Cheap ILS practice

[nmp9440a]

Can I use any airport's ILS in uncontrolled airspace for practice without contacting ATC, and break off the approach before entering the ATZ?

Similarly can I use any airport's VOR or NDB, and practice a few holds while keeping above the top of the ATZ?

Bad not to contact ATC, I know. But I am a cheap skate and don't want to pay fees.

[niknak]

Never mind cheap skate, you sound like a complete idiot who has a complete disregard for the principles of aviation and fellow pilots, never mind their passengers.
What you are suggesting is completely ludicrous and beyond belief.

[longer ron]

Dont feed the troll :ok:

[Gulfstreamaviator]

Low power radio stations are still radiating on MW, can be used safely, and legally for practice NDB holds.

More remote VOR sites can also be used, (but beware the passing traffic).

In my day I used LGW for practice ILS, (FOC)...... but that was before the invention of traffic at LGW.

MS FS is a very good tool to practice holds, and almost FOC.

Not such a stupid answer to a stupid question, I hope.

glf

[IO540]

Can I use any airport's ILS in uncontrolled airspace for practice without contacting ATC, and break off the approach before entering the ATZ?

Legally yes (I think, Class G) but it would be stupid to do so because - in the UK - the unit there is highly unlikely to have any radar coverage.

Similarly can I use any airport's VOR or NDB, and practice a few holds while keeping above the top of the ATZ?

Again yes, in Class G, if you are above the ATZ (2000ft AGL) but again it would be stupid, for the same reason. But using these navaids at a suitable distance is obviously fine. OTOH why bother, when there are plenty of VORs and NDBs which are not at airports and you can just pretend they are? Plenty of people have practiced VOR procedures around Seaford for example. Obviously you want to do it away from GA traffic (which means well above 2000ft ;) ) and as high as possible, and in VMC and keeping a lookout.

[kharmael]

Alternatively, just decide on a point in space at a random range and radial from a known facility and make that your "Beacon". i.e. make OTR/090R/50 your Beacon and practise holds over the sea :rolleyes:

[Pace]

NMP

It is perfectly legal for you to use the ILS free of charge without telling ATC.
If you are flying visual circuits at that airport there is nothing to stop you dialling in the ILS and using it for localiser and glideslope guidance for your visual approach to landing.

Apart from helping you with the glidesope you can also practice keeping the needles locked. But as part of a normal circuit.

Flying a visual join at an airport I will often dial in the ILS to assist with centreline and glide positioning and I would call that good practice.

Pace

[BackPacker]

Can I use any airport's ILS in uncontrolled airspace for practice without contacting ATC, and break off the approach before entering the ATZ?

Another factor to consider here is that the ILS beam "narrows down" the closer you get to the ground. A slight deviation off the centerline, or off the glidescope, leads to a far greater deflection on the dial when near the ground, compared to higher up.

So practicing an ILS approach well away from the field (outside the ATZ) isn't nearly as fun/serious/hard/effective as flying the ILS all the way down to minima.

[Jim59]

What is proposed is illegal. Rule of the air 24 covers this point and among other things states that ATC must have been previously informed. (See CAP 393.)

In any case its is not in your interests or those of anybody else to muck about on a notified instrument approach outside controlled airspace. You are giving the airport operator a good justification to apply for a class D zone that will screw us all.

[Halfbaked_Boy]

I can understand where the OP is coming from - the fees for using a service that is radiating energy whether anyone is using it or not, are disgraceful.

But in saying that, what you are proposing is not just illegal (as above poster mentions), but dangerous. Consider St Mawgan (Newquay) as an example. Sure, outside the 2.5 NM ATZ you're in Class G, but Ryanair fly their 737s within G airspace in order to reach the ILS... Amongst all manner of other flying machines you may encounter along the localiser/glidepath!

Best answer I think has again already been mentioned - find an airfield with an ILS, tell them you want to practice circuits/T+Gs etc, and just dial in the ILS freq and use that for the approach, with a safety pilot sat next to you for visual lookout.

:)

[IO540]

It may be stupid (it is stupid) but it isn't actually illegal to loiter outside the ATZ of a Class G airport.

Class G is Class G :ugh:

If this was not so, every pilot flying around Biggin, or Shoreham, etc, etc, etc, etc (repeat for every Class G airport in the UK) would be prosecuted. And there would be loads and loads of them.

Is it more dangerous to fly right across the instrument approach path of some Class G airport (which could happen some quite suprising distance away - hands up all those who have actually looked up the ILS for Lydd whose DME arc starts somewhere in Finland) which happens all the time, and can be pretty hazardous (see that ILS calibration flight mid-air for one recent example), or flying the ILS right in front or right behind somebody else? Both are pretty stupid.

But the vast majority of plain PPLs have little clue what an instrument approach is, and since they are not marked on the map (some are indicated with the chevrons) the airspace is fair game for all.

That's before one gets onto all those airfields without published approaches, where people fly DIY approaches ;)

The veneer of safety/security represented by ATC in Class G is very thin indeed.

If it was not for UK ATC accounting and other practices, every tower could have a radar screen, for the cost of an internet connection and a laptop. Then, subject to transponder carriage, an ATC clearance to fly the approach might mean something useful.

[BillieBob]

It may be stupid (it is stupid) but it isn't actually illegal to loiter outside the ATZ of a Class G airport.Nobody said that it was, did they? It is illegal, however, to make use of any radio navigation aid without complying with such restrictions and procedures as may be notified in relation to that aid (Rule 22) and it is illegal to carry out an instrument approach practice in VMC unless the appropriate air traffic control unit has previously been informed (Rule 24).

[A and C]

I find it hard to see any value in the flying that this guy wants to do, any idiot can track an ILS outside the ATZ, it is tracking the ILS between 700 & 200ft that takes the skill and so that is what requires the practice.

It would seem to me that the guy starting this post is trying to save £20 and paying £200 to do it........................ and then not getting any thing worthwile for it!

So if you want to get good value for money and real ILS practice take yourself of to LFAC for the day.

[Torque Tonight]

If you wanted to maximize your chances of a midair collision, this would be quite a good way of doing it.

[Mike Parsons]

How about try it at home, on a sim - all the way to the runway!

[Golf-Sierra]

The original poster might be a bit of a troll, but maybe he's picked up on a good point here?

Why can't just about every training airfield be equipped with a training ILS system? For the sake of safety let's call it non-certified and allow it to be only active during VMC conditions. Pilot's under training could use it with a vision obscurring device and with an instructor on board. Everyone else could just use it to practice.

I've seen a 500USD ILS capable handheld reciever advertised somewhere, surely people in some place like China can build an ILS transmitter for say 5000 USD.

[jollyrog]

Yes, go ahead. Nobody will mind.

[Barnaby the Bear]

I can understand where the OP is coming from - the fees for using a service that is radiating energy whether anyone is using it or not, are disgraceful.

And clearly you have no idea how much it costs an operator to install and maintain such a facility. :}

nmp9440a don't be so tight, you may save a few pounds but the guy you delay because of an unknown (you) won't be so pleased (That could be you one day).
And at the non radar units you could potentially pose a far more dangerous threat.
Holding overhead a facility (especially at an airfield with a published hold) without talking to anyone is also poor airmanship in my humble opinion.
The Chevrons on the charts and facilities are there for a good reason.
It's posts like that that can only serve to strengthen the applications for Class D around regional Airports, as another poster suggested earlier. :ok:

[Saab Dastard]

This is the same chap who posted this troll as well
A pilots race/ethnicity

like it was suggested right at the top of the thread- don't feed the guy.

Not sure why his post count is only showing "1".

He has a habit of deleting the threads he starts, e.g. "Instrument Rating in a Cessna 172" and "Overhead join" here in PF, and "Can UK ATC cope with IFR and VFR flight mixing?" in the ATC forum to mention recent examples.

SD

[OpenCirrus619]

On a more positive vein....

If you fly in the SE and want to make a number of ILS approaches pop over to Le Touquet. Unless it's changed you can fly as many approaches as you want, land for lunch and then fly some more before coming home. The cost...ONE (very reasonable) landing fee.

...of course it does help that the people I know, who do this, are based in Kent - less than 30mins flying from Le Touquet.

OC619