Kettle Moraine Forest, Saved by the chute.

Morgan3820 said:
The pilot in question, flying at night in IMC over terrain in a single engine aircraft begs a lot of questions. Would he have done that in an aircraft without a BRS? Either answer proves my point.

...

So it is a good thing for safety, but he mentioned a couple of instances where the handle was pulled but failed to deploy. In both examples the pilot landed safely anyway. So why did the pilots pulled the handle when they could have landed safely without it?

...
the biggest problem with the CAPS can be summed up in a direct quote from a Cirrus pilot that came into the shop “The weather was really crappy but I had the chute so I took off anyway “ I had to walk away.
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Very interesting. Classic risk compensation and unintended consequences.
 
Morgan3820 said:
Apparently, i struck a nerve and you are calling me out.

Except for one fact, I offer only anecdotes. That fact, told to me by a Cirrus dealer is that 75% of Cirrus aircraft are financed as a business expense. My take away from that tidbit is that a lot of Cirrus pilots are buying them as their first plane for a personal/business convenience rather than the latest in a series of aircraft, building time and experience over years of flying lower performance aircraft as a hobby. It is also my opinion that the Cirrus is purchased because of the BRS as a crutch or a bone to throw a reluctant significant other. There are a lot of other, more capable used aircraft available for half the cost. Why buy a lesser performing aircraft for twice the money except for the BRS? Would Cirrus sales be what they are without the BRS? It is my opinion that Cirrus air frames attract lower time pilots with bigger checkbooks. They are the new Bonanza. Shiny status symbols for people concerned about such things.

The pilot in question, flying at night in IMC over terrain in a single engine aircraft begs a lot of questions. Would he have done that in an aircraft without a BRS? Either answer proves my point.

Paul B. offers some perspective in a You tube presentation
. In it he agrees that no one has died due to a BRS deployment. So it is a good thing for safety, but he mentioned a couple of instances where the handle was pulled but failed to deploy. In both examples the pilot landed safely anyway. So why did the pilots pulled the handle when they could have landed safely without it?

Additionally, In the comments section this was found:

Russell Witt
2 years ago
I worked at a Cirrus repair center, the biggest problem with the CAPS can be summed up in a direct quote from a Cirrus pilot that came into the shop “The weather was really crappy but I had the chute so I took off anyway “ I had to walk away.

Also, If you are taking my opinions as a personal slam, you should not. I don't know you. If you are a happy Cirrus owner, why worry about the 'inference prevalent in the GA community"? I own an Arrow II. A lot of pilots would not own one. For others, it is the plane they hope to get, one day. That is fine. I am happy with what I have. Be happy with what you have.
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I think you draw a lot of conclusions, or at least controversial theories from anecdotes. This pilot flying a single engine airplane, in IMC at night over terrain is hardly the only single engine pilot to do so irregardless of aircraft brand. So if this pilot is irresponsible, what does that make pilots of Bonanzas, Mooneys, Cessnas and others who do the same?

The bottom line here is this guy had some type of instrument failure OR, maybe nothing failed and he lost his wits in IMC over terrain at night, he wouldn't be the first GA pilot to have that happen. It doesn't matter, instead of perishing he used his "Save our lives" handle and survived. If he were in an airplane without that feature he may not have been so lucky.

There are a lot of Cirrus out there flying around now. There are a lot of Cirrus on their third or forth owner. Cirrus is working hard to make its brand of aircraft one of the safest around, and they are succeeding. Hopefully these owners are getting the proper training to fly these airplanes, unfortunately there are some pilots out there who for whatever reason don't think this training is important. There are going to be accidents. There are good pilots who have issues, and there are bad pilots out there too, flying all types of airplanes.

Just seems like a lot of jealousy, I don't get it, you are correct, fly, enjoy what you have. Let's learn from these accidents and move on.
 
luvflyin said:
Simulator. Don't remember which one but it was pretty sophisticated. You sat in it, not just in a chair in front of it. The instructor can do all kinds of mean nasty evil stuff. It doesn't just 'poof' turn off an instrument and/or flag it. It lets it slowly wind down not making sense if your comparing to other instruments.
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Recently did the same thing in X-Plane 11 after realizing that I hadn't practiced partial panel in a very long time. I set the vacuum pump to fail after 27 minutes, then executed an IFR flight, starting cold and dark. I absolutely wasn't tracking the time so that I'd be at least somewhat surprised by the specific timing of the failure. I also tried my best not to dwell on it ahead of time. I purposefully picked an IFR flight with a busy pilot nav SID so that I'd be occupied shortly after wheels up. If memory serve, the failure occurred shortly into the enroute portion while on a victor airway. It was eye opening how much work it was to fly the approach and not going into a PIO during the approach. GPS with magnetic course was helpful, for sure. I also brought ForeFlight with SV into the picture for a little bit as a training refresher, but quickly put it away as there wasn't a whole lot to practice once it was up and running.

Xplane does a decent job with the vacuum failure. The AI tumbles slowly. The hardest part is ignoring it when it's only off by a little bit. It's pretty straight forward once the AI is showing a 90 deg bank and you know you're straight and level. But when it's only 5-10 degs off....oof. You really have to remove it from the scan.
 
coma24 said:
Recently did the same thing in X-Plane 11 after realizing that I hadn't practiced partial panel in a very long time. I set the vacuum pump to fail after 27 minutes, then executed an IFR flight, starting cold and dark. I absolutely wasn't tracking the time so that I'd be at least somewhat surprised by the specific timing of the failure. I also tried my best not to dwell on it ahead of time. I purposefully picked an IFR flight with a busy pilot nav SID so that I'd be occupied shortly after wheels up. If memory serve, the failure occurred shortly into the enroute portion while on a victor airway. It was eye opening how much work it was to fly the approach and not going into a PIO during the approach. GPS with magnetic course was helpful, for sure. I also brought ForeFlight with SV into the picture for a little bit as a training refresher, but quickly put it away as there wasn't a whole lot to practice once it was up and running.

Xplane does a decent job with the vacuum failure. The AI tumbles slowly. The hardest part is ignoring it when it's only off by a little bit. It's pretty straight forward once the AI is showing a 90 deg bank and you know you're straight and level. But when it's only 5-10 degs off....oof. You really have to remove it from the scan.
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Yeah. Way different than when the CFI just slaps a sticker on an instrument. I looked back to see the SIM I used. It was a CRX MAX. I didn't know when or what she was going to do next. Vacuum failure, pitot tube or static port icing up. It was an eye opener. I was pretty worn out by the time it was over
 
coma24 said:
Recently did the same thing in X-Plane 11 after realizing that I hadn't practiced partial panel in a very long time. I set the vacuum pump to fail after 27 minutes, then executed an IFR flight, starting cold and dark. I absolutely wasn't tracking the time so that I'd be at least somewhat surprised by the specific timing of the failure. I also tried my best not to dwell on it ahead of time. I purposefully picked an IFR flight with a busy pilot nav SID so that I'd be occupied shortly after wheels up. If memory serve, the failure occurred shortly into the enroute portion while on a victor airway. It was eye opening how much work it was to fly the approach and not going into a PIO during the approach. GPS with magnetic course was helpful, for sure. I also brought ForeFlight with SV into the picture for a little bit as a training refresher, but quickly put it away as there wasn't a whole lot to practice once it was up and running.

Xplane does a decent job with the vacuum failure. The AI tumbles slowly. The hardest part is ignoring it when it's only off by a little bit. It's pretty straight forward once the AI is showing a 90 deg bank and you know you're straight and level. But when it's only 5-10 degs off....oof. You really have to remove it from the scan.
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I'm using X-plane and PilotWorkshops' Instrument Rating Accelerator to do some self-guided intro to IFR before I jump in and knock out the actual flight training. I dipped my toe in with my first actual IMC a few weeks ago. It was also my first flight in a high performance aircraft, and the IMC was one of the easiest parts of the flight. I have a ton to learn, but I think learning to do a basic scan in a simulator where you have no gravity reference makes it feel much less alien in the real aircraft.

To your point about the failures, as I've kept working it, I've added most of the main instruments/systems (including the big fan on the front) set on a high mean time to failure so I lose something about every long flight or every other short flight. I've noticed the difference when I fly the real airplane - I'm still VFR only, but I'm cross-checking and contingency planning much better throughout each phase of flight. It's a good mental conditioning tool, if nothing else.

Also, don't let anyone talk you out of using a Mac for this purpose. The M1 MacBook Pro does a fantastic job with X-plane 11.
 
Hi, I've just inherited two National 490 parachutes. I'm looking for a venue to sell them. They were inspected every year until my step-Dad could no longer fly his planes. If anyone can point me in the right direction that would be highly appreciated. Thanks!
 
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