Hell, why not post the checkride writeup too?
Private Pilot Checkride
Well my first "Shock" was when the DE first came in the room and we started chatting, and I realised I was dealing with a friendly Polish guy who likes to mountain bike and whom I'm paying $350 to test my ability and knowledge as a pilot; not the Pope. No need to tremble in fear.
We got started with the logbook endorsements, requirements met, 8710, and all that good stuff. Then we moved on to the actual oral. Except for only 3 major misakes, it went very smooth and quick and was over in 40 minutes. It was much much easier and quicker than I expected it. Just one or two questions about private pilot priviliges and limitations, a question about Va and its variance with weight, one aeromedical question about hypoxia and a brief chat about hyperventilation, one or two about communications/clearance requirements of different airspaces, a little bit about inop equipment, a little chat about how I'd alter my flight plan if it was at night, and... hell, that's about all I remember. The parts where I blundered and we ended up spending a little longer were airworthiness requirements/AD compliance/aircraft equipment lists, and VFR minimums in different airpsaces. As far as the latter, I got everything right except I switched above/below for the 500/1000 foot thing for every class it applied in. It was over in a very quick 40 minutes, and it was surprisingly easy compared to my expectation of getting drilled like an oilwell. (I was ready to use a different euphemism...)
After the fact, my CFI told me that the DE told him he was very impressed with my oral.
Next came the actual flight, in which some parts were as smooth sailing as the oral, while others had me seriously worried about failing.
I arrived at the airplane a good 15 minutes before he did, and he just drove up and jumped in, no questions about the preflight or the airplane or anything. He told me no need for a passenger briefing, just go. So I did. Taxi and runup and all that went uneventfully, and after that we went to do some patternwork first before moving on to the cross country. That's where things started to get ugly. I couldn't land worth squat, the same as several hours before, when I was flying solo to do some warming up. The first one was a soft field landing, and, well, it didn't live up to its name. As usual, I added a little too much power and ballooned, at least 2 or 3 times, but luckily I didn't balloon too high, nor did my sink rates get too high after the balloons. Nonetheless, after about 3 cycles of that I ended up eating up half the runway and ending up with a not-so-soft soft-field landing.
One of the worst parts of the checkride came up when we taxied back to the beginning of the runway. Tower cleared me to go before I wasn't ready, and instead of telling them I'll hold, I accepted the clearance and started going through my takeoff checklist. In the meanwhile, the landing traffic that was originally on base was now on short final, and tower god pissed and told me to hold. The examiner got pissed at me for that (and rightfully so) and lectured me on the stupidity of my action and about accepting clearances that I can't yet fulfill. The thing is that I am actually already aware of that, and have been in the same situation in the past on multiple occasions, and have calmly told tower that I'll hold. But this time, it was a checkride, I was nervous with a million things running through my mind, got flustered, and let the situation get ahead of me.
Anyway, we continued. I forgot what the next takeoff was, but it went well. Takeoffs are easy. (And optional. While landings are mandatory.. you know the old mantra
) I forgot which landing was next, but I think it was the power off one. He pulled my power when I was almost abeam the numbers, and I pitched up a little bit to 65. For a couple of seconds, I just flew the plane but then it hit me that I needed to attempt the engine restart. What threw me off that I was in the pattern and when practicing power off landdings from downwind I always treated it as a normal landing, just power-off, and not as a simulated emergency. Anyway, I did my restart attempt flow but had no time to pull out the checklist. I forgot whether I voiced that last bit out loud. By that time I turned base, but I did so a little too early. Unfortunately, I overcompensated by throwing all the flaps out and slipping, which put me low. He told me to put my hand on the throttle and get ready to use it if I needed to. I forgot whether I made it over the fence without using power (I'm leaning toward that being the case) but I gave it a shot before the flare because we were sinking pretty fast. Just like the soft-field landing, my power-off landing didn't live up to its name. Unacceptable. Those two performances really had me worried about the outcome of the checkride, but I guess he took it easy on me. My only explanation is that he must have been biased by my performance on the oral, or something... but those were definitely not checkride-worthy landings in my opinion. I forgot whether we did another landing, but in either case he didn't make me do a short-field landing, which I think (and my CFI says) is my strongest suit. On a good day, I can get off on Bravo at RHV.
Next came the cross country. I started my timer (he thankfully gave me a little hint about that) and off we went. I didn't compensate for climbout on my flight plan, so he asked me how long it wouold really take us to get to our first checkpoint. A little twist of the wiz wheel and he got his answer. He told me to level off and head to Anderson lake, and he told me to divert to Watsonville once we get there. I don't know why he did that, but that made it really easy for me. I drew the line on my sectional and plotted the heading before we got there. And just as I'm typing this, I realised I forgot to subtract the 15 degrees of magnetic variation! Ooops! And he never said anything about that. It was turbulent so it was pretty hard doing that while flying the plane at the same time, and a couple of times I let the plane roll 20 or 30 degrees on me before getting a chance to grab the yoke and righting it.
After the turn over Anderson to Watsonville, he asked me for the time, and with another quick twist of the wiz wheel he got his answer, and just like that, we were done with the cross country portion of the checkride. Next were maneuvers, which consisted of one set of steep turns, one power off stall, and that was that. Surprisingly quick.
Next he told me to descend and land at South County, which we were almost right over, and I did so. I told him that in my experience, the south county winds always matched the RHV winds and asked him whether I should go overfly the field to check the winds before landing. He told me to do whatever I want to do. I went with the more conservative approach and checked the winds. Surprise surprise, they favored 14, the opposite of the RHV winds. I made some calls and proceeded to go out and join in the 45, making calls all along. A Cherokee was approaching the pattern from over Anderson, and I told him what the winds were since he asked. The DE told me that my turn out & back for the 45 was way too tight, put me on a 90 rather than a 45, and I did it as a formality rather than a way to REALLY see the WHOLE pattern. That was true, and a valid criticism. The windsock was horizontal and the wind was pretty much a direct crosswind, but I managed to give him what I think was a pretty **CENSORED****CENSORED****CENSORED****CENSORED** good crosswind landing. I held centerline, had barely any drift, and was pointed straight down the runway. It was a bit gusty, so I gave it a shot of power here and there. I forgot whether I increased my approach speed because of the gust and whether I told the DE, but in the end it was good. It was a TAD long but I definitely didn't balloon, and the touchdown was pretty soft. I spaced out on the takeoff and didn't rotate till the wheels were skittering and he told me to rotate at 70 kts (DOH!), but I held pretty good crosswind correction on departure leg. Unfortunately, by his tone and phrasing when he asked me about that, he didn't seem to think so. I looked back and told him that I had drifted a little bit (and it was a little bit) downwind, but when I had looked back 20 seconds before I was a little bit upwind (which was true.) He didn't say anything, but later my CFI told me that the DE was impressed with my wind awareness. I guess he was, since he didn't make my do ground reference maneuvers, which is exactly what my CFI had told me would happen if I flew a good pattern.
After that came the hoodwork which sonsisted of one right and one left turn, and two unusual attitude recoveries. Then he tuned in SJC VOR and told me he had already ID'ed it, and told me to head direct, and I did. And that was it!
He took the controls, told me to take the hood off, kept the controls, and headed back to RHV. That was a little weird, and I didn't expect it. I thought he was testing to see if I was keeping up my duty as PIC even though he was flying, so I still ran the checklists myself and made it a point to subtly let him know that I was still looking for traffic. I joked with him that he was either treating me to a ride because I did so well, or was flying it because he deemed me too incompetent to fly it myself... one of those two. He didn't seem to find it funny, though. We landed, taxied back, hopped off, and I spent 10 nerve-racking minutes waiting for the result while he was chatting his friends who had driven up in Nice Air's fuel truck.
Next thing, he came back, asked me for my logbook, and the rest is history.
