Check Rides with renting a plane [Archive]

Genghis the Engineer

14th Jan 2011, 14:29

I have a JAA CPL, plus an FAA PPL and have been flying for 21 years.

In that time, I think there have been three occasions where I've been allowed to rent an aeroplane without a checkout. On each of those - all in the UK and since I passed four figures in my logbook, I produced logbook evidence that I was very recent on the same type somewhere else and was known by professional reputation.

Given your minimal experience and hours, I'd not expect any slack at all in your case. This is exaccerbated by the fact that your profile suggests you trained recently by the integrated route, and so probably have limited experience of real light aircraft operations, so rather more than a simple checkout is likely to be required. There's also issues of local airfield / club practices that you need to be familiarised with, and clearly they need to be happy that you can fly as well.

Sorry old chap, but that's just how it is.

G

cloud9dk

14th Jan 2011, 14:40

Thanks for the response Genghis,

You are right, I did go along the integrated route.
I can understand where the flying clubs come from on this matter as they want to protect their investment. If flying clubs recognised each other though and the checks that each one does then this would save people such as yourself who obviously has done a lot of flying a lot of hassle and expense.
Say if I these flying clubs were part of a membership, a society that if you flew with one of these members then you wouldnt need to do a check ride if you then flew with another member.
I am not however advocating that these clubs let anyone fly a plane solo. We want to keep the skies safe after all!

cloud9dk

14th Jan 2011, 14:44

by the way, I wasnt speaking of myself in thinking that I have a lot of experience. I recognise that 200 hours it at the very bottom of the scale and there is a long way to go yet.

Genghis the Engineer

14th Jan 2011, 14:52

I can see where you're coming from, but a lot of it is about locality, and there's no minimum length of checkout.

I've done checkouts which were essential a wide circuit, and others that went to a couple of hours. Standards are not universal, but equally aeroplanes vary a lot, and so do airfields. I recall a very long checkout for example at Long Beach - which was about 10 minutes to see if I could handle the aeroplane, and a couple of hours teaching me to deal with the local (and horrible) procedures and airspace. It might also cover some unusual instruments in the aeroplane, local noise avoidance rules, refuelling practices and suchlike.

So, to be honest, no I can't see checkout-free rental happening very often, in any club or at any airfield.

G

cloud9dk

14th Jan 2011, 14:59

If for the UK something was able to happen, would it be something you and your colleagues would be interested in?
Ie paying an annual membership where you would be able to rent the planes in the UK subject to certain conditions?

1: you are legally current on the aircraft
2: you flew with another member of this group in those 3 months as a check
3: you provide logbook evidence to the flying club

Whirlygig

14th Jan 2011, 17:37

It may also depend on the stipulations under the school's insurance policy.

Cheers

Whirls

cloud9dk

16th Jan 2011, 20:14

Thats very true on the rule for passengers, but I am also thinking of the minimums of what flying clubs will want and what many peope rent planes for, enjoyment to share with their friends and family.

redsnail

16th Jan 2011, 22:52

Cloud, as you've gathered, you'll need to do a check ride.
So, rather than "fight" the process just make sure you know as much as you can about the a/c. :)
You'll enjoy it and definitely use it as a chance to learn stuff. :ok:

Big Pistons Forever

17th Jan 2011, 03:48

I have done a lot of renter check outs over the years. Some of the least fun have been with new CPL's from College programs ( the Canadian equivalent of UK integrated programs) who have drunk the school cool aid and think they know everything because they are a product of the XXXXXX school program. I remember one young sky god that was horrified that he was actually required to fuel the aircraft himself and just could not just tell the dispatcher what fuel load he required :rolleyes:

My experience is the length (and therefore the cost) of the checkout was directly related to the amount of preparation the person put in. Those that made an effort to learn the club procedures, review the airspace, had a good handle on the POH and kept their ears open and their mouth shut usually had a pretty quick check. I, however had no problem putting the boots to those who kept on saying "but that's not the way we did it at XXXX":E

717tech

17th Jan 2011, 07:04

The club I learnt to fly have a rule that you need to have flown the same type of aircaft (at the school) within the last 30 days.

cloud9dk

17th Jan 2011, 10:17

some valid points there.

Personally after going through the integrated route, I cannot afford to do fly for enjoyment at the moment, I need to save up to pay back the loan. Is it ideal, no, but its a choice I made to get into the airlines and I dont regret it for one minute. Fingers crossed come the summer my log book will be used again.

This thread was to find out what others thought about this idea as I was thinking of putting together a proposal for the flying clubs. One very valid point that was mentioned was that no two aerodromes are the same and of course there are danger areas around that people need to made aware of which is what the check rides are for.

You are very right though, you get out what you put in, and I have trained with enough people to realise that if you dont work hard, you dont get the results, that comes to both flying and everything.

mad_jock

17th Jan 2011, 12:23

Just check and make sure you have a SEP class rating on your license.

You won't be the first or last to presume you can fly a SEP when you haven't been issued with the class rating on your CPL.

Genghis the Engineer

17th Jan 2011, 14:02

Cloud 9, it may not be loggable, but there's a spare seats sticky at the top of the private flying forum. You could do worse than post your details on there, and then keep monitoring it.

Once you've got a firm operating base for your airline flying however, almost certainly your best long term option is to buy a cheap share nearby. Hunt around and you can, particularly through LAA, get shares under £1k then as little as £45/£45 for a simple SEP.

G

max_continuous

18th Jan 2011, 01:31

My club has a 6-week pic rule which is apparently a compromise between those who favoured a 4-week rule and those for an 8-week rule.

The airport lies between two much busier airports and although not complicated really the surrounding airspace is the most complicated north the M6.

Since joining I've flown every month but have twice needed a club check out because of the rule and on both occasions I have spotted significant errors on my part. On one occasion I even "turned-down" my sign-off and the next flight was also with an instructor by my own choice because of poor circuit performance.

As people have said if it isn't your aircraft then who can blame anyone for checking you out!

mad_jock

18th Jan 2011, 11:15

To be honest though a 200 hour intergrated bod has zero true PIC time everything they do is with someone looking over there shoulder signing them out constantly.

In some ways a home grown PPL student has more of a clue about go/no go PIC skills with 50 hours post PPL under thier belt than a 200 hour Int CPL.

The flying procedures you have been taught alot of them are inapproprate and are used as a stepping stone towards IFR flight and operating. eg always using PAPI's and 3 deg glides.

Most instructors I know give the intergrated pilots more of a going over than a PPL mainly because through experence we know the amount of pish they have been taught in relation to flying a SEP. So I think it will be a cold day in hell before an Intergrated grad will be able to walk up to a flying school and not get checked out and more than likely retrained.

BigGrecian

18th Jan 2011, 14:36

In some ways a home grown PPL student has more of a clue about go/no go PIC skills with 50 hours post PPL under thier belt than a 200 hour Int CPL.

Well said.

Integrated students have to remember that their course isn't designed for them to rent an aircraft privately post completion of the course.

To add my 2p : Ex OAA students need the most work out of any school - mainly due to the fact that they have in house examining which has led to a dramatic drop in standards - particuarly the CPL.

rmcb

19th Jan 2011, 10:41

To add my 2p : Ex OAA students need the most work out of any school - mainly due to the fact that they have in house examining which has led to a dramatic drop in standards - particuarly the CPL.

Have you raised your concerns regarding the implications of your statement with the CAA?

mad_jock

19th Jan 2011, 11:49

Lots of people have apparently.

But a CAA staff examiner costs a fortune to get ticketed up and get current never mind what they pay them.

EASA has already stated that the UK system of having on staff examiners to do intials will not continue. Every IRE will be able to do the intials. So they just won't pay to get more staff examiners on the books.

Before you start yes I know the CPL always could be done by an outside examiner but they were always allocated through Gatwick and the final IR test was done by a staff examiner who was the final wall to get past before getting let loose on the general public. I presume the CPL test is done in the USA so Gatwick will not have any other choice than to allocate the local company examiner.

Any complaints about what examiners pass or fail are notoriously difficult to prove either way. The line "Well on the day they performed to a Satis standard" is very hard to prove otherwise.

And to be honest there isn't even a safety case for improving things either because PPL schools won't let them loose until they are safe. And to be fair being pish at flying a SEP VFR isn't really going to show up while working in the RHS of a multi crew aircraft.

rmcb

19th Jan 2011, 13:25

mad jock - thankyou for that - I agree wholeheartedly with everything you have said.

As I understand Big Grecian's comment, he is questioning the examiners' decisions and/or standards when examining the capabilities of OAA students. This, he implies, is due to the examiners being too closely involved with that organisation, ie 'in house'. If this is how he feels, should he not raise his concerns officially with the CAA rather than on a nebulous forum?

European Flight Training, Florida (EFT) used regularly a CPL(A) examiner advertised, until recently, as being a co-owner of EFT. The CAA have, I presume, given this liaison its blessing. It should, therefore, be assumed the same case applies to OAA.

Does anyone at the CAA have anything to say about this alleged impropriety? Does any of this go against the spirit of the 'guidance' given in Standards Document 36, version 2? Does this document have any weight - are standards only such until they are not?

mad_jock

19th Jan 2011, 16:34

Nah why bother, they know its bad practise and not the best way of doing things. I am sure the current staff examiners will have voiced there unease at the situation. Highlighting a known fact isn't going to suddenly create money to either sort the issue out or change the fact that EASA is going to change things anyway.

The CAA has very little to do with blessing or not blessing whats going on. The lawyers say its legal therefore the schools will demand to do it and they will get to do it.

Until a suitable safety case is brought to say its wrong it will continue to happen. And to be honest I don't think it will ever come to light because Intergrated grads won't want and won't be wanted for Single pilot jobs. Before they get let loose in single engined single pilot aircraft for some real PIC time they have some one like me or Big Grecian retraining them. And if they are flying Multi crew they have someone who knows there arse from thier elbow in the LHS watching them like a hawk and making all the descions.

My biggest concern is when they become FI's because then its the blind leading the blind and some other poor sod has to sort the mess out at a later date.

cloud9dk

19th Jan 2011, 21:53

Quote:

To be honest though a 200 hour intergrated bod has zero true PIC time everything they do is with someone looking over there shoulder signing them out constantly.

In some ways a home grown PPL student has more of a clue about go/no go PIC skills with 50 hours post PPL under thier belt than a 200 hour Int CPL.

The flying procedures you have been taught alot of them are inapproprate and are used as a stepping stone towards IFR flight and operating. eg always using PAPI's and 3 deg glides.

Most instructors I know give the intergrated pilots more of a going over than a PPL mainly because through experence we know the amount of pish they have been taught in relation to flying a SEP. So I think it will be a cold day in hell before an Intergrated grad will be able to walk up to a flying school and not get checked out and more than likely retrained.

I have to disagree with you on that. Flying integrated doesn’t mean that you are cuddled and gently pushed with the instructors making the decisions, at least not where I was. It was a case of the student makes the decision, and had to back it up either way. I don’t understand how you think that a home grown PPL could be better suited when the chances are that they only fly once a week or month even. I believe I have a sound knowledge of flying, making decisions as to go/no go which has come from experience. That is the only way those skills can get better and as I get more experience, my decision making will get better.

With the regards to the techniques that you say we are taught, I must also disagree. On SEP we are taught to NOT use the glide slope and in most airports that I flew into, there were no PAPI's to even use. In IFR, do we use PAPI's, nope! We have a screen in front us all the way through the flight up until the Missed Approach where we would do a visual circuit to land, specifically again disobeying the PAPI information as this is not relevant to light a/c.

I actually find some of your comments rather insulting, and I would like to hear what you base them on. Are you currently an instructor who has flown with a few people who have shown such poor techniques?

As for your final comment, I would appreciate it if you read the posts before where I stated that this is not specifically for me. I am asking for the industry. Yes I have limited experience, 200 hours is not a lot I agree, and this is why along these posts I feel I have made it clear that there must be rules put in place. I will say this, I am not advertising the fact that somebody who was trained in a cessna should be allowed to go up in a piper without supervision, that would be crazy! if you read through the posts again, I hope this will be made clear.

I have contacted the CAA with regards to this and they have responded saying that it is totally up to the aeroclubs but of course it may well be to do with the insurance implications.

Genghis the Engineer

19th Jan 2011, 23:35

I think it's probably a bit unfair to be quite so hard on new ex-integrated pilots.

The issue is more new pilots who have not done significant unsupervised flying. I learned a lot on my CPL course, and I'm glad I did it - but equally there is vastly more that I learned through flying small aeroplanes, on my own, making my own weather / route / go_no_go decisions, doing bits of maintenance because there was nobody else to do it - and on occasion p***ng people off or making a complete fool of myself.

The difference between the new 200hr integrated graduate, and the PPL+50hrs, is that the latter has had that 50 hours of true independence - he's also had a more basic standard of training and assessment than the fATPL. So, the fATPL with 50 hours of truly independent flying should be a better pilot than the PPL with the same

However, another issue is that the PPL learns to fly with the expectation of continuing to fly with his own money. The fATPL often hopes after graduation to never spend his own money on flying again. That creates two very different attitudes.

So, personally, I'd be happy to introduce to one of my flying syndicates any pilot - but will be very suspect of anybody just out of training. I want to see that independent, purely-for-the-hell-of-it flying that I learned a lot from. The licence itself is a lot less important.

G

BigGrecian

20th Jan 2011, 01:10

European Flight Training, Florida (EFT) used regularly a CPL(A) examiner advertised, until recently, as being a co-owner of EFT. The CAA have, I presume, given this liaison its blessing. It should, therefore, be assumed the same case applies to OAA.

The CAA allocate JAA CPL examiners in Florida.

School's can't request an examiner neither can a student. This way the examiners are shared fairly - therefore in theory helping to keep the playing field even. The CPL examiner in question hadn't worked or had any business involvement in EFT for a considerable period of time before examining as they didn't leave and instantly become an examiner - they flew commercially. They had no control over the examiner allocated.

There was one school where the examiner was conducting training and testing those students as well - although we can't mention why because I'll get censored - but the CAA soon put a stop to that.

However, they won't do the same to OAA. They did once a couple of years ago and rotated some other examiners through there and let's just leave it as not many passed... :sad: and then OAA apparentely(Although I can't substantiate) complained and the rotation ceased.

mad_jock

20th Jan 2011, 07:35

But thats the whole issue because you are a zero to hero you think you are better than a home grown PPL pilot when in fact you are not. In some ways you aren't as current as them because you have been flying around twins for the previous 6 months and you have never flown VFR in the UK or had to make a decsion without an instructor double checking and signing you out.

You have a load of IFR bollocks swimming round in your head which isn't relevent to SEP flying. Then linked in with the outside controlled airspace and the great "standby" culture of getting a transit in the UK the home grown will always have an advantage experence wise. It would be interesting to see the number of infringments of CAS done by different lic holder types.

If you had actually done PPL SEP airlaw like a PPL will have done you would have realised it was utterly pointless contacting them on this subject (to be honest its utterly pointless contacting them for an opinion on most subjects)

And the Flying school industry which both myself and BigGrecian have been in for nearly 10 years now think that the any fresh out of school Int grad needs a right good check out if not retrained and closely monitored for there own good. Its not done out of any spite about the way you were trained. Its just done through years of experence (and I might add my experence was gained before the current drop in standards that Grecian has noticed) this issue with SEP is nothing new and I really can't see it changing because fundementally the whole object of doing intergrated is that you go straight to an automated flight deck multicrew. Which apperently they are not to bad at but nothing special.

And to add yes I am a current instructor and also a line training Captain on Turboprops.

LH2

20th Jan 2011, 10:14

This is interesting, because the mentally unwell Scotsman's views agree with what I have been told by a friend of mine, whose job is to train the likes of our cloudy friend.

It's not the students' nor the instructors' fault--it's just the way the sausage factory system is set up, allowing no discretion or initiative whatsoever. Or so I'm told.

On the other hand, a post-PPL type who only flies around his local area once a month... I do not think that's too impressive either, and it is often argued that most PPLs belong to this category, only a minority ever taking up bigger challenges. I don't have any evidence to support or disprove this assertion, just repeating what I hear.

Hmm... I guess what the above is saying is that most of us are ****e at flying, which is probably why the AAIB reports are such a long read. :}

B2N2

20th Jan 2011, 17:59

Let's summarize, a 200 hr Wonderpilot is insulted that a rental CHECK OUT is required.
OMG, I'm gonna walk away from this one before I hurt somebody...:ugh:

I believe I have a sound knowledge of flying, making decisions as to go/no go which has come from experience

On SEP we are taught to NOT use the glide slope

In IFR, do we use PAPI's, nope!

specifically again disobeying the PAPI information as this is not relevant to light a/c

I have contacted the CAA with regards to this

BillieBob

20th Jan 2011, 20:03

I have to disagree with you on that.
Unfortunately, you are in no position to make a judgement on the relative abilities of integrated and PPL students. The only people qualified to make such a comparison are those who have been required to prepare pilots from both instructional streams for life in the real world. In my experience (some 25 years in civil instructing), graduates of the CAP509/integrated ATPL course have become increasingly ill prepared to exercise the privileges of the licence/rating with which they are issued on completion of their training.

The fact is that integrated training providers have, over the last 15 years or so, convinced themselves that they are training pilots only for the right hand seat of a multi-pilot aeroplane whereas they should actually be doing nothing of the sort. The licence/rating that is issued to the graduate of an integrated course, gives the holder the privilege to fly a single-pilot, multi-engined aroplane for hire or reward. The training, however, has not been directed to this privilege but, instead, has focussed mainly on the operation of multi-pilot aeroplanes, a privilege not included in the licence/rating combination issued.

It is only training for the MPL that should be directed mainly to the operation of multi-pilot aeroplanes and students on a traditional integrated course should be focussed on the proper operation of single-pilot aeroplanes. Unfortunately, many of the instructors currently employed on integrated training courses have little or no experience in either discipline, as the training providers have increasingly valued economy over experience, and so are not in a position to provide the necessary training.

cloud9dk

20th Jan 2011, 22:45

b2n2, you are twisting the facts and are just trying to stir things up while people are trying to have a conversation. I am not insulted that a check out is required, far be it. Please read the post properly as to find what I was looking to find out and what I was insulted over.

mad jock i respect your opinion as you obviously have a lot of time in the industry, but that does not mean I agree with all of it.

billiebob, i can see where you are coming from, as personally I have only had one view of the industry. However during SEP we were specifically taught to fly SE, with the correct techniques. I agree that on SE I am not current at this present time, but this whole thread was to see what people thought as a whole of this idea, not of what people thought of me and my training.

I appreciate the posts that people have taken the time to write on this matter.

all the best as this will be my final post on this matter.

cloud9dk

mad_jock

21st Jan 2011, 07:50

I really don't have alot of time in the industry.

And the being taught to fly SEP with the correct technique we will have to disagree on. From the many I have checked out/retrained for SEP/LST there have been some bizarre to out right dangerous practises coming out of Int grads. Powering out of fully developed stalls, stalled hanging in the air using foot loads of rudder to keep the wings level (which I presume is the yank instructors handy work). Laxy daisy steep turns fannying around trying to go round a point which I believe is another yank exercise. The list goes on with every exercise there is something slightly different to the way the rest of us do it.

A bit off advice approaching grumpy auld bastards like myself in flying schools to get checked out. Walk in and tell them you are straight out of school but that you realise that you know dick about flying in this local area. Could you please sort out organising a familisation flight of the local area with some general handling practise because I am a bit rusty, and then a check flight.

Don't mention how you trained, don't tell them thats not they way you were taught when they tell you to do something different, just watch what they want you to do. If you don't understand why they want you to do something ask at the debrief. And FFS enjoy yourself.

If you go in telling them you are int trained and have a CPL so only require a quick circuit checkout you will get exactly the same responce you have got on here which is actually quite mild compared to what you would have got face to face in the school I help at.

And BTW I have an ATPL current FI ticket 1200 hours SEP and 1000 hours instruction given and I would expect a check ride if I was going somewhere that didn't know me.

Genghis the Engineer

21st Jan 2011, 09:09

And the being taught to fly SEP with the correct technique we will have to disagree on. From the many I have checked out/retrained for SEP/LST there have been some bizarre to out right dangerous practises coming out of Int grads. Powering out of fully developed stalls, stalled hanging in the air using foot loads of rudder to keep the wings level (which I presume is the yank instructors handy work). Laxy daisy steep turns fannying around trying to go round a point which I believe is another yank exercise. The list goes on with every exercise there is something slightly different to the way the rest of us do it.

I find this statement really interesting.

Last year, a colleague and I were invited to give a presentation on a chunk of ongoing GA flight safety research to a high level air transport ops training conference at 4HP. Where we've presented this before to any of a GA, test pilot, or academic audience - this has been very well received. To this particular audience however, it was very poorly received. In particular various airline training people asserted quite loudly that:

(a) Light aircraft should adopt LoC (stall) recovery techniques that rather than being optimised for those aeroplanes, should be designed to train habits appropriate to heavies.

(b) There is a standard spin recovery which works for all aeroplanes, and there should be no requirement for individual recovery drills to be learned for individual aircraft types.

At the same time, Sean Roberts, (who is Director of the National Test Pilot School in the US and thus almost certainly knows more about how to fly aeroplanes than most of us will ever have a chance to forget) has been on a crusade for several years about what he (absolutely correctly in my opinion) considers the utterly dangerous habit taught by many, particularly FAA qualified, instructors of using power with or worse before pitch in stall recovery. Clearly, with a low thrustline aeroplane this has significant potential to push an aeroplane into a spin or deep stall.*

Incidentally, I'll add a couple of other bad habits I've seen in recently trained pilots from this sort of commercial training environment: flying PFLs using a rectangular base and sharp finals turn, and dragging an SEP in on power at something like a 3 degree slope into airfields where finals is over a town so an engine failure on finals would almost certainly be non-survivable.

It all adds up, in my mind, to a large chunk of the flying training community who are convinced that everything they're doing is directed towards multi-engine airline ops, despite the fact they're actually flying SEPs. This is self perpetuating, and creating some very dangerous habits in new pilots particularly given that those perpetuating this often don't have a good understanding of either real GA ops, nor of airline ops since they've never spent any real quality time in either environment.

G

* Quick plug, I'm actually trying to run a research programme on this issue of effects of different stall recoveries on different types at the moment. If anybody's interested in possibly collaborating, drop me a PM, ideally with an email address.

bingofuel

21st Jan 2011, 12:12

Many years ago training for my AFI rating, my instructor had me 'recover' from an incipient stall in a 152. With the instruction, apply full power and maintain the nose high attitude, and count to 3.

On the count of 3 the aeroplane dropped a wing so rapidly it went past the 90deg. and the subsequent recovery used quite a bit of altitude.
Lesson learnt!! lower the nose to reduce the AofA. Light GA types rarely have the power to fly out of an incipient stall.

mad_jock

21st Jan 2011, 12:15

You have got it in one Genghis.

And I am really not susprised that you had the reaction that you did have.

Another one for your list of vices is adding speed on approach for gusts, you can end up with PA28 coming over the numbers on the 3 deg PAPI's with an extra 10knts on the approach speed. And the folk wonder why the plane either went off the end, why the aircraft went sideways off the runway or why they staved the nose gear in on a PIO.

Genghis the Engineer

21st Jan 2011, 13:21

That's a really interesting one. The FAA Airplane Flying Handbook (http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=V3SZXFWuCIgC&pg=StA8-PA17&lpg=SA8-PA17&dq=CAA+airspeed+gusts&source=bl&ots=HkSJKgkEoB&sig=HS0W_tCt6OLDXz4qJKEY82YRPpU&hl=en&ei=TZQ5TfL1BcyXhQeAp-TfCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CCkQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q&f=false) recommends adding adding half the gust magnitude to the approach speed, but does warn of the risks of PIO (which it called "wheelbarrowing"). But, it doesn't mention either the increase in landing distance, or the fact that gust response is actually proportional to speed^2/wing-loading. So whilst you're less likely to be stalled, you're more likely to overrun or be deflected off the approach (or into the trees under short finals!).

I don't *think* that CAA have ever published similar advice have they? This potentially dubious bit of advice is certainly not in their safety sense leaflet on airmanship.

G

mad_jock

21st Jan 2011, 14:38

There was a discussion on this subject in the private flying forum. I was of the opinion and still am that half the gust is for high momentum aircraft and unless it is mentioned in the POM or POH you don't require it and it is bad practise to add it.

But this led to quite a bit of debate on the subject showing it to be quite a common practise amongst PPL's

The CAA hasn't published anything on the subject and you will get varying opinion from the various exam callsigns depending what back ground they come from heavy (they want to add it), turboprop (don't add it) or helicopters (will just lead to a story about doing a winch over the oggin when it was 60G90 on a thimble of fuel by far the most interesting reply to the question really). The FII's and FIE's don't have a united front on the subject either.

The best one I have had on this practise was someone wanting to fly the tommy at 85 knots on approach because of all the additions that they "had" to add. Which I might add was 30knts faster than I would have flown it. The float in the flare was interesting and we used more runway than the J31 that had landed infront of us who was off at the intersection (Bucket using less runway than a 747 for once I believe), we were still in the flare going past the intersection heading towards the ILS DME container.... BUt apparently it was a good landing because it was a greaser. The fact we had used 2/3rds of 23 at Inverness wasn't an issue, and I was just showing off when I demonstrated stopping inside the piano keys on the next approach at a more sensible 60knts speed.

But some auld tosser down south with thousands of hours says you will die a horrible death if you fly at less than 70knts+half the gusts on approach in a tommy. This sort of ****e is now intrenched in folk law around the country unfortunately.

Genghis the Engineer

21st Jan 2011, 22:19

You've got me thinking now Jock, and I think that I may have to resort to some equations.

G

B2N2

22nd Jan 2011, 01:25

I was curious as to whether I would need a check ride if I were to rent a plane from a flying club

Yes, you do.
You happy now?
You are currently in the most dangerous experience "bracket" of your career.
Commercially rated with minimal solo PIC experience.
You probably didn't fly for 6-7 months as you were digging through the ATPL exams, after that dual instruction only with a skill test on a route that you practiced many time before...:D

JHC, just think about what you asked in your first post.
AOPA Online: Air SafetyInstitute - Special Reports (http://www.aopa.org/asf/publications/topics/index.html)

mad_jock

27th Jan 2011, 12:09

I have been thinking about it as well.

How does the coefficent of drag change in ground affect for a low wing aircraft?

Just with the squared effect of increasing the speed to be washed off by 10%-25% blows the landing perf out the window.

Genghis the Engineer

27th Jan 2011, 12:54

Drag's a much less significant term I think than normal gust response and lateral stability, which in turn dictates lateral gust response.

Normal gust response is proportional to TAS^2/wing loading. So, the slower you go, more stable the aeroplane appears to be.

Lateral stability is a function of wing shape and angle of attack, but in a straight winged aeroplane is pretty much constant. So, speed will make no difference. On the other hand with a highly swept wing (such as weightshift microlights) it's proportional to angle of attack, so a faster aeroplane will respond less to lateral gusts.

Stall avoidance is in theory an issue, but this is complex and I need to go and play with some equations because an aeroplane doesn't really stall at a fixed speed, it actually stalls at a fixed angle of attack, and the relationship between sudden change in headwind component, and sudden change in AoA is nonlinear. Close to the ground, there's also straightforward changes in lift coefficients with a change in the direction of the local wind vector, which will cause the aeroplane's rate of descent to change.

G

mad_jock

27th Jan 2011, 14:32

it actually stalls at a fixed angle of attack

Now your out the depth of most CPL's now and god for bid you tell them what the trimmer actually does. They mostly think it something to do with flying an aircraft straight and level and if you mention airspeed you get a confused look.

And another thing to add into your thinking process is the fannying around with different flap settings ie some reckon you should fly it clean if its gusty where as I just fly it as normal with same flaps as usual because when I decide we are landing I want the transition from flying to taxing to be done with the minimal amount of time and fuss without getting raped in the flare by mother nature.

Genghis the Engineer

27th Jan 2011, 15:00

Interesting point that, whilst I don't think flaps have any significant effect upon lateral stability, they certainly will influence the normal gust response, because by modifying the aerofoil shape they'll change partial dCl/d.alpha. That I really can't do in my head, and possibly not without some graph-plotting.

Incidentally, I'm about to kick off a new research programme into AoA in primary flight guidance, one of the points of which being that it *may* be better to fly approaches on AoA (at-least making weight irrelevant) rather than IAS.

CPL aerodynamics is certainly pretty basic (I turned up late for my exam and got 95% in 22 minutes of the 45 available), and serious thought how IAS is used doesn't seem to be widely encouraged. Probably because 75% of the syllabus is about precision navigation, rather than much more useful topics such as system management or handling emergencies. (Yes, I know they do emergencies in the CPL skill test - an engine failure and an engine fire. I've had my fair share of emergencies in light aeroplanes only a few of which were engine failure; none involved fire!).

G

'India-Mike

27th Jan 2011, 15:12

whilst I don't think flaps have any significant effect upon lateral stability

ATPL theory heresy Genghis:= You're for it now;)

Standby for whole new can of worms.......

mad_jock

27th Jan 2011, 16:13

You shouldn't be solo unless you know what a trimmer does, its effects of controls part 2.

And don't get me started how many pilots I have taught to trim an aircraft properly while they were flying a multicrew TP. How they manged to make it through the IR while flying out of trim all the time baffles me.

The flaps thing really is a load of pish, through a completely none scientific study on a ****e winters day blowing a gale on the west coast of Scotland. It didn't matter what flap setting you had. The approach was more akin to a ride at Altern Towers. And when you eventually came to the "get down you whore" point it was the flick of a dice by the big man if you raped the runway or started pooing yourself because the old girl had touched down too gently and you were hydroplaning.