for a single engine ILS approach into Gateway.

We taxied out and on the takeoff roll, he cut the mixture on the right engine. Done. Takeoff after that was fine. This particular DE is an Airbus check airman and is BIG on checklist usage. I practically had the checklist glued to my hands to ensure proper usage. Climb checklist complete. We hit 5,000' and he asked me to perform steep turns to the left and right.

Flying with a DPE can be like playing "Simon Says". The way they give you commands tempts you to do the maneuver without proper setup. I made sure to take a deep breath and remember to configure the aircraft and do clearing turns. Clearing turns before every maneuver. The steep turns were fine. +/- 20 feet for both turns. He asked me to transition in to slow flight from the steep turns, again trying to get me to do it without doing a clearing turn. No dice. Once in slow flight, all he asked for was a 110 degree turn to the right. He said since I held my altitude exactly, there was no need to climb or descend. Good.

We did a power off stall and a power on stall in takeoff configuration. PTS. Done. Next, he had me go under the hood, vectored me all over the place and then cut an engine. Then we did a full feather, shut down and air restart. The air restart was a little hairy. The starter just wouldn't get the prop going, so I had to dive 1,500 feet while engaging the starter to get it going again. Finally that was done. Air shut down/restarts are not my favorite task in these old Senecas.

He told me to take off the view limiting device and climb back to 5,500'. Once there he said, "There's smoke in the cabin. Do the right thing." Power out, props forward, gear down and descend at 140 MPH towards the nearest landing site. I recovered at 1,500' AGL and we entered the pattern at Coolidge for pattern work.

I felt blessed today. The winds were light and variable, never more than about 6 knots. The first landing was just normal on runway 23. Since we were the only aircraft at the airport, we taxied to the other end and took off on 5. Next time around was a short field with a 50' barrier at the threshold. I picked the 1000' markers and nailed them. It felt great. Then we taxied to the end of 5, turned around again to 23 and did a normal takeoff. He said we were going back to Gateway for the ILS. First he cut the mixture on the takeoff roll again. Then at about 300' AGL, he cut my left engine. Directional control, airspeed 105, gear up, establish zero side slip, mixture rich, props forward, full throttle both engines. Identify dead engine. Verify dead engine. Feather affected engine. Even though it was nearly 90 degrees, with zero side slip and Vyse the plane was able to get within 200' of pattern altitude. The single engine pattern landing was pretty straight forward. There were no surprises other than when he cut the engine when I was expecting to return to Gateway.

Again, we landed on runway 23 and turned around and departed on 5. He said, Things are going well, all you need to do is the ILS 30C at Gateway with single engine and you've passed. I want to see you nail your airspeed, configuration and center the damn needles all the way down. At DH, go visual and do what it takes to land. There will be no go-around or do-over. Do you understand?" I replied, "Yeah, do it right and go visual at DH!"

He cut the engine well before LOC & GS intercept. The aircraft followed my lead and the needles came in. Airspeed was a little fast, but some trim took care of that. We settle right on the glideslope. Perfect rate of descent. At 1,580' DH, I called minimums and took off the shades. It looked great. I put in 25 degrees of flaps and greased it on the 1000' markers dead center. At that point he said that's where most people bust. They don't follow his instructions to go visual at the DH, they hesitate and then ask him what to do and they bust. What's funny is that most instructors make you wait until DH and then tell you to go visual. I can see someone could easily make the mistake.

After landing, I hurried a little too much to the nearest taxi way and had to break a little harder than I liked. He said he noticed that a lot of pilots do it at Gateway. I think it's because the nearest taxiway from runway 30C is over 5,000 feet from the threshold. Due to the number of ILS approaches on that runway, the tower is always asking pilots to expedite. Today they didn't and habit took over. It really wasn't that big of a deal.

Taxiing back he said, "Congratulations. You did a great job. Get me back to the ramp in one piece and I'll get the paperwork started." That was good enough for me.

When we debriefed, he said the only issue he took with my flying was that I took my hand off the throttle and put it on the glare shield a few times. That's a bad habit and one I will definitely break. Other than that, it couldn't have been a better checkride. Everything went my way today. I didn't make any of my typical mistakes, no matter how much my attention was divided. Today was a good day.

Private: 45 days

Instrument: 75 days

Commercial SEL initial: 105 days (about 45 days worth of work including cross country time building)

CMEL add-on 60 days (about 7 days worth of real work and 50+ days wasted on maintenance problems)

Overall start to finish in 10 1/2 months. It really hasn't been that long. Best of all, not a single checkride bust, although I walked the tightrope on instrument.

The final phase of jet training starts in 2 weeks. That will take 30 days. After that, I'll need another 50 hours of multi engine time and it will be time to set up interviews at my top four choices.

I hit the jackpot on a place to build multi-engine time. More on that another time. This is already way too long-winded.