To log or not to log

[JamesBiggles]

Picture the following charter scene at a busy regional airport flying a Baron58:

You sign on an hour before departure.
Pax arrive, you welcome them load them and their baggage and hop into the hot seat.
Masters on, avionics on, call for start....the clock is ticking
3 minutes pass and start is approved.
Avionics off and start as normal.
Avionics on, call for taxi and taxi is approved.
Taxi to the hold and pre-flight checks completed including power checks, another 9 minutes have passed.
Clearance provided, await landing aircraft to clear runway and cleared for take off.
Advance throttles (power lever if you are in a jet), 85kt, rotate, blue line, gear up, another 6 minutes have passed.
18 minutes or 0.3 hours have passed before the hobbs in the aircraft is turning.
1 hour 30 min you are overhead the field for a NDB let down.
Due terrain the let down starts at 8000' and field elevation is 2000'
With gear and flap out to slow you down, the hobbs is no longer turning. You fly the complete let down in this configuration.
The let down, landing and taxi to parking bay with subsequent shut down takes another 12 minutes.
We now have 0.3 at the start, 1.5 "flying hours" or in the climb and cruise and 0.2 for the let down, taxi and parking.
My question is do you log 2 hours at the controls or 1.5 as per the hobbs.
I have heard opposing views on this scenario.
Any air law boffins input would be appreciated.

[Solid Rust Twotter]

Can't go wrong logging what's in the tech log.

[Sand fly]

No law boffin but has always logged Chock to chock

[Carrier]

Remember SUDS. No, not beer! SUDS refers to the times a pilot should record for each flight.

Start - when you start the first engine
Up - when the wheels leave the runway
Down - When the wheels touch the runway
Stop - When the engines are shut down

Start to Stop is the Flight Time, from when the/an engine is first started for purposes of flight to when it is turned off at the end of the flight. You record flight time in your personal logbook. Up to Down is the Air Time. Both flight time and air time should be recorded in the aircraft’s Journey Log, with air time being used to keep a running total of airframe time.
Long experience has shown that flight time is normally 0.2 longer than air time. Many pilots just record air time and add 0.2 to obtain flight time. This assumes that you do not do a runup for that flight/leg. A run-up and checks takes extra time so it is normal to add 0.3 instead of 0.2 to the air time of the first flight of the day.

The majority of pilots, companies and civil aviation agencies accept the above. Some authorities regard flight time as commencing when an aircraft first moves for the purposes of flight to when it stops but most people do not split hairs to that extent.

[I.R.PIRATE]

Yup, we log similar to SUDS times.

Start
Off Blocks
On Blocks
Shutdown


For logbook purposes, I use the block time.

[Propellerpilot]

Yes similar to SUDS:

Offblock Time UTC
Take Off Time UTC
Landing Time UTC
Onblock Time UTC

All taken from the GPS as real hours and minutes, as decimal time is not as fine a unit (only moves every 6 minutes if you don't take the 1/10 into account). Over thousands of hours it certainly makes a small difference of +/- 15 hrs. A lot of GA aircraft tachos and hobbs meters run slow or fast and need calibration.

I also log each flight seperatly, even if it is a short positioning hop. I know some pilots in SA that only log the total hobbs time of that particular day, with no real indications where they have flown to and no UTC times whatsoever.

[theBOSS]

i always thought a jet had thrust levers?

[Goffel]

Suitcaseman.

I have to get in before the Cavorting Spotty gives us all an English lesson........but what you are refering to, is Flight time....NOT log book time.

Log book time is when you are in control of the beast...start to shutdown....
(me thinks you put finger to keyboard before engaging and then though...Ooooooh sheeet, did I really write that without reading properly...eisch.....hope Spotty is asleep).:ok:

Goffel....and no, I am not a pilot.

[JamesBiggles]

Yes, thank you, thrust levers not power levers on jets. Sorry. I reckon I am going with the chock to chock respone which is what I have always done in any event. Just wanted some other views/opinions.

[helldog]

Log hard:ok:

[JamesBiggles]

Suitcaseman, maybe I am missing something here. You do refer to chock to chock time and airbourne time in your original post. You do not however say which should be logged in ones logbook. From your last post it would appear to me as if you are saying you can only log your airbourne time but that is not clear either. So which is it? Remember also that you can fly a full approach with the gear down and according to the hobbs meter not have logged any time.

[Avvy]

Log it all. When you start training, the hobbs starts ticking over the second the engine starts, you pay per 0.1 there. So why is it different on a different aircraft.

[cavortingcheetah]

:hmm:

Yes that is all very well but what then happens if on taxi in the APU is cranked up. Many SOPs require a pilot to be on the flight deck at all times while an APU is running, just in case of fire. So then, if there is no ground power available on a turn around and the APU is left running, technically shut down has never taken place. Of course the pilots might have to change over in the cockpit on the ground, while the APU is running, if they have to change places so that one or other of them can go to relieve themselves, with or without the hostess in attendance. In those cases one would always hope that the captain would be generous enough to pretend that the first officer had remained on the flight deck throughout, thus enabling him to log the total time from start up to eventual shut down of the final and absolutely last engine turning?
Best thing to do really in these days of strictly monitored duty time, is log in the log book just exactly that, the whole duty time from report to sign off. That removes any ambiguity? Does it not?;)

[cavortingcheetah]

:ooh:

That'll be sitting at EHAM, smoking straight Lebanese Blond, no tobacco mix permitted because the public smoking of that weed is illegal in jolly old Holland, whereas the Afghan Black and its like is not, all rolled up in pages torn from my international collection of ANRs?:eek:

[birrddog]

My advice would be if logging a time different to the hobs time / tech log time, you make a note of the difference and the reason. (e.g. gear up/down vs. engine start to stop)

It would make things a lot easier if your logbook ever got audited against a tech log and then you need to start explaining the discrepancies.

It seems reasonable to log the time you are "on duty" once the aircraft engine starts until shutdown.

Can someone here please enlighten me how flight duty time is defined by the big airlines? (and how it may differ from time logged operating aircraft type)

--
Birrddog

[cavortingcheetah]

:hmm:

The orignal question was posed in respect of a Baron 58. In the old days of charter we just used to log off chocks to on chocks. Then after shut down the tach time was entered in the aircraft logbook, to be checked by the next pilot before any subsequent flight.
In somewhat larger machines, and depending upon operator, the take off to touch down times are entered in the aircraft technical log to assist engineering in the compilation of their highly sophisticated maintainance calculations.
Off chocks to on chocks was what went in the pilots' log books and in the company journey log as well as the airborne times.
In practice one has to admit that after a long hard six sector day banging through the northern winters, the on chock time was often just rounded up to the nearest five minutes or so to make the final, agonizing additions required that much easier. It all evened out in the long run.
Having recently rewritten SA Air Law and Procedures I am pleased to say that I do not have my notes with me and so cannot check the precise definitions. Have to say though that I found the new (to me who previously wrote Air Law in 1976) syllabus to be emminently sensible and of much more practical use that the old one which was really nothing more than a ghastly memory exercise,
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Flight Duty Time.

Usually in one's limited experience the time used to calculate the duty time in respect of calculating subsequent rest periods.
It depends rather on the company and by all accounts some, such as in India are rather extracting the last juiceical drop.
Generally it was one hour or forty five minutes before scheduled airborne time to half an hour after actual on chocks time at the end of one's final flight of the day. :)

[Solid Rust Twotter]

Log what goes in the tech log. Saves hassle and easy to check.

[cavortingcheetah]

:hmm:

Not so sure about that actually.
If you fly 200 days a year at 4 sectors a day and you add five minutes each side of a sector to represent taxi time from touch down to on chocks, that makes a total of 800 minutes of non flight, engine running time. That amounts to 133 hours? That's a lot in a year to someone chasing the time for a higher licence.:confused:

[Sir Osis of the river]

Chock to chock.

That is what works, and that is what the airlines want to see.

What goes in the a/c logbook is flight time and this is what the owner pays maintenance on.

The moment the push back starts, start logging! If flying a general aviation a/c, (baron with no push back), work it out for yourself. How long do really sit with motors running before you taxi?? Use your discretion and dont cook the books and you will be ok.

Honesty counts :D

[planecrazi]

Sir Osis,

Chock to chocks heah!:O

Do my 20 compass swings count?:}

Chock to chocks with intention of flight is what is logged in it's most basic idea. In the airline we start the clock when releasing the park brake for the pushback and stop the clock in the bay on the stop position. This is what counts for the log book. The maintenance counts the lift off to landing. When doing ULR (ultra long range, 17 hours endurance on pushback for 15;30 hour flight to Toronto one way, in winter) we are only allowed to log 75% of the total trip time. Boss doesn't want us to count the bunk time, so he can work us one more flight in a month. Now you can 125 hours and only count 100 in the logbook. This is unfair, the laws never changed, just the bosses!

No cheating in the Airbus, the crew schedulers have all the details before you request push and have it in the AIMS already and the Chief pilot is watching the fuel so tightly:E, you can't spend another minute longer in the air anyway!:{

[Check Airman]

Make a note in the log that this hobbs only works with the gear up. Log the entire flight as shown on your watch. The logbook entry should cover your ass.

[Goffel]

General Aviation...log start up to shut down.....airlines, I think, log push back to in the bay.
The law does not say you cannot log start to shut down...reason being someone has to be in charge of the aircraft, and if you are now in charge of an aircraft that is running and intended for flight, you are in charge...you log it.
If for some reason you prefer to log chock to chock, gear up to gear down, take off to touch down, be my guest....which ever way you look at it, there is no wrong answer.

Suitcaseman, I was just tweeking your ears there as I knew that we would all get an English lesson on the original Indian dung that is somewhat brewed and puffed.

But then again, lets get like some of the airline captains and just log dual for every flight we do anyway..gets our instructional time up..and who knows..we might all get grade 1's...:=

Goffel

[Bartholomew]

Somewhere in my distant past, it was mentioned "when the aircraft moves under it's own power (ie after push-back is completed) until it's final stop (in the bay). Too damn hard. I do blocks off to blocks on. However, I have known people flying C206's to log 30min prior start-up to 30min post shut-down := (yes, I know, you get them everywhere).

I've even seen people fly 2 sectors, then dead-head the next 2, and log the lot! Sometimes, the world is just too full of people like this... I've been told "it'll come back and bite them"... I'm still waiting to see a Parker-boy get busted!

In addition, one of them even went back and logged every second leg as PIC after he found some obscure ruling that said when you have the type as P1, you can log the leg you fly as PIC!!! IMHO, the guy who signs the log book is PIC. Only him - he's gonna take the wrap if it goes pear shaped - needless to say, he's Cpt Popularity/I'm So Smooth I Slide Uphill/ Looking For The Next Job Which Becomes Available :mad:

In a Baron, start to stop.

Cheers

[B Sousa]

Fly what you have too,
Log what you need............:D:D

[Avi8tor]

he found some obscure ruling that said when you have the type as P1, you can log the leg you fly as PIC!!!Seem to think you could count it ALL, not only the leg where u were PF. However you had to have an ATP to do that. ie. the time was not towards a higher licence.

I remember a First Officer at Airlink going for a EK interview with a logbook full of E135 command time. This after he failed his upgrade. Same loop hole.

NOTE to DE's:- DONT sign a guy out P1 if he has trained in the sim as P2!!

NOT the case in 61.01.7(7)

[Bucket]

The law is completely clear on this and there is no ambiguity about it. You are only allowed to log chock to chock ie from when the aircraft first moves under its own power to when it comes to a rest. That's it. Fiddle your log books at your peril; I have seen it done. Weren't they called Parker Pen hours. Those that do are usually the lower time guys chasing every 0.1 of an hour they can get. Even some training schools spout forth non-sense about this.

:ok: