Originally Posted by Superpilot
I try to request an approach with reduced levels of automation about once per week and even then if the weather is good. In about 400 hours of line flying, that request was refused by captains (mostly guys from the so-called brave age) with them kindly advising me: "I would rather you do that with a trainer thank you very much!".
If the captain deems it's unsafe at the moment to fly manually due to condition of aircraft, crew (fatigue!), ATC, weather, etc. he has every right to ask you to stick with the autopilot in until reasonable altitude. Maybe captain was fatigued after a week of 4 sector days and decided it would be best if use autopilot untill 500ft or so, because PM has much more work to do if PF is flying manually and situational awareness is the first to degrade. There are many reasons why you weren't allowed to fly manually, but this is hardly a forum for this debate - first chance to have a talk is during daily debrief, but if it's a more widespread problem in the company, talk to an instructor or chief pilot.
You have to be aware - it's the captain who is fully responsible for the safety of everybody on the aircraft and he's the one who signs the aircraft. Cockpit is not a democracy, although suggestions from FO should be taken into account when the captain is making critical decisions. Try not to make everything in cockpit about you, more about the entire crew and how each of them thinks and operates and you'll see that captains mostly do very good decisions based on the entire crew's input. Of course there are exceptions, but they should be in minority.
Originally Posted by Superpilot
-First turbo-prop offer May 2011
-A320 hours Aug 2011
Speakes volumes. Too "super" for a TP?
Originally Posted by Claybird
Why did you have to request such an approach and not merely just perform it? Were you not the PF?
I disagree. The amount of automation used during the approach should be covered during the approach briefing (and discussed should any questions arise). It would be extremely poor CRM if FO as PF wouldn't mention that he will disconnect AP at FL100 (perhaps suspecting captain would disagree) and then surprising the captain.