So you want to fly a different airplane…?
Start with the pre-flight briefing, a.k.a. ground school. Flight is not a natural occupation of human beings and as a result human flyers must devote time and effort to formal education and practice. And while it is true that many of the early pioneers of aviation were self-taught, it should also be remembered that a lot of them died flying, and those that didn’t, such as the Wright brothers and Igor Sikorsky, spent years, even decades in slow, careful pursuit of knowledge. Damn few people have that sort of patience.
So, if you want to learn to fly resign yourself early to the idea that you will have a certain amount of book learning. You will also have to practice, review, and re-learn on a regular basis.
I received about 20 pages of stuff via e-mail prior to my first lesson. One item was an abridged version of the pilot handbook for the Bellanca Citabria Model 7ECA, which was the variety of airplane I’d be training in for my tailwheel endorsement (more on that “endorsement” thing in a minute). This contained important information such as approved flight conditions, important airspeeds, engine/instrumentation/engine limits, fuel and oil requirements, emergency procedures, pre-flight checklist, normal procedures, and weight and balance information. There was information about regulations pertaining specifically to tailwheel airplanes (there are just a few), directions on how to obtain information on transitioning from tricycle gear airplanes (the current standard) to taildraggers from the FAA (on line, these days), and the course syllabus.
Oh, and the word “endorsement” - without getting too much into jargon, an endorsement is not something that appears on your license itself, but rather it’s an entry in your log book that an instructor at some point certifies that you have had sufficient training in an area to be considered competant. The trick, of course, is convincing that instructor person that you do, indeed, have the goods. Endorsements are also needed for “complex” airplanes (retractable gear and in-flight adjustable props), or high performance airplanes (over 200 hp engines). They are for areas of skill and knowledge that do require some training, but not to the extent that, say, earning an instrument flight rating or multi-engine rating do. Ratings appear on your license, endorsements stay in the back of your logbook.
Anyhow, I started with the transition training materials, which were about six pages, and covered key differences between the landing gear I learned on and the landing gear I was going to learn to land on. Interesting quote from the first paragraph: “Tailwheel airplanes are not necessarily more difficult to takeoff, land, and/or taxi than tricylce gear airplanes; in fact under certain conditions, they may even handle with less difficulty.” Which sort of answers the question of why people continue to build new taildraggers - in addition to the fun and amusement aspect, they do serve specific needs in specific niches.
Since it’s on the ground these airplanes handle differently than the usual that is largely what both the background info and the training is all about. First there is a discussion of how to taxi a taildragger. That is, how to drive it around on the ground as opposed to flying it through the air. Due to where the center of gravity is located on a taildragger relative to the wheels there is a certain instability present - it always has an urge to swap ends with itself, swinging around in a tight, tipping circle that may leave the rear-end proceeding first and the front end trailing, possibly also with damage to the wings if the tipping is severe enough to caught the airplane structure (other than the wheels) to impact the ground. This may sound alarming, but clearly the situation is managable since folks fly taildraggers every day of the year all over the world mostly without incident. It’s a tendency, not a mandate. Sort of like how SUV’s are more prone to tip over than a low-slung sports car - driven properly, you don’t tip. It does mean that if you are at the controls you must pay attention when moving about on the ground to a greater degree than with tricycle gear airplanes.
In fact, what was told to me years ago and confirmed by recent discussion with folks more experienced than me in these matters is worth repeating. When in a taildragger you must pay the same attention and care to ground operations as when you are flying, and it helps to consider it a matter of flying even when you’re entirely on the ground. Because of the instability of traildragger gear they are much more affected by wind and the controls on the wings and tail must be used to control those effects whereas on tricycle gear airplanes the breeze must be quite brisk and gusty to pose a real ground navigation hazard. Consider yourself to be in flight from the moment you get in until the time you shut down the engine, get out, and secure the airplane.
Anyhow, there was a bunch more stuff about take-offs and landings, which I won’t bore you with right now.
Next up was reviewing the syllabus. This really impressed me - not every civilian flight school uses syllabi, although it’s becoming much more common. Many that are used are sketchy at best, and unevenly applied. This school not only lays things out well, they actually use the syllabus to make sure everything is covered in a reasonably methodical manner.
The course is divided into three parts - introduction to tailwheel airplanes, advanced tailwheel operations, and tailwheel proficiency - crosswind operations.
We’ll start with “lesson one” (which often turns into several sessions or lessons, but more on that later). It occassionally surprises people, but the first 30 minutes to an hour, maybe even more, of learning to do a new sort of flying usually involves no flying at all - it’s classroom and ground time. The classroom time, in this case, was a one-on-one discussion of handling characteristics of taildraggers in general and of this particular airplane specifically. This includes not only normal operations, but also some basic consideration of emergencies such as best glide speed, aborting of landings, and so forth.
Also important was agreement on how to exchange control of the airplane between instructor and student, even more important in this airplane than some others. Many, if not most, modern airplanes have side to side seating so it’s relatively easy to have some idea of what the person sitting next to you is doing. Citabrias have tandem seating, that is, one person behind the other. My instructor in this airplane sees the back of my head, not what my hands and feet are doing. For that matter, the instructor’s view of most of the instrument panel (rather minimal to begin with ) is also blocked by the student in front of him/her. Even with headsets and intercoms, communication requires cooperation here - in the days before such items were common instructors and students did a LOT OF SHOUTING and, in the more powerful airplanes, worked out non-verbal signals before getting into the airplane and starting it up. (One gnarly old instructor told me that in the old days when he need a student to relinquish the controls he’d whack them on the back of the head as a signal. This isn’t as bad as it sounds - it was a sort of aircraft where folks usually wore helmets) It’s important that, when control needs to be shifted between pilots, the exchange is done quickly and surely.
After the classroom pre-flight briefing it was on to the airplane. No, we still weren’t flying yet. Have I mentioned that aviation requires patience? It was time to pre-flight the airplane. Now, pre-flighting is something I’ve been doing for a decade now, but every airplane has it’s unique characteristics and quirks. Keep in mind as well that there are models of airplanes out there with histories of a half century (sometimes longer) and thus a vast accumulated knowledge of Things to Look Out For. The Citabria isn’t quite that old, but it’s still been around awhile. Initial pre-flight not only included standard procedures common to all airplanes (and when you’re in a learning situation your pre-flight technique is observed and sometimes critiqued, no matter how experienced you may be in other aircraft) but also involved making sure I knew where everything was on that airplane down to where the spare seat cushion for short folks was kept (since I’m a shorty, it turns out I needed to use it). The Citabria is also a wood-wing aircraft with a fabric covering, so the was also a brief discussion of what is and isn’t normal in such airplanes and how to do a reasonable exterior inspection of same. Preflight also included how the heck to get up to the fuel tanks, which are accessed from the top of the wings. Obviously, a full grown human attempting to scale the exterior of a fabric airplane is not a good idea - it’s not a good idea even on metal-skinned airplanes for that matter, as the load-carrying capacity of most surfaces is well under the weight of the average human being. If there aren’t steps built into the side of the thing (there aren’t on the Citabria) and you can’t climb the wing struts (not a good idea unless the manual specifically says it’s OK - not a common thing) then that means finding a ladder. A good operation will have one readily to hand (a really good operation has at least on in the hangar and keeps another slung on the back of the fuel truck.