Kasi’s Flight Log

Entry: Day Three – The Pit

04/18/2023: Finally, I had some time to take my third flying lesson. The goal today was to try to keep the FW330 over our fire pit. It seemed like an easy task, being that I was easily hovering over the grass, but once I tried to keep it over the fire pit, I felt as though I was all over the place! At one point, James set it down and we thought we broke a prop! We didn’t thankfully, it was just a piece of charred wood. Weather was decent. There was some wind, but not too terrible, and in true Florida fashion it was hot and sunny – so sunny that my eyes kept watering! I can tell you, it is not easy to see your aircraft when you are crying, LOL.

James also had me turn the multi-rotor 90 degrees and play around with a different orientation. That experience was interesting to say the least. I played around a bit with figuring out what directions I needed to move the sticks to get it to go where I wanted. My biggest issue was the lag time between when I moved a stick and when I expected the Flame Wheel to move. Overall, today was a great flying day!

Kasi’s Flight Log

Entry: Day 2 – My Second Flying Lesson

Well, this flight log is from two weeks ago, but better late than never, right?!

03/30/2023: Day 2 – Today I had my second flying lesson. We continued to work on a tail end hover. The wind was stronger today than it was the first time so it took a bit of adjustment to keep the Flame Wheel in front of me. Trying to master the movements is even harder when you are correcting for environmental changes. It is also odd dealing with the ground effects. Ground effect, as I learned, is how the air coming off (in my case) the rotor blades can actually cause lift. According to Skybrary, Ground Effect is “positive influence on the lifting characteristics of the horizontal surfaces of an aircraft wing when it is close to the ground”. I can tell that I am getting more comfortable with the multicopper, but I still panic when it turns into a different orientation. After I get down the tail end hover we will work on left and right orientations. I was able to fly it out and bring it back to me without turning too much. My stick movement has also become smoother. I even had a few onlookers while I was flying today, and thankfully I was able to handle it pretty well. I am excited for our next lesson!  

Weather has been rather windy this week, but I am hoping to get back out towards the end of this week for my third lesson. Stay tuned!

Source: Author Unknown. “Ground Effect” Skybrary. (2023). Retrived from URL https://www.skybrary.aero/articles/ground-effect (April, 2023)