Pilot Life: First Flight in the Piper Arrow!

While things related to the Instrument Rating is on hold, I've decided to go ahead and pull the trigger and go off on a productive tangent by working on requirements towards my commercial rating. I've already done a few things I needed to get done on my own (like the 250 nautical mile cross-country, night landings at a towered airport along with at least five hours of night flying), so all I have left are a few things I have to do while in training (meaning I have to receive flight instruction from my flight instructor). One of the requirements I decided to focus on is time-building/flight training in a complex airplane, something that I got started doing last summer when I got few flights in with my uncle in his Mooney M20; in fact, my original plan was to go back to Idaho for about a week or two to knock out the complex airplane requirements in my uncle's plane. Unfortunately, THAT Mooney has been down for several months now getting a new engine and is still not done, meaning it's not available. So, it was Plan B: flying the Piper Arrow, another new airplane to add to the logbook! Which also means I'm renting from a flight school again...

I'm using Infinite Air Center's Piper PA-28R-180 Arrow (N4958J) nicknamed "Julie" to get the rest of my complex hours.

The first thing I did was meet with with my flight instructor and we went over the airplane, particularly the retractable landing gear, as well as a review of constant-speed propellers and the GUMPS checklist. Afterwards, we headed out to the airplane and my instructor walked me through the pre-flight process for the airplane before hopping in. We got the engine started, and taxied out to Runway. We did our run-ups, which also included cycling the constant-speed propeller to check manifold pressure as well as oil pressure. Everything looked good, so we got airborne off Runway 34 and departed the pattern southbound on the downwind towards a practice area just south of Albany.

My instructor had me level us off and we flew around a little bit just so I can feel how the airplane handles in flight; and I've gotta say, the Piper Arrow is much easier to handle in the air compared to my uncle's Mooney (which has positive control, being a model built in the 1960s!). In fact, flying the Arrow reminds of the Piper Cherokee Cruiser I used to fly back in Utah! After getting a handle on how the plane flies in cruise configuration along with the constant speed propeller, my instructor had go through some paces, namely the different indicated air speeds for different configurations.

We configured the airplane for slow flight and went over the proper air speeds for flap extension as well as gear extension. We also simulated a go-around procedure at altitude along with the associated and appropriate cockpit flows when re-configuring the airplane, which would start with the flaps in increments, followed by retracting the landing gear. After that, my instructor had me fly up to Salem so I could practice some landings there!

After getting the current ATIS information, I called up the tower and we were instructed to make a straight-in for Runway 34. After making a decent first landing in the Arrow, we got airborne again and did a total of three laps in the pattern, all decent touch-and-go landings. I gotta say though, the final approach landing speed at 80 mph with flaps fully-extended is a little faster than what I've been used to (you can't even drive 80 mph on the freeway in Oregon without risking a speeding ticket!)! Needless to say, I'm quite pleased that I was able to get my first landings in the Piper Arrow right.

After doing the third touch-and-go landing, I requested a southbound departure with Salem Tower, which they cleared us for and we were on our way back to Albany, where we landed uneventfully on Runway 34 after entering the downwind on the 45 (I gotta remember to get back into that habit a little since I've been doing nothing but instrument approaches!). After clearing the runway, I taxied the Arrow back to the ramp, shut the engine down, proceeded to do post-flight checks before logging the flight. I gotta say, it feels refreshing to add another new airplane to the logbook, considering that the Arrow is only the second complex airplane I've logged time in, and not to mention that I've been flying nothing but my uncle's Cessna 172 for the past eight months. I'm on Spring Break this week, so I plan on getting a few more flights in the Arrow knocked out this week so I can get up to the 10 required training hours of complex time I need for the Commercial certificate!