Starting Circuits soon....
for me (in a 172) it means fuel tanks on both.
Re go round - how can you tell if you have enough fuel for that. Hopefully you still have your 3/4 hour reserve intact.
Re go round - how can you tell if you have enough fuel for that. Hopefully you still have your 3/4 hour reserve intact.
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Barondriver,
I'll have to make my subtle jokes less subtle from now on!
I was commenting on the various ways many schools unnecessarily increase their students training time (aka profits) by adding a few minutes hear and there on every flight. As someone who used to run a school I seen them all and tried to remove them as I believe they are immoral and unprofessional. i.e:
"My instructor made the suggestion. After showing him this thread he said that the student pilot usually requires larger circuits when learning...." They need the larger circuits to finish the un-necessary checks like MAGS BOTH, MASTER ON, HATCHES ans HARNESSES SECURE. Many circuits in cessnas are bigger that a Boeings. This is inefficent and argubly unsafe. But the flying school's aren't complaining.
The under-supervision of junior instructors, where the poor student pays for extra circuit sessions as his jnr Gr3 won't hand him off for a solo check until he could pass a CPL.
The misuse of checklists. "...'cos that's wot the airlines do". RUBBISH, what would some instructor with 200 hrs know about what the airlines do? Airlines use CHECKlists not DOlists. A CHECKlist is used after the actions have already been completed and the CHECKlist verifys these have not been missed. In Non-normal situations, the checklist IS used as a read-and-do list. Many flying schools sit in the run-up bay for 0.1 or 0.2 too long reading through a sheet with items like SEAT: ADJUST etc, etc and the poor buggers can't start an engine without a checklist.
Instructor's hogging the radio "to take the load off the student" and then needing to do further hours while the student learns to take this all on later.
A general tendency to inadequately brief before lessons.
Not teaching students to be independent learners (an oxymoron, I know). I used to teach my students how to visualise a flight whilst sitting in the areoplane without the VDO ticking over. Mentally rehearsing the sequences, the radio calls, checks, procedures, and emergencies. This costs nothing, reduces training time and costs. I believe an instructor's job isn't to teach the student to fly. It is to teach the student HOW TO LEARN HOW TO FLY. ie. It's the student's job to learn not your job to teach.
Not using wonderfully cheap resources like Microsoft Flight Sim. This program has addons available for highly detailed C172, PA28, C152, PA34, etc up to and including the big Boeings. The detail is so good, students can practice any procedural items themselves at no cost, practice that tricky instrument approach, practice navs using real scenery and weather, and many other things.
I could go on for hours but most readers would have already stopped reading by now!
None of these points are really the fault of the average flying school instructor. They are an endemic problem in the industry with a poor standard of Grade 1/ CFIs who peddle this rubbish to Grade 3's and it gets accepted as law. It is also the fault of CASA FOIs who turn their own opinions into enforcable law to CFI's and who do not stop these old wives tales and home grown ideas becoming accepted by the GA fraternity. i.e. where does it say to set 25" 2500 @ 500' after take-off in any Aircraft Operating Manual?
I'm going to have a lie down now. Ready, aim, FIRE!
I'll have to make my subtle jokes less subtle from now on!
I was commenting on the various ways many schools unnecessarily increase their students training time (aka profits) by adding a few minutes hear and there on every flight. As someone who used to run a school I seen them all and tried to remove them as I believe they are immoral and unprofessional. i.e:
"My instructor made the suggestion. After showing him this thread he said that the student pilot usually requires larger circuits when learning...." They need the larger circuits to finish the un-necessary checks like MAGS BOTH, MASTER ON, HATCHES ans HARNESSES SECURE. Many circuits in cessnas are bigger that a Boeings. This is inefficent and argubly unsafe. But the flying school's aren't complaining.
The under-supervision of junior instructors, where the poor student pays for extra circuit sessions as his jnr Gr3 won't hand him off for a solo check until he could pass a CPL.
The misuse of checklists. "...'cos that's wot the airlines do". RUBBISH, what would some instructor with 200 hrs know about what the airlines do? Airlines use CHECKlists not DOlists. A CHECKlist is used after the actions have already been completed and the CHECKlist verifys these have not been missed. In Non-normal situations, the checklist IS used as a read-and-do list. Many flying schools sit in the run-up bay for 0.1 or 0.2 too long reading through a sheet with items like SEAT: ADJUST etc, etc and the poor buggers can't start an engine without a checklist.
Instructor's hogging the radio "to take the load off the student" and then needing to do further hours while the student learns to take this all on later.
A general tendency to inadequately brief before lessons.
Not teaching students to be independent learners (an oxymoron, I know). I used to teach my students how to visualise a flight whilst sitting in the areoplane without the VDO ticking over. Mentally rehearsing the sequences, the radio calls, checks, procedures, and emergencies. This costs nothing, reduces training time and costs. I believe an instructor's job isn't to teach the student to fly. It is to teach the student HOW TO LEARN HOW TO FLY. ie. It's the student's job to learn not your job to teach.
Not using wonderfully cheap resources like Microsoft Flight Sim. This program has addons available for highly detailed C172, PA28, C152, PA34, etc up to and including the big Boeings. The detail is so good, students can practice any procedural items themselves at no cost, practice that tricky instrument approach, practice navs using real scenery and weather, and many other things.
I could go on for hours but most readers would have already stopped reading by now!
None of these points are really the fault of the average flying school instructor. They are an endemic problem in the industry with a poor standard of Grade 1/ CFIs who peddle this rubbish to Grade 3's and it gets accepted as law. It is also the fault of CASA FOIs who turn their own opinions into enforcable law to CFI's and who do not stop these old wives tales and home grown ideas becoming accepted by the GA fraternity. i.e. where does it say to set 25" 2500 @ 500' after take-off in any Aircraft Operating Manual?
I'm going to have a lie down now. Ready, aim, FIRE!
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I'll have to make my subtle jokes less subtle from now on!
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None of the schools I am familiar with have quality accreditation to Australian Standards, something that even larger law firms do these days.
While its a big job to get it, the first school that does will wipe the floor with the rest of the industry.
A quality accredited school would have to ensure students get taught the same way every time, standardised lesson plans, content and briefings. In other words, standardised instruction and most importantly feedback from the students.
One of the delightful reasons I fly with instructors occasionally is that I learn something different and new each time...... I could go on.
The other thing I think would be VERY interesting is for CASA to do a sampling exercise on students at new GFPT/PPL level to discover what they actually know. "Outcome Oriented/ Competency based" education is a
mess in my opinion. I'm still trying to work out what I don't know.
While its a big job to get it, the first school that does will wipe the floor with the rest of the industry.
A quality accredited school would have to ensure students get taught the same way every time, standardised lesson plans, content and briefings. In other words, standardised instruction and most importantly feedback from the students.
One of the delightful reasons I fly with instructors occasionally is that I learn something different and new each time...... I could go on.
The other thing I think would be VERY interesting is for CASA to do a sampling exercise on students at new GFPT/PPL level to discover what they actually know. "Outcome Oriented/ Competency based" education is a
mess in my opinion. I'm still trying to work out what I don't know.
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hey chap,
Just make sure you have the SAME instructor for all your initial circuit work, and do what he/she says, and you will be fine. There are many a pilot on this forum and indeed at your flying school, alot of (very correct, most likely) views to take in when you are so inexperienced, just take your instructors approach and go for it.
When you start your cross country flying, you will have seen a few different approaches from several instructors, but at that stage, it is (from memory) a bit easier to comprehend, than when you are sweating it out on the circuit in a 90knot Tomahawk!
Akro in a Tommy sounds healthy, or not.
M14P
Just make sure you have the SAME instructor for all your initial circuit work, and do what he/she says, and you will be fine. There are many a pilot on this forum and indeed at your flying school, alot of (very correct, most likely) views to take in when you are so inexperienced, just take your instructors approach and go for it.
When you start your cross country flying, you will have seen a few different approaches from several instructors, but at that stage, it is (from memory) a bit easier to comprehend, than when you are sweating it out on the circuit in a 90knot Tomahawk!
Akro in a Tommy sounds healthy, or not.
M14P
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OZZI PPL and other young low time pilots.
Watching that video send shivers down my spine. As an Ex-mil pilot and current aeros instructor, that is a classic example of how NOT to roll an aircraft, especially one that is not certified for aerobatics.
Normally I wouldn't worry about posting about something like this, however I think it's relevant as the aircraft YOU are doing circuits in, might have had this done to it.
You may well ask what was wrong with what he did? Let me try and equate it like this. Would you consider it safe to trim fully forward at 200ft and let go of the controls for 5 seconds and then land the aircraft? In theory it would be possible to land successfully, but if someone saw you do it they would think you were crazy and after watching you thump it in they wouldn't want to fly that aircraft.
Now lets look at that footage, now you hear all the time that a barrel roll is a 1 G maneuver. Do you think he was pulling 1 G at the bottom?
I think not... why not after all it's a 1G maneuver!!!!!
A barrel roll should start and finish at the same height and at the same speed... Do you think that was the case?
That's because it's not a 1G maneuver... 1G is straight and level, to deviate from that you MUST be pulling more than 1G, when you hear that comment, it actually means that it's a 2G maneuver 1 + 1. That being said, I have not had one student successfully do a barrel roll remaining within 2G.
How close to the edge of the envelope was he....? I'd say pretty close, probable as close as you would be trying to land trimmed fully forward, but you can't tell, as it has no G Meter, so you don't know if it has been overstressed or not.
So what about the aircraft? There is a reason that you are not supposed to do aerobatics and that reason is the same as the reason you can't drive your Hyundai Excel around Bathurst at 150K's.... It's not designed for it and you will quickly exceed the limits of engine/brakes. Would you want to drive a car that always has it's gears changed 100rpm below red line? Or that always goes from max power to full brakes....?
So can you safely draw a conclusion that that particular pilot did not really know what he was doing? I hope so...
I hope you can see what I'm trying to say here, PLEASE don't try this stuff, if you want the thrills of Aerobatics, great, it will make you a better pilot, just don't do it in a Tommi !
Cheers
Wombat
Watching that video send shivers down my spine. As an Ex-mil pilot and current aeros instructor, that is a classic example of how NOT to roll an aircraft, especially one that is not certified for aerobatics.
Normally I wouldn't worry about posting about something like this, however I think it's relevant as the aircraft YOU are doing circuits in, might have had this done to it.
You may well ask what was wrong with what he did? Let me try and equate it like this. Would you consider it safe to trim fully forward at 200ft and let go of the controls for 5 seconds and then land the aircraft? In theory it would be possible to land successfully, but if someone saw you do it they would think you were crazy and after watching you thump it in they wouldn't want to fly that aircraft.
Now lets look at that footage, now you hear all the time that a barrel roll is a 1 G maneuver. Do you think he was pulling 1 G at the bottom?
I think not... why not after all it's a 1G maneuver!!!!!
A barrel roll should start and finish at the same height and at the same speed... Do you think that was the case?
That's because it's not a 1G maneuver... 1G is straight and level, to deviate from that you MUST be pulling more than 1G, when you hear that comment, it actually means that it's a 2G maneuver 1 + 1. That being said, I have not had one student successfully do a barrel roll remaining within 2G.
How close to the edge of the envelope was he....? I'd say pretty close, probable as close as you would be trying to land trimmed fully forward, but you can't tell, as it has no G Meter, so you don't know if it has been overstressed or not.
So what about the aircraft? There is a reason that you are not supposed to do aerobatics and that reason is the same as the reason you can't drive your Hyundai Excel around Bathurst at 150K's.... It's not designed for it and you will quickly exceed the limits of engine/brakes. Would you want to drive a car that always has it's gears changed 100rpm below red line? Or that always goes from max power to full brakes....?
So can you safely draw a conclusion that that particular pilot did not really know what he was doing? I hope so...
I hope you can see what I'm trying to say here, PLEASE don't try this stuff, if you want the thrills of Aerobatics, great, it will make you a better pilot, just don't do it in a Tommi !
Cheers
Wombat
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On finals think "Aiming point, centerline, airspeed" over and over all the way to your decision height then "On speed, on slope, windsock, fully configured, runway clear, carb ht off"... then land! 
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No Worries Womba, Agree with you 100%. It's amazing when you do a search of youtube the amount of cowboy pilots you find trying to kill themselves in all sorts of imaginative ways. I'm certainly not one of them.
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With you Wombat, after I watched that vid I started to watch the airshow stuff, flown by pilots who knew the limits of their a/c and were flying things that were designed for aeros.
Never seen a Tommy or c172 or such doing airshow routines, they arent designed for it and probably boring as batpoo.
Never seen a Tommy or c172 or such doing airshow routines, they arent designed for it and probably boring as batpoo.
Wombat
Are you sure you have this right? Its been a while since I have spun a Tommyaxe (ex Manawatu Districts Aero Club - can't remember the call sign but I think it may have been destroyed in mid-air some years later) but the video clearly starts and end with a spin.
The bit in the middle sure looks like some sort of roll, but the Tommyaxe will roll onto its back when spun one way (can't remember which), and I have never observed it from outside the aeroplane, but that sort of spin entry and immediate recovery would look like some sort of roll.
FTDC
Are you sure you have this right? Its been a while since I have spun a Tommyaxe (ex Manawatu Districts Aero Club - can't remember the call sign but I think it may have been destroyed in mid-air some years later) but the video clearly starts and end with a spin.
The bit in the middle sure looks like some sort of roll, but the Tommyaxe will roll onto its back when spun one way (can't remember which), and I have never observed it from outside the aeroplane, but that sort of spin entry and immediate recovery would look like some sort of roll.
FTDC
