Cessna 172 pro-active familiarisation for PPL
Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2017
Location: Belgium
Posts: 6
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Cessna 172 pro-active familiarisation for PPL
As I posted in this post I am starting up for a PPL/CPL training. I found, on the internet, that the Cessna 172 is a very popular training plane and hence I want to familiarise myself up-front with this plane. The school I have in mind (Fly-in-Spain) has these Cessna's.
I have an x-plane simulator license (v.11) since yesterday with a standard Cessna 172 in it. My questions to people that may have done the same are as follows:
1) I would like to download the REAL documentation of the Cessna 172 and use it one-on-one with the simulator to learn to understand each instrument so that when the real instructor guided lessons start it isn't all new and overwhelming. I also want to start using the correct vocabulary from the start and not my own newbie terms.
2) Is there anyone who knows of a possible better (newer/better resolution/more complete/etc) Cessna 172 version for x-plane v.11. I am prepared to buy the better stuff and do things right. In the end all this 'amatory-grade' simulator tools are cheap compared to NOT be prepared and having to take exams all over or forcing your instructor into several extra hours of training because you have no clue what he is explaining.
3) Last but not least, are there Cessna 172 options to consider? With a car you have options and I suppose that is also the case with a plane. I prefer to learn to much then not enough (i was thinking radio/information systems/GPS/etc). In that case what are the options one should look for (I mean prepare for). I am of course not talking about tissue or leather seats type of options
4) Can someone tell my why glass cockpits are important? Schools seem to have them. Is there any use for that in simulators or is this only for extra visibility for VFR training?
Many thanks.
I have an x-plane simulator license (v.11) since yesterday with a standard Cessna 172 in it. My questions to people that may have done the same are as follows:
1) I would like to download the REAL documentation of the Cessna 172 and use it one-on-one with the simulator to learn to understand each instrument so that when the real instructor guided lessons start it isn't all new and overwhelming. I also want to start using the correct vocabulary from the start and not my own newbie terms.
2) Is there anyone who knows of a possible better (newer/better resolution/more complete/etc) Cessna 172 version for x-plane v.11. I am prepared to buy the better stuff and do things right. In the end all this 'amatory-grade' simulator tools are cheap compared to NOT be prepared and having to take exams all over or forcing your instructor into several extra hours of training because you have no clue what he is explaining.
3) Last but not least, are there Cessna 172 options to consider? With a car you have options and I suppose that is also the case with a plane. I prefer to learn to much then not enough (i was thinking radio/information systems/GPS/etc). In that case what are the options one should look for (I mean prepare for). I am of course not talking about tissue or leather seats type of options
4) Can someone tell my why glass cockpits are important? Schools seem to have them. Is there any use for that in simulators or is this only for extra visibility for VFR training?
Many thanks.
Have you done ground school yet?
Most instructors don't seem to like teaching simmers - you can get yourself into some bad habits if you're not careful. Useful for practicing navigation and some other skills but useless for handling.
I don't think my simming was too harmful but if you have time then concentrate on books. If you can arrive ready to sit air law then it will be a real boon.
Yes, there are lots of different c172s. Your flying school should make their manuals available to you.
Are you sure you want to do a cpl rather than atpl?
Most instructors don't seem to like teaching simmers - you can get yourself into some bad habits if you're not careful. Useful for practicing navigation and some other skills but useless for handling.
I don't think my simming was too harmful but if you have time then concentrate on books. If you can arrive ready to sit air law then it will be a real boon.
Yes, there are lots of different c172s. Your flying school should make their manuals available to you.
Are you sure you want to do a cpl rather than atpl?
Hi A.W. If you were flying in Great Britain you would most likely only have the option of a 30 or 40 year old Cessna, and most likely C152 not C172.
That is because of their relative costs. So look for the usual set of 6 'steam driven' Gauges, and a Carburettor engine.
My Aero Club does have a newish C172SP with Fuel injection engine, but only hires it out to trained pilots. ( It is a dog to start when hot, if you get the sequence wrong.)
As a cost effective start to your PPL you could see if the club has any old Charts for you to practice with. Practice some 100 nm routes, and see what type of airspace you encounter and at what altitude. Use a Permanent Marker Pen to mark the chart, and a Whiteboard Marker to erase that line after use.
One other pre PPL thing you could try, is to listen on a Scanner to the local airfield, to get used to the language used on the Radio.
.
That is because of their relative costs. So look for the usual set of 6 'steam driven' Gauges, and a Carburettor engine.
My Aero Club does have a newish C172SP with Fuel injection engine, but only hires it out to trained pilots. ( It is a dog to start when hot, if you get the sequence wrong.)
As a cost effective start to your PPL you could see if the club has any old Charts for you to practice with. Practice some 100 nm routes, and see what type of airspace you encounter and at what altitude. Use a Permanent Marker Pen to mark the chart, and a Whiteboard Marker to erase that line after use.
One other pre PPL thing you could try, is to listen on a Scanner to the local airfield, to get used to the language used on the Radio.
.
Most instructors don't seem to like teaching simmers - you can get yourself into some bad habits if you're not careful. Useful for practicing navigation and some other skills but useless for handling.
Want to really impress your instructor. Google "attitudes and movements" and then go through everything you find. Make a note of anything you find you don't fully understand so you can ask your instructor. The Attitudes and Movements lesson presents the foundation skills that you will use in every part of every flight for the rest of your flying career. Truly understanding and apply the concepts in this lesson is vital to successful flight training.
With respect to a particular training airplane, any airplane, my general observations about student weaknesses, is that systems knowledge is weak to non existent and that they have not committed the emergency vital actions to memory. The airplane Pilot Operating Handbook is your friend
Most instructors don't seem to like teaching simmers -
By the way, despite my negative comments about flight simulators, it's good to make the effort. And you will be able to make good use of the sim later practicing procedural skills and navigation so it won't be wasted.
Last edited by abgd; 14th Apr 2017 at 21:37.
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Glens o' Angus by way of LA
Age: 60
Posts: 1,975
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
As others have implied, I'd lighten up on the sim and hit the books, the attached link is an FAA publication called Pilots Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge that is downloadable, free and covers pretty much everything a young person starting out on a PPL needs for reference material, as you're learning in the UK/EU I'd probably skip the first chapter on the FAA's history.
https://www.faa.gov/regulations_poli...t_handbook.pdf
https://www.faa.gov/regulations_poli...t_handbook.pdf
Join Date: Nov 2000
Location: Cambridge, England, EU
Posts: 3,443
Likes: 0
Received 1 Like
on
1 Post
Suggestion: just don't.
It's easier for an instructor to teach you to fly from scratch than to have to start by getting you out of flight sim bad habits and ways of thinking.
(The sims do come in useful, later on when you can fly, for instrument procedures and suchlike.)
It's easier for an instructor to teach you to fly from scratch than to have to start by getting you out of flight sim bad habits and ways of thinking.
(The sims do come in useful, later on when you can fly, for instrument procedures and suchlike.)
I'm very much in agreement with Big Pistons here. There have been a few exceptions, but mostly simulator time does more harm than good - teaching yourself to fly on a sim will just teach you wrong habits that will take a lot of time and money (and the frustration of your instructor) to rectify.
But quality time spent with the official manual for whatever you're going to learn on will most certainly not be wasted. Get to know the manual inside-out, and whenever you find things in there you don't understand go to other textbooks to understand tohse things. This will all do you huge favours.
G
But quality time spent with the official manual for whatever you're going to learn on will most certainly not be wasted. Get to know the manual inside-out, and whenever you find things in there you don't understand go to other textbooks to understand tohse things. This will all do you huge favours.
G
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: Canada
Posts: 631
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
AirWaterloo,
Welcome to the group. I agree with the negative sentiments with respect to home computer flight sims, and worse, the users of these casual systems teaching themselves bad habits.
You have advice from some really experienced pilots and trainers here, and I agree with it. We learned to fly just after paper became a new idea. Computers were sliderules. And we learned well. Sure, there are excellent innovations in electronic technology to support piloting. These innovations will result in systems I grew up with fading into history, that's evolution, and as it should be.
But, the basics of piloting will remain unchanged, and must be learned. Preparing to fly a plane is excellent, prepare by reading the guidance material linked to you earlier, and the flight manual for the aircraft. It's very easy to find scans of single Cessna flight manuals on the internet. For the detail you need now, most any Cessna flight manual for a 100 series fixed gear, later than 1975, will be in a format, and contain the information which will be useful for your familiarization.
Don't concern yourself with "options" on the aircraft. At the PPL level, and optional equipment which may be installed will be a needless distraction to the new pilot (and my sweeping statement is intended to include glass cockpit). If you can only find glass cockpit to learn in (which is where we are pointed), okay, but don't go looking for it, nor pay extra to have it available if you have a choice.
If I were able to influence the flight training industry, every student pilot would train in a Piper J3 Cub with no electrical system at all, until later stages of their training.
Prepare to pay your instructor for the training you require. If your instructor would like you to practice or review on your own, they will direct you (and it will not be to a computer sim). At the initial stages of piloting, simming, and watching Youtube self help instructional videos are detrimental, and will increase your cost to take you to a PPL skill level.
Simulators are excellent training tools, when certified for the purpose, and used in a training environment. The cost of that level simulator will be a little less than the use of the aircraft, though not much less. And, it will not provide much benefit to a student pilot.
Welcome to the group. I agree with the negative sentiments with respect to home computer flight sims, and worse, the users of these casual systems teaching themselves bad habits.
You have advice from some really experienced pilots and trainers here, and I agree with it. We learned to fly just after paper became a new idea. Computers were sliderules. And we learned well. Sure, there are excellent innovations in electronic technology to support piloting. These innovations will result in systems I grew up with fading into history, that's evolution, and as it should be.
But, the basics of piloting will remain unchanged, and must be learned. Preparing to fly a plane is excellent, prepare by reading the guidance material linked to you earlier, and the flight manual for the aircraft. It's very easy to find scans of single Cessna flight manuals on the internet. For the detail you need now, most any Cessna flight manual for a 100 series fixed gear, later than 1975, will be in a format, and contain the information which will be useful for your familiarization.
Don't concern yourself with "options" on the aircraft. At the PPL level, and optional equipment which may be installed will be a needless distraction to the new pilot (and my sweeping statement is intended to include glass cockpit). If you can only find glass cockpit to learn in (which is where we are pointed), okay, but don't go looking for it, nor pay extra to have it available if you have a choice.
If I were able to influence the flight training industry, every student pilot would train in a Piper J3 Cub with no electrical system at all, until later stages of their training.
Prepare to pay your instructor for the training you require. If your instructor would like you to practice or review on your own, they will direct you (and it will not be to a computer sim). At the initial stages of piloting, simming, and watching Youtube self help instructional videos are detrimental, and will increase your cost to take you to a PPL skill level.
Simulators are excellent training tools, when certified for the purpose, and used in a training environment. The cost of that level simulator will be a little less than the use of the aircraft, though not much less. And, it will not provide much benefit to a student pilot.
Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2017
Location: Belgium
Posts: 6
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Thanks to all for the advice.
Based on the reactions I will change the Flight Simulator usage and use it to learn about the instruments, their usage and how they react in relation to activity of the plane.
I will refrain from flying or doing take-off and landing exercises and just see how instruments indicate their information as the plane moves. Furthermore, now that I have been told what a glass cockpit means, I think I will also try to map what instrument (old way) maps what information in the (new way) and if they differ in features.
I have also just set-up FlightAware to listen to radio communications in order to get used to the many accents, the fast speech, the noisy radio channels, etc.
I also have set-up Goolgle Earth to map real 3D Airport images (RunWays, TaxiWays, etc) with the ground maps that FlightAware embeds. I think I know the Jerez (Spain) Airport by memory now and JFK starts to become very familiar - just joking.
Thanks also for pointing me to the "Pilots Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge" of the FAA.
And although I found my English to be quite decent (3rd language) I found out that the aviation world has a lot of abbreviations and field specific terms. So I started to enhance my vocabulary with a book on Aviation English.
Based on the reactions I will change the Flight Simulator usage and use it to learn about the instruments, their usage and how they react in relation to activity of the plane.
I will refrain from flying or doing take-off and landing exercises and just see how instruments indicate their information as the plane moves. Furthermore, now that I have been told what a glass cockpit means, I think I will also try to map what instrument (old way) maps what information in the (new way) and if they differ in features.
I have also just set-up FlightAware to listen to radio communications in order to get used to the many accents, the fast speech, the noisy radio channels, etc.
I also have set-up Goolgle Earth to map real 3D Airport images (RunWays, TaxiWays, etc) with the ground maps that FlightAware embeds. I think I know the Jerez (Spain) Airport by memory now and JFK starts to become very familiar
- just joking.Thanks also for pointing me to the "Pilots Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge" of the FAA.
And although I found my English to be quite decent (3rd language) I found out that the aviation world has a lot of abbreviations and field specific terms. So I started to enhance my vocabulary with a book on Aviation English.
Moderator
AirWaterloo,
See if you can work out how to do self learning without using a simulator, digital map, FlightAware or Google Earth at all. Just paper for the first while....
I'm not saying that a digital map (including Google Earth) is not useful, but it's not what you need to learn first or best. That will come later - learn to fly a plane by feeling the controls, and looking out of the windshield. Listening to radio communications can be educational, if it is done in the context of integrating what you have been taught during flying instruction into your understanding. If you're simply listening to the communications, while interesting, it will have very limited basic training value. Focus on learning to fly the plane, by feeling the controls, and looking out the windshield.
A book on aviation English - excellent! More books! Yes, they can be on a computer, I'm not any computer, I just discourage the use of a computer to evade the basic disciplines of reading the required instructional material in written format, and distracting the student pilot from learning what the instructor has to teach.
An instructor who comes to recognize you've learned it wrong, will teach you the right way. They'll figure out how you learned it wrong. And, of course, they will charge you the time to provide the corrective instruction. You'll pay to unlearn what the sim showed you, and what you misinterpreted from the mapping software. When your instructor is ready, they may direct you to limited use of some mapping software. Wait for them to tell you the time is right for you.
See if you can work out how to do self learning without using a simulator, digital map, FlightAware or Google Earth at all. Just paper for the first while....
I'm not saying that a digital map (including Google Earth) is not useful, but it's not what you need to learn first or best. That will come later - learn to fly a plane by feeling the controls, and looking out of the windshield. Listening to radio communications can be educational, if it is done in the context of integrating what you have been taught during flying instruction into your understanding. If you're simply listening to the communications, while interesting, it will have very limited basic training value. Focus on learning to fly the plane, by feeling the controls, and looking out the windshield.
A book on aviation English - excellent! More books! Yes, they can be on a computer, I'm not any computer, I just discourage the use of a computer to evade the basic disciplines of reading the required instructional material in written format, and distracting the student pilot from learning what the instructor has to teach.
An instructor who comes to recognize you've learned it wrong, will teach you the right way. They'll figure out how you learned it wrong. And, of course, they will charge you the time to provide the corrective instruction. You'll pay to unlearn what the sim showed you, and what you misinterpreted from the mapping software. When your instructor is ready, they may direct you to limited use of some mapping software. Wait for them to tell you the time is right for you.
Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2017
Location: Belgium
Posts: 6
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
@Pilot DAR, thanks. I have the 7 Pooley books and the 9 exam question books underway. I also downloaded the FAA's Pilot Handbook and started to extend my vocabulary with an English Aviation Vocabulary book.
However, the FlightAware listening is ABSOLUTELY a must for me as English is my 3rd language and currently I cannot repeat (just repeat) what the tower and pilots are saying. I pick-up some numbers, of course the Alpha, Bravo, Charlie stuff but that is about it. I MUST absolutely get used to the mix of fast speech, the complete lack of articulation and the accents where applicable and at least be able to repeat what was said (even if I would not fully understand the meaning). I teach (complex matters) in English so you can understand that it is quite scary to me that I cannot repeat a simple sentence that I hear in a radio communication.
I use JFK radio communications because, over here, it is said that New-Yorkers are the most difficult to understand Don't take that to serious
However, the FlightAware listening is ABSOLUTELY a must for me as English is my 3rd language and currently I cannot repeat (just repeat) what the tower and pilots are saying. I pick-up some numbers, of course the Alpha, Bravo, Charlie stuff but that is about it. I MUST absolutely get used to the mix of fast speech, the complete lack of articulation and the accents where applicable and at least be able to repeat what was said (even if I would not fully understand the meaning). I teach (complex matters) in English so you can understand that it is quite scary to me that I cannot repeat a simple sentence that I hear in a radio communication.
I use JFK radio communications because, over here, it is said that New-Yorkers are the most difficult to understand
Don't take that to serious
Join Date: Nov 2000
Location: Cambridge, England, EU
Posts: 3,443
Likes: 0
Received 1 Like
on
1 Post
But I can't imagine how it would be useful for a beginning PPL student.
What would be useful is reading (some of) the books you'll need to learn to pass the exams (some bits are rather harder to get to grips with until you have some flying experience). And, yes, listening to the radio, but whilst you're studying the appropriate book so that you know what you're listening to.
Hi AirWaterloo. The ebook 'Handling Light Aircraft' by Julien Evans might be a useful supplement to your training. Good luck, and welcome to the pilot community. Some of us have been messing about with flying machines for half a century! But I expect we'll grow out of it one day!
I use JFK radio communications because, over here, it is said that New-Yorkers are the most difficult to understand
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: UK,Twighlight Zone
Posts: 0
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Can I suggest that you just wait until you get to Spain. My staff are extremely capable and will teach you everything you need. We invariably find flight simmers a nightmare to train as they have so many preconceptions. ��
Please take the advice of bose-x. Close the flight sim down and don't open it again until advised. You'll thank him some time in the future.
If you want to do anything read the Pooleys Air Law book until it sends you to sleep, then continue reading it the next day until the same thing happens. Repeat daily.
If you want to do anything read the Pooleys Air Law book until it sends you to sleep, then continue reading it the next day until the same thing happens. Repeat daily.
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Hotel this week, hotel next week, home whenever...
Posts: 1,492
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Phone F.I.S and ask (or Bose-X might post) what versions of the 172 they operate (M,N,P,R etc...) then download the appropriate POH and LEARN IT from front to back. Speeds, systems, Emergency checklists etc