Engine out practice

Ive been thinking about this concept of spinning vs stopped prop and started the Engine Out Survival Tactic book thanks to my gf getting it for me for Valentines day (and someone mentioning it here)and I've come to this observation:

I think the theory can be proved by simple observation in our helicopter cousins...

if a helo looses its engine what will slow its decent more? A stopped rotor or a spinning rotor...

or

can a gyro copter create enough lift if its “wings” were fixd? Even spinning one so both were pointed the right way for a wing? Of course not... so the rotating blade obviously creates more surface area in effect than what exists in actual reality...
 
I can also verify that engine out in my 182 slows me down, but my prop windmills.

If you can practice this safely, say above a long runway, prudence dictates you do it as rarely as needed to maintain competence for a unlikely event, lest the training becomes more risky than the event!

That said idle power is very noticeable, not to mention the deafening silence.

It also is a constant speed, so oil pressure matters...
 
Huckster79 said:
Ive been thinking about this concept of spinning vs stopped prop and started the Engine Out Survival Tactic book thanks to my gf getting it for me for Valentines day (and someone mentioning it here)and I've come to this observation:

I think the theory can be proved by simple observation in our helicopter cousins...

if a helo looses its engine what will slow its decent more? A stopped rotor or a spinning rotor...

or

can a gyro copter create enough lift if its “wings” were fixd? Even spinning one so both were pointed the right way for a wing? Of course not... so the rotating blade obviously creates more surface area in effect than what exists in actual reality...
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I think this is incorrect. But I’m probably wrong. In my opinion this is due to the energy stored in the inertia of the blades, which. You can trade that inertia back and forth by losing altitude, and then slowing your descent. That isn’t possible with an airpane prop
 
Salty said:
I think this is incorrect. But I’m probably wrong. In my opinion this is due to the energy stored in the inertia of the blades, which. You can trade that inertia back and forth by losing altitude, and then slowing your descent. That isn’t possible with an airpane prop
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A helicopter will autorotate and come down at a constant rate, but it's like a gliding plane, if you don't flare before touchdown you're gonna hit hard. Just before touchdown, the pilot pulls the collective to increase the pitch and use the stored energy in the spinning rotor to check the descent. The timing is critical, more so than flaring a plane.
 
I gotta admit im a bit disappointed in the Engine Out Survival tactics book. Too much detail on one model and heavy on words, could have really been amplified by more real world varied scenarios... never even discussed in detail the dreaded engine out at take off... I also think he certainly should have used his military training as his base of knowledge but it was a bit heavy in f16 talk..
 
The whole spinning prop versus stopped prop seems like it would be a huge distraction/waste of time/brain power in a situation where you may only have a minute or two to get your butt on the ground safely. Now if it happens at 15,000 agl, might be worth doing.
 
PaulS said:
The whole spinning prop versus stopped prop seems like it would be a huge distraction/waste of time/brain power in a situation where you may only have a minute or two to get your butt on the ground safely. Now if it happens at 15,000 agl, might be worth doing.
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Where’s the cutoff between something that isn’t worthwhile if you only have a minute or two, but may be worthwhile if you have 20 minutes?
 
brcase said:
Only the Altimeter, had two VSI (Variometers) that both worked fine.
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Now the time I skewed a bumblebee on the Pitot, that messed up the Airspeed and one of my Variometer. Not only are variometers more sensitive than a VSI they also usually have. Feature we Called Total Energy Compensation, Basically this subtracts out altitude changes caused by changes in airspeed. In so in theory in calm error if if pull. Up and slow down from 100kts to 50kts the variomenter will not show any climb because I have not added any energy to the system I only traded kinetic energy for potential energy.

The feature mentioned is Variometers often an audio output so we don’t have to stare at them to see changes in climb.

When I skewed the bumblebee (mostly plugging the pitot) the Airspeed responded very slowly and altitude changes affected it. My second variometer was on a separate pitot static system.(my sailplane has 3 static’s systems and 2 pitot systems).

Brian
 
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