kitcarguy wrote:Any advice?
You bet! First of all, don't let this intimidate you. Everybody hits this roadblock, we've all gotten past it, and not one of us is any more capable or intelligent than you.
Second, it helps if you understand the purpose of radio work. It's all about collision avoidance, so it's kind of a big deal. When you drive, what keeps you clear of other traffic is road design. You have pavement below you to reduce driving to a (mostly) two-dimensional problem. You have lane markings to tell you where to be, road signs to tell you where to go, and traffic lights to tell you when it's (allegedly) safe. And, all the other drivers have the same advantages, so keeping cars separated doesn't require talking to each other (or to a traffic controller) on the radio.
Not so simple when flying. The airspace is three-dimensional, the traffic lights never work, and the lane markings keep falling out of the sky. So, we depend upon communications to keep traffic separated. And, to make sure we all understand each other, we communicate in a secret language. Once you've learned that language, it all becomes intuitive.
It helps if you know in advance what things you're going to say, and in what order. It helps the other pilots anticipate and understand, if they know in advance what things you're going to say, and in what order. And, it helps you to understand other pilots if you know in advance that they're going to say those same things, in the same order.
Now, what are those things, and what is the standard order in which to say them? Let's break it down to a five-step recipe. Every radio call includes:
Who you're calling
Who you are
Where you are
What you're doing
What you want
And, since a given frequency is often shared by multiple airports, it's common practice to add that first item ( who you're calling) to the end of the transmission as well, so folks at your airport perk up their ears, and those at other airports can disregard.
Let's take those items one at a time.
Who you're calling, in the pattern at a non-towered airport, is other traffic at that airport. At KLHV, for example, we start with "Lock Haven traffic".
Who you are has been a topic much discussed recently in another thread. Some like to use make, model, and callsign, as in "Evektor SportStar November Six Six Alpha Victor." This is what ATC usually likes to hear at a towered airport. With no tower, safety is enhanced by telling others what you look like (for example, "red low wing") or how you perform (such as "light sport" or "experimental"). I don't favor using callsigns in a non-ATC environment, because it just clutters up the frequency and provides no useful information. Others here disagree, and it's been argued that the FARs or FCC regs require a callsign. I leave that debate for another thread.
Where you are is your location in the traffic pattern or practice area. "Holding short of 27 Right" is self-evident (and doesn't require you to state altitude, since you're probably on the ground). "left base for runway 9" also needs no explanation, and it implies you're at proper pattern altitude. If you're practicing stalls or steep turns, "in the practice area at 4000 feet" should be pretty clear.
What you're doing is sometimes implied by where you are, but if in doubt, add it. Example: "maneuvering," "pattern practice," "taking off 25" "landing 07", etc.
What you want gives a hint to the other pilot of what to expect from you next. Sometimes, what you're doing implies this, or makes it obvious. Other times, you have to be explicit, as in "departing the pattern straight out" or "descending to 2000 feet".
Finally, since we're sharing the frequency with several other nearby airports, your location again at the end ("Lock Haven") avoids confusion.
Try this: using the above recipe, practice flying the pattern in your head, and say every traffic call out loud - not in the plane, but at home in a comfy chair. Make calls holding short, rolling for takeoff, turning crosswind, turning downwind, turning base, turning final, on short final, and clear of the runway. Do it over and over again until it becomes automatic. Then, listen to pattern traffic on an aviation handheld, scanner, or ATC website, noticing if other pilots follow the same recipe (all should, and some actually do!). If they flub, you can learn from their mistakes instead of your own.
I have a PowerPoint lesson on my website that covers all of this, along with traffic pattern procedures. See
http://avsport.org/pwrpoint/lesson03.pps. Hope this helps.
Most importantly, don't get discouraged!
For whatever reason they make me really uncomfortable. I did some pattern work this morning with my instructor and was reluctantly doing them. About 45 minutes later we went up again and left for the practice area. He asked me to make a call, and I could not. Knew what I needed to say, just could not spit it out. No matter how many times he explained it I just could not. He proceeded to take the controls, and say he will fly and I make the calls. At that point I told him I could not do it and to just go ahead head back to the airport because I was done for the day.
