I'm in love!

WOW... what can I say? 2 engines good, 1 engine bad :P

So I've had my first flight at the controls of a light twin, a Beechcraft BE-76 Duchess (ZK-SMI)... and it was awesome!

Firstly tho, a little bit of a back story...

Unfortunately, the club where I do the majority of my flying, Airline Flying Club, do not have any twin's on the flightline, which is a bit problematic when one is wanting to do a multi-engine instrument rating... :(

Fortunately, our club president has a few contacts about the place and has managed to swing a deal with the club next door, Auckland Aero Club, whereby those of us at AFC who are wanting to get multi ratings, are able to do so at AAC using their aircraft and instructors... :)

So I've enlisted the services of an AAC B-Cat instructor, Jason, and their Duchess... ZK-SMI.

It was just an initial intro to type flight, that covered the basics of the aircraft, how to pre-flight, taxiing, take-off, basic maneuvers like medium turns, steep turns, stalls, emergency (ie. manual) gear extension etc... then a circuit and full stop landing... but thus far, one of the best 1.1 hours of my flying so far.

The machine just has so much get up and go... it easily climbs at over 1000' a minute (we were getting around 1300 or 1400'/minute) at the "standard" climb power setting of 25" Manifold Pressure and 2500 RPM, which isn't full power... compared with say a 152 that might do 600' in an updraft or thermal at full power :P

And it hums along quite nicely at 140kts in the cruise... compare with a 152 that might do 100 with a tailwind ;)

And here-in lies the problem with these aircraft... they're fast and powerful, and it's very easy to get a long way behind the aircraft as it travels so far in such a short space of time you have to plan a long way ahead. I think the next week or so are going to be very interesting and hopefully bucketloads of fun... I've got 2 flights booked for tomorrow ;)


This Flight: 1.1 Dual Multi
Total Hours: 317.8 (150.4/140.3 Day, 8.6/17.4 Night, 1.1 Multi, 18.6 IFR)