You call people lazy or stupid for doing so and that's when you get students belting off to the training area without the maximum amount of knowledge they could have under their belts
WHAT----A-----LOAD-----OF-----CRAP!
To say that a student pilot or any other pilot, for that matter may "belt off to the taining area without the maximum amount of knowledge under their belt" for fear of being ridiculed at asking questions is an insult to your fellow aviator.
There is no place, regardless of aptitude or work ethic for someone to get in a plane, whether it be a C152 or a 744 without knowing how the aircraft systems operate, at least to the extent that the given system is explained in the POH.
In most light aircraft there is little more than a couple of paragraphs or pages on each system, its not that hard.
You should and must ask questions, you should and must also beforehand RTFM simply because when being interviewed by CASA as to why everything went pear shaped, if your reference to aircraft technical information is your mate LUCKY THE PILOT that "told you so" on PPRUNE you will not only have blood on your hands, you will, and should have you licence cancelled.
SOME (but not many) of the questions that were asked are NOT in the manual and if ever in doubt, or you just wish to expand your knowledge, you should talk to your instructor, chief pilot, engineer, etc at the very least you should talk to a pilot with time on type, who's reputation and experience you can vouch for. Anything less is to rely on hearsay.
I do not mean to suggest that anyone on PPRUNE would intentionally derail your prefered method of learning. Some may well have misguided intentions. For example with regard to the PA-31 and PA-31-350 one has couter-rotating propellers the other has a critical engine....as to which one you will have to look that up (yes it does tell you in the manual) if you rely on what you read here you may well get inacurate information from someone who has flown one but not the other.
Downwind,
I'm sorry mate, but you have obviously picked up the manual flicked through a couple of pages, yawned a few times and figured it was easier to source what you were after on PPRUNE.
If you are lucky enough to be in a position to be flying a PA-31 it will no doubt be in some sort of professional capacity, treat it as such, you are not a cook in a kitchen pondering the quantity of raspberry coulis required to adaquetly decorate your torte.
Your passengers will be expecting that you have a thorough knowledge of not only the answers to the questions on the standard CASA questionnaire, but the rest of the manual.
Don't dissapoint them
Willie.
There is nothing quite as useless as a meaningless maxim