Drivez: For me 500ft is my target, and I do it well consistently. And guess what: the ground is at 0ft, not at 499ft. If you need to aim at 1000ft to be stable at 500ft on a routine basis, I seriously doubt your ability to control the aircraft you are in charge of... I know WAY BEFORE the 500ft gate if I'm gonna be stable or not. And I always act accordingly. My guess is you never handfly... Let me tell you one thing: when I fly, the safety of the aircraft, the passengers and the crew come first. But I'm a professional, and I'm honing my skills daily. A concept most airline pilots are not familiar with I'm afraid (one of the main reasons of degrading skills)...If you think 3000ft stable is safer than 500ft, you are fooling yourself. Its not less safe, but not more safe either!
Thanks for the insight in to my professional flying ability. I also know well before 500 feet whether I am likely to be stable or not, that was not my point. My point was that 500' is a limit for being stable not a point to consistently aim as making it at. I have no doubt (or at least like to think) the safety of your passengers come first but you miss an important point here when claiming your bravado style of flying is a way of testing your skills and not becoming a child of the magenta line.
No I do not need to aim for 1000 to be stable by 500 although my airline does encourage this, as it makes the flight below 1000' less busy, far more controlled, and capacity far greater rather than fighting to get stable.
I regularly hand fly the aircraft, RD ILS (no I don't keep the FD) etc. and the other day I disconnected shortly after leaving the cruise and flew the aircraft in. On every occasion I do this though there is something in common, the weather is reasonably good, traffic conditions are light, and I consider my colleague, brief them thoroughly, and only do it when I consider me practicing my hand flying skill is not going to place undue strain on my colleague. In other words ensuring none of those pesky Swiss cheese holes have even the slightest chance of lining up before I even slightly lower my capacity.
My guess is FO's hate flying with you because every approach as they approach 6-700 feet they are tensing wondering if you'll make it stable this time. On that note I would love to know which airline you fly for, so I can avoid it.
My other guess though, we're feeding a troll.