Timed Turns

[flyingdogguitar]

Hi,
When the instructor says "turn onto a heading of XXX, how long will this take at rate one?"
Are there any tricks of the trade, to calculte timings?



Cheers

Dave

[loftustb]

Rate 1:

360 degrees in 2 minutes
180 degrees in 1 minute (60 seconds)
30 degrees in 10 seconds

To execute timed turns, use a nav instrument. Set your present heading at the top then work out which way to turn onto the heading you require (shortest route unless the instructor/examiner specifies otherwise). Segments of 30 degrees are easy to read from the compass rose on the nav instrument and each one takes 10 seconds. Quick bit of mental arithmetic, click the stopwatch and off you go - keeping an eye on the turn co-ordinator to make sure that you are maintaining a Rate 1 turn. Click the stopwatch and level wings. Let the compass settle and if you need to adjust, repeat the process until you're where you want to be. Might take two or three attempts. Some pilots turn and then start the watch - personal preference.

For small adjustments, (eg 20 degrees in 6 seconds) count the seconds in your head rather than use the stopwatch.

[Tinstaafl]

No. of degrees to turn divided by 3 = seconds to turn @ rate 1.

Use anything with a compass rose on it to help figure out how many degrees to turn. It's easier to do with a 'DI' style compass than the standard wet compass restricted view.

A DI style rose also helps orient WRT to the shortest direction of turn.

Count of divisions helps, as suggested above. If you can see a compass rose then you can shortcut the counting of divisions if you can recognise when there's an easily divisible combination of divisions eg 360 --> 090 is of course 90 deg to turn and easily divisible by 3. Similarly if you're starting from, say, a couple of divisions before the 360 mark then the same number of divisions prior to 090 is also 90 deg.

I prefer to start timing as I commence the roll to turn. At the end of the timing I start the roll to wings level. I try to keep the roll-in & roll-out at approx the same rate. The slight extra bit of turn - while still with an amount of AoB at the end of the timing - compensates to some amount for the slightly slower rate of turn at the beginning prior to achieving a Rate 1 angle of bank.