preparation for the IR

[flighttime2.0]

Hi guy's/girls

Im starting my Ir in the new year and would appreciate some advise on what I could do in advance to prepare for it as in books/cd rom's ect ! thanks flighttime2.0

[expedite_climb]

Its a bit different to when I did it; i.e. there is much more flying that HAS to be done before you can test (when I did it, you did the test as soon as you were ready - CAA post 700hrs).

I called up the school to find out likely airfields and routes I would be using, and then flew all these procedurally in flight sim, as well as practiced holding with different winds and assessing my performance with the tracking. The 172 RG gives similar performance to a light twin.

You will not learn anything about flying flight sim, so use the automatics, then when you are paying X hundred per hour on the a/c, you will know your route / procedure inside out and not waste time / money on mistakes due to lack of knowledge. In addition, your capacity to fly the a/c should be improved.

I reckon so anyways....

[avrodamo]

I have just finished my IR, so its all pretty fresh in my mind. I began studying for my IR about 3 months before starting for the course. First thing i did is made sure i had a real good understanding of what the VOR and ADF were telling me. Understanding how to mentally see yourself from just looking at the instrument. I found very few books that were helpful. One book though i found very useful, and gave me many handy tips. This is a book called Never Get Lost by Willhelm Thaller. The german translation is a bit ropey in places, but the diagrams and explanations were superb. It really helped me, and its got progress tests to do in it.
I also had a real good look at plates, and tried to work out exactly what they are telling you. Get your old Jeppessen student manual out and look at that. Have a good look through the keys for airways charts, so you have a good understanding of the minima. Refresh yourself on the minima for precision and non-precision approaches, and for the minima applied to a particular nav aid. Have a good understanding of holds and the correct entry. They can be a pain, and if you have a good understanding it really will help.
Try and get a copy of the aircraft checklist and learn all the V speeds, power settings and airborne checks. That really does help.

[fescalised portion]

Try and lay off the Guinness Del boy!!

[too_sleepy]

Hi

Although I'm quite a way off my IR, I wanted to understand charts better. I never find it useful just to look at the charts so I'm using MS Flight Sim and have bought Jeppesen Sim Charts. When I'm flying around London in Flight Sim I can call up any chart, SID, STAR or airport diagram, all in game. One other great feature is when you're flying an approach you can see a little aircraft logo on the STAR chart, so you can see how bad you're doing. I know it's not the same as flying them for real, but you sure do learn how these charts work very quickly.

[flighttime2.0]

thanks for the advise guy's but as for laying off on the guinness " i don't think so " ...

[PPRuNe Towers]

Don't get swamped by plates while paying through the nose. Learn to dissect them in your own time as a simplified discipline.

Use lots of different approach plates learning to get the important stuff and avoid become visually overloaded. The 'new' Jepp format helps instill the thought process then you can work on spotting the 'gotcha's on any plate. Any other format then becomes much simpler to analyse.

Test yourself by drawing the approach including the vital parts for you as the pilot rather than onlooker. This isn't recommended in public but copy the hard won skills of aerobatic pilots and skydivers by flying the procedure with your hand in front of you. Sounds and looks daft but an utterly proven technique in understanding and imprinting 2 and 3 dimensional flight.

It is a basic part of most people's perception that each plate is an entirely unique series of patterns and requirements. Each plate appears paralysingly different from the last one you looked at. This is not the case - it's simply new to you and you have yet to learn a new way of reading and analysing data as with sheet music.

So, a hold is a hold is a hold, only a few details matter. An ILS is an ILS - find what counts. Unless going around an approach consists of turning, flying straight and descending an aeroplane with occasional periods flying level. Sometimes you have to do two of these things at the same time! If you're clever you can sometimes find study of the plate allows you to organise it so you revert to just doing one at a time. This is a good thing. This will help.

The missed approach is the part of the plate that will save your life not an afterthought. The initial part of it is therefore vital particularly including aid pre selection.

PC based sims are great value for procedural work - just turn off all the eye candy. A 10 year old basic sim along the lines of RANT or IFT Pro gives far more training value than any of the modern ones. You are totally isolated and have to learn the vital basics in your own time and for almost nothing.

I am the original 'average' pilot but got a first time pass in the absolute minimum legal time. 6 hours plus test it was then. I achieved this through doing 140 totally structured hours on a home computer with no hard drive and a 12 inch monochrome monitor. Operating system on one floppy, sim software on a second. Any desktop sim then or now does not teach you to fly but tracking, intercepting, timing and discipline becomes second nature long before an FTO accounting ledger starts ticking.

Regards
Rob Lloyd

PS Final top tip time. Don't repeat the same routes again and again in your own time. The schools often train you up for canned routes. They have reasons they consider both sound and valid. This makes it tempting to do the same in your practice.

However, here in the real world of professional aviation we don't have that luxury. Routes, destinations and routings are a little more dynamic that that. Constantly ring the changes on where you go and procedures you fly so you can develop the metal agility to cope with plan B suddenly being thrust in your lap. It happens, it happens every single day flying the line and that's where you want to be isn't it??

[Tinstaafl]

What Rob says is important: DON'T train yourself to be a specialist for half a dozen or so approaches on known training & testing routes. You have to be a generalist ie be able to do any approach that happens to be at the end of one of your (future) many & varied flights.

Ditto the use of an old PC sim. I used one on a Commodore 64 at the school & at home. It had no scenery, just a basic instrument panel. The goal isn't to use it to learn to fly but instead to 'pre learn' those instrument skills that don't need an a/c at $$$$/min. eg interpreting the plates, intuitive ADF orientation, procedures & some general techniques etc etc etc. You don't need fancy scenery or realistic instrument panel pictures or throttle levers for this.

Once these skill are learnt then you won't have to learn them from scratch while you're learning to cope with the variabilities of the aircraft environment. It's a form of 'chaining', to use 'education speak'.

[Maxiumus]

Purchase a good leather flying helmet, WW2 goggles and a silk scarf. The examiner really wants to see that you look a pilot at least.