November 12-14, 2010 - Team RV Formation Clinic

Part One

I took Friday off from work to attend the Formation Clinic at Rowan County Airport in Salisbury, North Carolina, just north of Charlotte, hosted by Team RV . 

I started formation flying in January of this year and have logged about 27 hours of serious form time since then.   I've really come to enjoy it.  It's challenging but satisfying flying.  The people I fly with are a great group to be part of.  Ironically, my first ever flight in an RV was at a formation clinic.  Link . 

As late as a month ago, I wondered if I was good enough to pass a Wingman checkride.  But in the last month, I finally cracked the code on how to make consistently good rejoins.  I also practiced with some Team RV pilots two weeks ago and learned a lot from that as well as understand what they expect.  I felt like I had a shot at passing the Wingman checkride and that was my goal.  But regardless of whether I achieved it or not, it would be a great aviation weekend. 

Flying across Baltimore, there wasn't a cloud in the blue sky.  Visibility was phenonminal and the air was smooth as silk, unusual for the skies over Baltimore.  Perfect flying conditions.  I even had a tailwind.  Here, I have just crossed Baltimore and am over I-495 -- the Baltimore Beltway -- looking down at all the commuters this Friday morning.  I commute on this road daily, but not today! 

Back at the airport, we went up for a practice formation fligtht.  Bones of Team RV was lead, I was #2, Mike #3, and Arjan was #4.  It was good practice for what lay ahead.

They had transportation to the motel where we checked in and then the Ground School started.  Smokey was the instructor for about 14 of us.  It was very well done.  There were a few nuggets that was new to me and the rest was good reinforcement.  Towards the end, pizza was ordered from the nearby Pizza Hut.    

There, much better.  The spinner is aligned with the outboard aileron hinge and I can't see the right elevator. 

Since I started flying formation, I could not consistently make good rejoins.  But once I learned about a month ago the rejoin technique of keeping leads vertical stab on the top wing, thereby staying on the Line, my rejoins improved dramatically.   Also, from the flight with Team RV two weeks ago, I realized that to be in proper position -- close enough --  I needed to have lead's outboard elevator completely hidden behind the rudder.  I'd been working on that and could consistently do it. 

Here I am rejoining Widget.  It was only in the last month or so that I realized that the key to a successful rejoin is staying on "The Line".  The Line is an imaginary 45 degree line from lead.  When you have Lead's vertical stabilizer on his high wing -- as pictured here --  you are on "The Line".   Then you smoothly move right up the line:  not too fast and not too slow.  But if there is space between the high wing and the vertical stab, you are acute and need bank into lead until high wing and vertical stab are re-aligned.   If you don't, you'll close lead way too fast and have to cross under him. 

Whatever lead does, you do. 

Another new thing to me was the vertical break from close trail.  Lead suddenly pulled up into the vertical and did a wingover to the left.  It was pretty obvious I needed to follow so I did.  Kind of fun, actually.

The lineup for Flight #3 was Smokey-1, Chris-2, myself -3 and Bob J.-4.   Since I was #3 I had my own element.  After takeoff with Bob on my wing, I used the vertical stab high wing technique to stay on the line and thought we joined Lead and #2 pretty well.  Maybe a little slow but then again we were in a climbing turn.  This flight didn't go as well as the first two, but I got a lot out of it, and especially got some good practice on the last part of the rejoin.  Since I was #3, I was basically supposed to join on #2 on the inside of the turn, then seamlessly crossover to the outside.  A lot easier said than done!  But I was getting better at it.

Someone on the ground took this shot of our takeoff.

I lent the passenger in Chris's plane my camera and he got this great shot of me with Bob J. just behind. 

The lineup for Flight #4 was Smokey-1, myself-2, Dan Frank-3 and Mike #4.   This was my checkride so Kahuna -- the checkride evaluator -- was #5.   Prior to engine start, I was really nervous.  In fact, I was nervous prior to every flight this weekend.  Formation flying is fun, but it's also challenging and stressful. 

Taxi, takeoff, and join-up went fine.  I had finally learned that in Route formation they wanted you in fairly close with spinner aligned to leading edge so I did that.  We did lazy-8s and I worked hard to stay in tight continuously.  The air was smooth which made things easier.  Then it was time for Rejoins.  My first rejoin was perfect, I stayed on the line and kept my speed up all the way up to the final position.  Smokey gave me a thumbs up.  Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Dan snap into position seconds later.  The second rejoin was excellent as well, although maybe not quite as good as the first.   I knew echelon turns were my weakest link but I did reasonably well on them.   Smokey went into the echelon turn smoothly which helped.  Smokey did some pretty aggressive maneuvering on extended trail but I enjoy that so I had no problem.  In close trail I was a little far out.  Kahuna told me to move up so I did and stayed there.  They had said it was easier when you were close in, and it's true.  However, it takes guts to go in there!  So far, I thought the flight had gone extremely well and apparently Smokey thought so too because he asked Kahuna if he had seen enough and he said yes.  Smokey and I did a formation landing followed by the second element and the flight was over. 

On debrief, Smokey gave me a few suggestions, then Kahuna said he had nothing to add, and congratulations, I had passed my FFI Wingman checkride.  All right!

Kahun's unique Super-8 RV.

Part Two