New start, new type

If you've noticed my hiatus, it's because I had to take a break from flying. There was other stuff happening outside of flying, I wasn't getting enough flying time (because of weather and technical problems with the Group's aircraft) and my Tiger Moth skill wasn't progressing. So both my flying and this blog have been on hold for more than a year. But now it's time to get back into the saddle, and to avoid the problems with Tiger Moths, I've moved to a new aircraft type and a new school.
Next door to Cambridge Flying Group is the slightly inaccurately named Mid-Anglia School of Flying. Originally based in mid-Anglia, they've been a fixture at Cambridge (in East Anglia) for many years. They offer initial training (amongst other things) on the Piper Warrior II, so it was a chance for me to discover how different a modern aircraft is.

A Piper Warrior II flying over Singapore

It was a very 'bumpy' day for a lesson. There was 10 knots of wind veering all over the compass, and very strong thermals. That meant it wasn't the best day to learn what "straight and level" looks like through a new windscreen, but it was a good day to learn how the aircraft responds. The wind would have been out of limits for the Tiger Moth, but even if I had been flying it on a day like this, my head would have been spinning after an hour's flying, with my brains blown out through my ears.
The enclosed cockpit of my new steed is a lot more civilized in such conditions. Moving to it from the Tiger Moth felt a little like moving to a flying game on a computer. The sensations of flying were much less: the acceleration, the rolling and pitching, and the feeling you get in your bum when you side-slip. There's no wind in your face, there's much less noise, and you don't need to wear six layers to keep warm. The experience is much less physically draining.
Maybe that takes away a lot of the fun, but it's a lot easier to talk with the instructor about what's going on, and to concentrate on learning. I found that not only are the sensations a lot less, but so is everything else. Flying the Tiger Moth, I learned to stomp on the rudder pedals whenever I rolled into a turn or adjusted the throttle, to anticipate the adverse yaw. Flying the Warrior, I was using way too much rudder, and we'd end up side-slipping the wrong way. The slightest foot pressure is enough to keep the aircraft in balance. It's the same with the yoke: a lot less force is needed to achieve anything. I was always too timid when rolling the Tiger, and ended up not achieving the desired rate of turn, but now even my timid rolls are too much and I keep having to level the wings slightly. Even when we did steep turns at 60° of bank—something the Tiger is a lot more suited to—only fine adjustments were needed to keep the right attitude, whereas I was always fighting the Tiger to stop it sucking me into a spiral.

This cockpit is an older variant of the type, but the 1960's car feel is present in all variants

The new "office", as pilots like to call it, has some other features the old office lacked, besides comfort, but I'll go into those another time. Overall, I'd say the change is a good one. It's like driving a family car when all you've known before is a dirt bike. Sure, the family car is boring, but it's a much more practical route to getting a driving licence, and if you want to take people to places, it's a better skill to have. But you might still want to take your dirt bike out for a scramble at the weekends, and I think when I have my licence, I'd still like to do a tailwheel conversion and have some fun on the Tiger Moth.