The new way to fly an ab initio trainer
 

I've been tossing and turning all night over this one, couldn't sleep and thought maybe some PPRUNE therapy would help!.

Young fella next door was telling me all about his flying training and how they learn to fly "ILS" style approaches from the ab initio stage of training. The aerodrome in question does not have an ILS or any other sort of visual guidance system and the basic GA trainer doesn't even have a receiver in it anyway. Having learnt myself at the aerodrome, a 3 degree approach would be scraping the tree tops and houses on final!. These kids are just taught to fly long, flat, high drag approaches using full flap with high power settings.

In my day I did my checks through using a small checklist that would fit in my pocket until I could get used to a system of flows or mnemonic as my craggy old instructor wouldn't let me rely on a written checklist, "what if you lose it?". The poor fella next door has an A5 booklet that must be referred to.

Fair enough if the student is a cadet who will never fly GA and their right hand seat is being warmed up for them as we speak but to put it politely, I just don't see the benefit of this sort of training for someone who has to go through normal GA. Anyway, this is just my opinion, feel free to give me some stick if you don't agree.

Part of me just wants to pull the boy aside and have a word with him and let him know what it's like in the real world, but another, albeit much smaller part doesn't want to be seen as meddling. Over to you guys.

I wonder if this method will survive that famous GA line:

"Didn't you know this aircraft always does that?"

RB.....mate! the young fella is definitly in the "dark ages" for sure.....we are all doing RNAV and GPS appraoches now:} .......no wonder your tossing and turning ......sign of the times mate.....:{ PB

Cringe. I wonder just how big his circuit must be in order to allow him to fly a 3 degree glideslope. He can't get more than five or six circuits an hour, rendering his money wasted. And I wonder how many other students' circuits he is disrupting by flying an enormous unweildy pattern.

Reckon he could do himself some favours and find another flying school.

i was under the impression, that a circuit is preferable flown so as to be within gliding distance to the aerodrome in case of the fan stopping, at all times. (except upwind obviously)

A Picture is worth a thousand words. If you can do it,take the lad up in the same aircraft and show him what it can do. Show him how many circuits you can do in an hour, do a few SF and glide approaches and then let him decide for himself whether he is in the right school. Most every time that this occurs the poor student doesn't know any different what BS the instructors are feeding him.

EDIT-Just to add, RB I agree with you and I think you should. I am just lucky that a couple of pro pilots got me early and showed me the life of a pro pilot and how I should fly ALL the time. My choices then helped me pick a good team to finish my training just recently. From a student's point of view. We are just putty, what ever is bashed into us at the beginning stays with us for life. I guess it depends on how cocky your neighbour is and whether he will accept the advice for what it is, after all you are only interested in his welfare.

Whats wrong with a 3 degree approach? Aren't the PAPI's set at 3 degrees? Turning final at 2 miles at about 600ft? Its been a while for me but that sounds about right doesn't it?

Ricky Bobbywhy would that be scraping the treetops and rooftops?

Given that the fella is at ab-initio stage and has probably never flown an ILS, you have to wonder what he actually means by "ILS style approach".

If he means being stabilised by a given height and going around anytime he is out of acceptable tolerances, I would have thought it to be a good thing. I doubt the circuits would be any larger or lower than usual? Isn't it good airmanship to use approach guidance whenever available and try to replicate that picture whenever guidance is not available?

Ricky Bobby I would not to mess with his training, I would however recommend to him to go and do some gliding and maybe take him along on a flight yourself. Ive seen this kind of circuit being increasingly taught by flying schools the wide circuits with the flat approaches, and I don't like it either it seems the mentality is to treat the aircraft as if it's an airliner.

Of course the circuit will be bigger if a flatter approach profile is flown. Assuming you commence final approach from 500' AARP, that point will be significantly further away from the runway on a 3 degree profile than it will be on a 5 degree profile. And if the approach is making good 60 knots (that might be optimistic) you're looking at a huge increase in the amount of time taken to crawl down final approach. That also ignores the extra time flown downwind.

As for using 'approach guidance' at the ab initio stage - the aim (IMO) is to teach the kid how to use his eyes hands and judgement, not how to follow PAPIs.

Stable at a given height, remain within tolerances, go around if outside - sure! That works for any desired approach angle.

Training value is actually reduced at the ab initio stage in a piston aircraft when flying a 3 degree glidepath with full flap and 'high' power settings. I believe it is better to teach good elementary handling and judgement, and then the student has the required skills to fly any approach profile.

so i guess things like the full flap/ sideslip steep approach are no longer taught? I suppose if they are treating a Cessna 152/Cherokee like a 747, then any approach out of the norm would be a go around..

If you want to produce pilots with some ability to make a safe approach from all heights and angles, in all configurations, then students need variation in their training. Experience is the sum of learning from exposure to the widest possible number of situations.

Is there a point in trying to 'standardise' all student pilots so early in their training ?

happy days,

Exactly - and nobody knows that this isn't exactly what he meant by "ILS style approach". That is my point. He didn't mention anything about a 3 degree approach angle. (although a 3 degree profile will put you about 1.5nm out when rolling finals, which is not quite as massive as some would think.)

And so it should be. How many accidents have been caused by people trying to salvage dodgy approaches? If you are that high on finals that you need full flap-sideslip to get you in, then you should go around!

I agree with Capt EW.
I think any training up to PPL standard should be all about stick and rudder and seeing what an aircraft can actually achieve when it is flown properly.
Save PAPI and approach lights for NVFR and IFR.

Having seen two different company's circuit proceedures first hand I can say that long, wide circuits just don't help other traffic to slot in and many a go-around was caused through some pilots not clearing runways fast enough cause they are going for 1000ft markers in 200 series cessna types.
Get them out in the bush and things are worse cause there is no PAPI or markers or anything. :eek:
Get some PNG guys to demonstrate circuits and what normal GA type aircraft are capable of.
Booya :ok:

Yet another case, possibly, of not flying the aircraft you're in appropriately.

Airliner style approaches are appropriate in airliners because they cannot do a steeper approach and they have more than adequate performance/system monitoring in any power loss, windshear, wake turbulence, system malfunction scenario to continue the approach or go around.

Do the same style of approach in a typical GA single or twin and if you lose power on approach you very well may not make the airport.

How much excess performance does a 200 series cessna have to overcome windshear? How about getting caught up in wake vortices from a bigger preceeding aircraft?

Another aspect of the approach and landing is that in a retractable GA single or twin you may get no audio warning of a possible gear problem until you reduce power below 15 in MP. If you make a steeper approach, reduce power to idle at 30-50 for the round out flare etc you will get more warning than a powered flat approach...personally I would rather have the gear warning go off at 40' than 4'. Yes I know the lack of green light should give it away too but why line up the last hole in the cheese for no good reason.

The number of times you don't end up with approach guidance even in a widebody more than justifies the developement of visual judgement in my opinion...the budding airline pilot will get plenty of opportunities later to perfect 'ILS' style approaches:ugh:

Perhaps by "ILS approach" he means throttle for speed and attitude for height. Nothing wrong with that.

No guys, by ILS approach I mean trying a 3 degree slope in a 2 seat trainer bopping along at 60kts on final. Roughly that would be what, a 300ft per minute descent. How would they land at a strip such as YSHR? I'd love to go for a flight with one of these instructors and see how they do this when there is no ILS or visual guidance system installed at the airfield. Their reasoning is they are training people who want to fly for airlines. Got news for you fellas, that little plane ain't an airliner, don't pretend it is.

I've had all weekend and I'm still fired up!!

funnily enough i have flown an Ultralight that requires a 3 deg or less approach, anything steeper, with power at idle will result in the aircraft accelerating even with full flap. very slippery little bugger, yet in a high lift, STOL aircraft, and keeping with my preference to always be in gliding range, the approach will be in the order of 10 deg or more approach angle at about 45kts and touchdown at 30kts.

Ultralights,

Are you sure you mean a 10 degree approach angle?

With a quick rough calculation I would figure that at being somewhere around an 18% approach gradient requiring something close to an 800fpm descent rate for a 45kt approach speed - seems a bit high for a 'nomal' approach in that category of aircraft? :confused:

However I do agree with the spirit of the questioning in this thread. I first started judging landings into a short grass strip paddock in a very minimal equipment tail dragging ultralight. Didn't have flaps and one of the machines didn't have brakes either - made things interesting as the grass strip wasn't flat... A good way to learn the basic skills and the extra ones like sideslipping that don't receive a lot of attention in GA. I once had a fellow instructor tell me that one shouldn't sideslip a C152 with full flap as it can overstress the flaps?! I could never find that limitation in the POH...

Since coming to PNG I have had a chuckle thinking about some of the competency 'sign offs' in training. Maintaining nosewheel on centreline and maintaining centreline until 500' for example. Not that this skill is not important and it has a place but up here with bent runways and terrain requiring a turn on takeoff at tree-top height you do just have to have a chuckle...:} Oh, and maximum 5kt tailwind T/O and landings...:E

I wonder whether this is guy is doing his training at some 'fast-track' pilot school? some idiot posted something about this on the weekend where he completed his cpl in 18 weeks and has been offered a position with a regional with no more than 160 hours tt :rolleyes: