Atitude indicators.
Atitude indicators.
Guest
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PFM, I may be wrong but I think the reason is :
back in the days when cockpits were painted matt black and Smiths provided the instruments, the british way was to have a ground pointer in the artificial horizon ( these were also the days before this instrument became the "ADI").
Today, most large a/c have sky pointers on their ADI's because that's the way american instruments have, I believe, always been designed, and most of these instruments are manufactured in North America.
I personally prefer skypointers, but it's probably just that I'm used to them.
I don't recall becoming disorientated when changing from one type to another, although I did hear of the CAA at the time expressing concern that sky pointers might be confusing ....well they would, wouldn't they?
back in the days when cockpits were painted matt black and Smiths provided the instruments, the british way was to have a ground pointer in the artificial horizon ( these were also the days before this instrument became the "ADI").
Today, most large a/c have sky pointers on their ADI's because that's the way american instruments have, I believe, always been designed, and most of these instruments are manufactured in North America.
I personally prefer skypointers, but it's probably just that I'm used to them.
I don't recall becoming disorientated when changing from one type to another, although I did hear of the CAA at the time expressing concern that sky pointers might be confusing ....well they would, wouldn't they?
Guest
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Altho trained on heavyjets in the USA, I must admit that the "ground pointer" is/was not a bad idea. Also have flown aircraft with ground pointers on the pilots' ADI's and sky pointers on the standby ADI. Hmmm, not a good idea but it was allowed by a certain (third world) regulatory authorty. Never found it much of a problem to operate from one day to the next with different displays. Same with Collins "V" bars or Sperry crosspointer F/D displays.
