Ready to add Aerobatics to your 'Pilot Tool-kit'?

Why do you want to learn basic aerobatic flight techniques?

Aerobatics in an open cockpit biplane is as real as it gets! You will love it.

Learning to fly Aerobatics is extremely fun, will improve your flying skills and boost overall confidence. Until you feel and experience these abnormal maneuvers, you can’t say for sure how you will react in an upset situation either from turbulence or some other emergency. As a professional pilot, aerobatics experience should be included in ‘Pilot-Tool kit’.

What are the basic Aerobatic Maneuvers?

Aerobatics or ‘Acro’ are maneuvers that exceed 40 degrees pitch up or down and 60 degrees angle of bank. The most common aerobatic maneuvers we teach are steep turns, wing overs, aileron rolls, barrel rolls, loops, spins and hammer heads. These maneuvers are the building blocks of all the other types of aerobatic maneuvers. Learning the basics will improve your flying skills, situation awareness in unusual attitudes and give you the confidence to recovery from anything.

How do you get started and what can you expect from Aerobatic Training?

Getting started is super easy! Just call, email or text us and we will schedule you with one of our instructors based on your availability. Contact us HERE. Depending on your availability, experiences and goals we will tailor an aerobatic program just for you. You can expect training at our vintage aviation hangar at Montgomery Field where we work on the maneuvers on the ground with you, teach you about safety items such as parachutes and the basics of flying our aircraft. After the 1-2 hour ground training, we will strap you in our open cockpit biplane or citabria for aerobatic training. We use the ‘demonstrate, then do’ approach, so you will be able to learn most efficiently. Click Here for What to Expect in Aerobatic Training!

Included in every aerobatic training flight is an amazing view and tour of San Diego.

Fox's Fast and Easy Tail Wheel Endorsement

Tail Wheel Training day 1

CoronaVirus Protocol

Ground Training 1: We will sit down at our runway mock up with a Citabria model and talk about the forces effecting you as a tail wheel pilot such as slipstream affect, P-Factor, gyroscopic forces and crosswinds. Some discussion items will be utilization of the brakes, and causes of some tail wheel incidents.

Flight Training 1: After our safety brief and preflight, we will have you fly from the front cockpit. All you will need to do is work on taxi, smooth brakes, takeoff, constant rate climbs and flight out to the area. In the practice area, we work on dutch roll drills, steep turns, stalls, and maybe falling leaf stalls. These maneuvers are critical to learning how to manage the rudder smoothly. We fly back, enter the pattern and introduce 3 point landings. We will demo/do full slips and turning slips. If you master the 3 point landing, we will introduce the wheel landing.

Tail Wheel Training day 2

Ground: Reviewing the proper 3 point landing techniques and aerodynamic forces is important to review every day in the beginning. Visualizing a good landing will be integral to you developing intuitive and natural landing skills. Flying with a control stick may feel a little different for some folks. We will introduce the Wheel Landing techniques, the why’s and the hows.

Flight Portion: After strapping in the front of the Citabria agiain, we will get aircraft started, work on smooth brake usage, control stick wind controls and basic taxi, takeoff and go right to pattern work. The instructor will demonstrate a wheel landing, and they you can get to work duplicating the techniques and learning the site picture and feel. We will practice full slips and turning slips to help you integrate them into your tail dragger skills tool box. As you get some experience with these landing techniques we can practice power-off landings, wheel landings and 3-point landings until you are comfortable.

Tail Wheel Training day 3

Ground: We will focus on any weaker areas and review all the forces at work on the aircraft, you will be able to relate better after two days of experiencing them.

Flight Portion: You will get aircraft started, do your checklists, taxi, takeoff and go right to pattern work. The instructor will try to not do any instruction for the first few landings, getting a feel with how you are progressing with wheel landing and 3 point landings. By this time, you will have seen all of the techniques for the tail wheel endorsement and we can just practice until you are comfortable in all tail wheel skills.

What is my Tail Wheel Training going to entail?

Tail Wheel Training day 1

CoronaVirus Protocol

Ground Training 1: We will sit down at our runway mock up with a biplane model and talk about the forces effecting you as a tail wheel pilot such as slipstream affect, P-Factor, gyroscopic forces and crosswinds. Some discussion items will be utilization of the heel brakes, and causes of some tail wheel incidents.

Flight Training 1: After our safety brief and putting on flight gear, we will have you strap in the front cockpit. All you will need to do is work on taxi, s-turns, takeoff, constant rate climbs and flight out to the area. In the practice area, we work on dutch roll drills, steep turns, stalls, and maybe falling leaf stalls. These maneuvers are critical to learning how to manage the rudder smoothly. We fly back, enter the pattern and introduce 3 point landings. We will demo/do full slips and turning slips. If you master the 3 point landing, we will introduce the wheel landing.

The Heel Brakes are great for training. You won’t accidentally hit the brakes while you are landing.

When ready to apply brakes, you can angle your feet inward at the heal and still use the rudders.

Tail Wheel Training day 2

Ground: Reviewing the proper 3 point landing techniques and aerodynamic forces is important to review every day in the beginning. Visualizing a good landing will be integral to you developing intuitive and natural landing skills. Flying with a control stick may feel a little different for some folks. We will introduce the Wheel Landing techniques, the why’s and the hows.

Flight Portion: After strapping in the front seat again, we will get aircraft started, practice heel brakes usage, s-turns and taxi, takeoff and go right to pattern work. The instructor will demonstrate a wheel landing, and they you can get to work duplicating the techniques and learning the site picture and feel. We will practice full slips and turning slips to help you integrate them into your tail dragger skills tool box. As you get some experience with these landing techniques we can practice power-off landings, wheel landings and 3-point landings until you are comfortable.

Tail Wheel Training day 3

The back seat is so much fun! You will enjoy flight and landings in a way that was previously just a dream.

Ground: We will talk about starting techniques, radio comms, checklist usage and backseat landing techniques that are a little different from the front seat. The toughest part of this is learning the ‘hot start’ and just getting comfortable in the back seat.

Flight Portion: After strapping in the BACK SEAT, you will get aircraft started, do your checklists, s-turns and taxi, takeoff and go right to pattern work. The instructor will demonstrate the landings from the front seat, including wheel landing and 3 point landings. You will quickly get used to the new sight picture and using your peripheral vision to enhance your landings. By this time, you will have seen all of the techniques for the tail wheel endorsement and we can just practice until you are comfortable in all tail wheel skills.

Common Questions about Tail Dragger Flying and Training

Why should I get my Tail Wheel training and Endorsement?

Pilots can incredibly improve their stick and rudder skills by a couple tail wheel training flights. Old timer pilots first learned in tail draggers like the J3 Cub. You would be surprised how sloppy pilots can be with their crosswind control and flare since they learned in tricycle gear trainers. In your tail wheel training, you WILL get more capable and confident at crosswind corrections. Your pitch corrections with the glide slope, airspeed and flare control will get much smoother and more refined. These skills are easily transitioned to a C172, M20J, Twin or even a B-737.

How long is the training for the Tail Wheel sign-off?

I have seen talented pilots get the tail wheel sign-off in two lessons and others in maybe 8 lessons. The key to good training is understanding how the cosswind control inputs and rudder coordination work together for a consistent and smooth landing. Let us shoot for 4 lessons!

When I am signed off, will I always feel comfortable flying tail draggers?

You may have higher personal limitations, like 10 knots of crosswind and gusts, but on the normal MYF days you will feel safe and confidents in your landings. After a couple days of solo pattern flights, you may look forward to the higher crosswind days for pattern practice.

Tail Wheel flying sounds scary, I don’t want to do tail wheel training until I get hired by an airline, it my risk my perfect record.

Flying with some pilots in a Cessna with poor fundamentals is terrifying. Getting better flight training and improving your skills is just smart. As an instructor, I had a tail wheel mishap with an Air Force Academy cadet on spring break. He was a couple months from graduating and going to USAF Flight School. I was 2 weeks from starting at United Airlines. When I told the United hiring manager, he laughed at my worry and said that only the best pilots instruct in tail wheel and they are happy to have me onboard. The cadet never had an issue either with his Air Force record.

Good Comms/Patterns at Montgomery Field

Leather Helmets are critical to Good Comms

Do you every hear the controllers get frustrated on the radio? Do they ask you to do a Full Stop instead of a Touch and Go? Good aviation communications will help you bond well with your Air Traffic Controller where ever you fly. By working towards BREVITY, the AIM verbiage, and general professionalism, you will usually get the best service from your controller.

If you are flying Biplanes, they expect you to be Top Notch on the Radio!

Radio work is not easy: old radio’s, static, newbie’s and poor English. I am always trying to follow more of the AIM, take out poor communications habits and improve my game. Let’s point out some ways we all can improve comm’s at Montgomery Field and keep our controllers happy.

MYF PATTERN Tips and Tricks:

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• think ‘Where you are, Who you are, and What you want to do’

• Practice your comm’s at home, and say it in your head before you click the microphone switch.

• Pause/listen when you flip the frequency before you transmit, you don’t want to block someone. This situation causes enormous risk to possibly missing a critical call.

Ground Communications

Be that Professional Aviator: Set the bar high!

As biplane pilots, we try to be expeditious since we are flying quite a bit and trying to reduce wait time and fuel burn.

Gibbs ramp is an uncontrolled area, but you don’t want to block someone coming in/out from Taxiway Juliet.

PILOT: Ground Control, Great Lakes 3617L, At Gibbs, Taxi for…….., with Information Whiskey.

• taxi for…

  • Straight out, Right Downwind Departure, Left Downwind Departure (not recommended), Right or Left Closed Traffic. Or Taxi IFR.

  • Don’t ask for a Runway unless you need one for a specific reason, such as a new tailwheel pilot wanting the wide rwy, or a formation takeoff. Twr sorts it out for their flow control needs.

  • I leave the Information “Whiskey” for last, just so they don’t forget and ask me again if I have that Information. (very common)

What do you need to repeat back? Your Call-Sign and the Runway. Taxi-way instructions and waiting for another aircraft crossing at Taxiway Hotel is not a required read back item.

Approaching the Run-up or Hold Short, switch over to the Tower Frequency. 119.2 is the normal frequency, but they have increasingly been using 125.7 for the 28R only, during busy times for dual controller ops.

When you are at the Hold Short area, don’t block other aircraft. When you let the Tower Controller know you are ready, he will assign you a sequence for takeoff. Location is not important here, some Instructor’s spend extra time training the student for pre-take verbiage and run-up. Conversely, another aircraft, like a turbine, may get priority over everyone due to their IFR slot time.

If a Tower Controller asks you to ‘Standby’ when you check in, that means they are busy and you should not read that back. Zipp it!

Pilot: Tower, Great Lakes 3617L:, Holding Short 28R, Straight Out..or Right Closed Traffic or Taxiway Delta Transition.

• Tower knows you are ready to go, that is why you called. Lol.

• Give them information about your departure plans, don’t make them have to ask you.

READ BACK: your Call-Sign, CLEARANCE and RUNWAY. Don’t be that pilot that just read backs their Call-sign or something unprofessional like ‘On the Go’. We know how you are excited for takeoff, but this isn’t your first or your last rodeo. Proper Example: Great Lakes 17L, Cleared for Takeoff, 28R

Pattern Comm’s

The good thing about Landing Pattern Communications is that there are only a limited number of clearances or communications we should expect. The bad thing is that our radio’s and headsets are prone to static and interference. Additionally, our tours or flight lessons are filled with conversation and training.

• Practice a couple times before you key the microphone (including chair flying at home)

Though ‘closed pattern’ usually means you don’t need to call for Crosswind or Base Turns, the Montgomery Field pattern gets quite busy and you should be prepared to anticipate Tower Calling your Base Turn.

CrosswindTurn in close has some static from an unknown company down below.

HIGH STATIC AREA: Right Crosswind turn in the NORTH PATTERN has a horrible static area. This has been identified by many local pilots for even the best quality receivers. Depending on the controller, Tower may give you a clearance during this time. You may need to clarify if you cannot interpret the call.

Pilot (abeam without a clearance) : Tower, abeam, for the option. This is only when Tower has been quiet for some time or is on a ‘land line’. Don’t bother them when they are busy on the radio.

Pilot (Read back): Great Lakes 17L, cleared for the OPTION, RWY 28R, (Sequence Number). You must say your call-sign, the Runway and the CLEARANCE. If you forget to say the Runway, Tower will call you on it and cause excessive embarrassing coms.

Short approach is a final within 400ft. Great training for Emergency Landings.

• the ‘Option’ means Touch and Go, Full Stop, Stop and Go, & Low Approach

• ‘Sequence number’ is not required BUT lets the Controller know you have the proper sequence for base turn and situational awareness in the pattern.

• if you finished your last Touch and Go, let Tower know on the UPWIND that you are ready for a FULL STOP. This allows them to better organize their traffic flow.

After Landing: If on 28R upon landing, Tower will call you on roll-out to either HOLD SHORT 28L or Cross 28L on a certain taxi-way. As a tail dragger pilot, you may be super busy trying to control the aircraft. That is ok, pause and focus on the landing first, then either say ‘STANDBY’ or Great Lakes 3617L, Hold short 28L or Cross 28L. You need to say the Runway and clearance. This is one of the main issues we hear on the radio every day and important for our professionalism. Every time you talk runway clearances, you need to respond back with your Callsign, Runway and Clearance.

Fun Fact: Abeam the Point of landing’ is a Naval Aviation Term but it has been adopted in Aviations best practices.

Anticipating ATC’s clearances, listening up, and reading back required items are essential to a professional pilot, especially at Montgomery Field. Let’s all get better every flight.

5 Reasons to get your Tailwheel Endorsement (even if you don't plan to fly)

UP YOUR FLYING GAME!

Though it isn’t easy to master these skills, these vintage flying skills enormously help your tricycle gear flying. Between gaining confidence with cross wind corrections in the flare, to a smoother rollout and braking, the improvement makes you a more refined pilot. When you think of a tail wheel aviator, you envision a pilot that is really engaged with crosswind landings.

Supercharge your crosswind skills.

Corrections aren’t that big a deal in a Cessna but are mandatory in a tail dragger. Practice makes perfect and you can make super smooth landings with those skills in your tricycle gear aircraft and impress your examiners or passengers.

Refine your pitch and touchdown finesse.

Bouncing makes landings tougher in a tail dragger, your Tailwheel instructor with make you learn to own the concrete about an inch of the runway so you can smoothly grease your landings.

Build overall confidence in your landings, which makes them all more fun.

You do better when you are having fun right? Tail dragger pilots are always seen refining their landings because practice becomes super fun. The pilotage becomes an art.

Doors open for you to fly unique aircraft.

Aerobatic planes, biplanes, and antique aircraft start to become available for you to fly with increased tail wheel experience. You will find colleagues flying these aircraft and they love to share the aviation experience. If you are a good like-able person, many of these pilots will invite you to more tail dragger activities.

Be part of the tail dragger clique.

You can own a small swagger in your step when you build that Tailwheel time and get a bunch of tail dragger and vintage aircraft in your logbook. You can sit and learn from stories from these old timer tail wheel instructors, they will be gone before we know it.