Blog – PPL Check Ride With CFI 12/04/2025
The weather today was nice with a few thermals to keep me honest.
After running through our pre-flight, taxi, and run-ups, we ran thru the following:
- Short Field Take-off
- Climb out
- Engine T’s and P’s
- Standard Turns
- Steep Turns
- Slow Flight
- Low Flying
- Forced Landing
- Without Power
- Coastal Reversals
- Feature Reversals
- Glide Approach
- Flapless Landing
- Standard Landing
I had a real mixed bag today. I felt a bit nervous and put a lot of pressure on myself to perform well.
My Short field take-off was fine, but the climb out was not well balanced. I did maintain a very good watch of the engine temps and pressures which my CFI was very impressed with. However my level turns were woeful! It took about 3 goes to get in the ballpark and the old balance was off yet again. Urgh!
Transition to slow flight was performed well and I flew my low flying portion well but again not always in balance.
I performed a Forced Landing Without Power well (Yay!) but my Coastal and Feature Reversals were a bit sloppy.
Both my Glide approach and Flapless landing attempts were too high, but I initiated great go arounds according to my CFI.
The Standard landing was all good so I did redeem myself a bit. Climbs and Descents were all within standard and my overhead join was fine also. My Standard Landing was good as I managed the crosswind component well; Not quite a “butter” landing but not bad.
My main take-away from today was that I was 95% consistent, accurate and safe; Its just that darn balance ball I need to keep an eye on.
Next lesson I will take a bit of a break and finish off my Simulated Instruments Time. Once that is done I just need to do the Flight Test.
So, so, close, yet so far away….
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Blog – PPL Check Ride With CFI 12/04/2025