partial panel training in IMC conditions?

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david
Curious if CFIIs are doing partial panel training in solid IMC. I've heard mixed opinions on whether it's a good idea.

Did anyone do partial panel training while IMC during their instrument training?

Instructors, do/would you do this with a student training for an instrument rating?
 
Only did it in simulated.


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I have no doubt mine would for an IPC. Probably not for IFR training though
 
\__[Ô]__/ said:
Curious if CFIIs are doing partial panel training in solid IMC. I've heard mixed opinions on whether it's a good idea.
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What happened to that risk management thing? On a solid IMC approach, I would imagine even a seasoned CFII would still have their hands full. Why burden a student? That's what SIMS are for.
 
I'm not sure I understand the issue. When would you need partial panel skills except in IMC? And if important then, why would you not train the way you're going to fight?
 
Certainly a good idea to train for it in actual...just ask @MAKG1 if it ever actually happens!
 
Bleeding.
There's only one way to practice it.
Hand me that knife, this won't hurt.
Much.
 
airdale said:
I'm not sure I understand the issue. When would you need partial panel skills except in IMC? And if important then, why would you not train the way you're going to fight?
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The issue is actual IMC versus simulated IMC. (Hood or sim)


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I did it during training-- we stuck to the syallabus regardless of weather. If it was VMC I flew with foggles, when it was IMC I didn't. I've got partial panel logged in IMC (as well as in a sim and simulated, foggles,in the plane) as a result and personally I'm glad that I got that experience with a CFII riding shotgun.
 
Who said anything about doing partial panel on an approach? The OP asked about partial panel in IMC. He never said anything about doing it on an approach
 
There's nothing wrong with it depending on the phase of flight. Believe it or not, it is possible to hold heading and altitude without an attitude indicator or HSI.
 
JCranford said:
Who said anything about doing partial panel on an approach? The OP asked about partial panel in IMC. He never said anything about doing it on an approach
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Good point. But since it came up...

For the people who've done partial panel training in IMC (as student or instructor), was it enroute or was it on an approach?
 
Shawn said:
Certainly a good idea to train for it in actual...just ask @MAKG1 if it ever actually happens!
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I never trained for it in actual, but I did have an electronic HSI failure for real in IMC.

It was not like training. Reading a mag compass is not easy in turbulence, and you can't cover an HSI because you need the info that still works. But yes, I did really need timed and compass turns to get out of that.

I also had a GPS lose signal during an LPV missed approach while out of radio contact with Approach. But I guess that's technically a full panel.

I'm not certain that training emergencies in actual is a good idea. There is a lot of additional risk if a non proficient pilot does that, and the instructor is also missing the instrument and can't bail you out as easily should that become necessary. Under the hood, the instructor has the real horizon. And real failures are different anyway. The real challenge for a vacuum failure is identifying it before you flip over, and a sim is better suited for that.

Having said all that, I've had some exhausting partial panel LPVs under the hood in G1000 aircraft on windy days. Failures are different in those, but the terrain turbulence makes for a really good exercise.
 
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As a CFII, I wouldn't do partial panel training in actual. Just too far on the "risky" side for my comfort. Same reason I wouldn't do unusual attitudes in actual.
 
When I took my CFII ride, we delayed it a day due to IMC. The examiner's comment was that practicing partial panel in IMC is of questionable legality. That sounded reasonable to me at the time. However, over the years I have decided that I no longer agree with him, there's nothing illegal about not looking at certain instruments, which is really all you're doing with partial panel work.

There are really two questions here - practicing partial panel maneuvers in IMC and performing instrument approaches partial panel.

Many times with a student if there are clouds (even if it's VFR, so, say overcast at 3000 maybe) I will request an IFR clearance with a block altitude from ATC - such as "remain with 10 nm of the VOR, 4000 to 7000" and usually I get it if I am flexible on the size of the block. Then we'll go and practice climbs, descents, turns, unusual attitudes, etc. Full or partial panel, doesn't really matter. It's great training.

For an approach, I have not had this exact situation before, but I imagine I would not have a problem performing partial panel approach in IMC with a student who is already reasonably competent and to a ceiling that is reasonably high - say 1000 feet. But CFI workload during any actual instrument approach with a student is dramatically higher than in VMC, so it would depend on a lot of other factors as well.

In the traditional "cover up the AI and DG" version of partial panel, you can use a 3M sticky note and stick it on so that you (the CFI) can see the instrument but the student can't. So that would be a good idea for this situation. For other versions of partial panel (glass cockpit, electric HSI but vacuum AI, or some other variant), it may or may not be more difficult to do this, but each case is different.

What I wouldn't do, though, would be something that takes significant time to un-do. Like, I might turn off the PFD in visual conditions to practice, but I'm not going to turn it off in IMC. That does seem to me to not only be questionable judgment, but questionable legality. If you have a problem, it may take longer to turn the thing back on than you have left.
 
As a CFII, 2x a year I do a IPC. The entire IPC is done right seat partial panel. So for me, partial panel in real IMC is not a chore.
 
The equipment isn't actually inop. It's covered with a removable sticky note or gauge cover. Bailing out of partial panel practice which has gone haywire is a matter of peeling off the sticky note.
 
Harold Rutila said:
The equipment isn't actually inop. It's covered with a removable sticky note or gauge cover. Bailing out of partial panel practice which has gone haywire is a matter of peeling off the sticky note.
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No it isn't.

You peel off the sticky, and then deal with the unusual attitude and pilot deviation.

You'll get 100 feet off altitude in a real hurry.

While it's less dangerous than real inop (like pulling the AHRS circuit breaker in a G1000 -- it ain't coming back until you're on the ground), there is more to it than just pulling the sticky off.
 
MAKG1 said:
No it isn't.

You peel off the sticky, and then deal with the unusual attitude and pilot deviation.

You'll get 100 feet off altitude in a real hurry.

While it's less dangerous than real inop (like pulling the AHRS circuit breaker in a G1000 -- it ain't coming back until you're on the ground), there is more to it than just pulling the sticky off.
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It's a good point that it's not just the unusual attitude to worry about, it's you deviating and causing loss of separation or worse...


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Yes, perhaps I should clarify haywire to mean "when the student begins deviating unacceptably." As CFIIs we can intervene way before it becomes a pilot deviation-type problem. When you're on an IFR clearance that lets you operate in a block of airspace, this helps mitigate those concerns.

For the record, I don't regularly practice covering gauges in real IMC, but I am not opposed to the idea when the conditions are right for it.
 
I did partial panel in IMC during training after doing partial panel with foggles. There really wasn't much difference other than not being able to cheat. Personally I'm happy for all the actual I got during training. I think having the first experience with an instructor on board was better than it would have been facing it for the first time when I was on my own.

Gary
 
We did partial panel in the sim (down to no instruments with 200 foot ceilings, great way to crash), simulated with foggles, and in actual...including a few approaches in actual. Then again, the plane had a back up attitude indicator and tracking the nav source was more important than maintaining an exact heading.
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
feeling with hands out the window? listening for gear to hit something? (Or, I did not follow "no instruments" correctly)
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This was in a non-motion simulator. He had the weather set up with something like 2 miles of visibility and 200 foot ceilings. Tops at 6000'. My instructor progressively killed the instruments "en route", starting with my vacuum system, then pitot/static, then nav and comms. It was not a successful landing. First response was to divert to a closer airport with an ILS when he failed the vacuum system. Once the pitot/static was failed, I could still use GPS for ground speed and was already tracking the localizer/glide slope on the way down. Nav and comms went next, and I made the mistake of trying to climb to MSA. Turn coordinator kept me wings relatively level, but I got slow, stalled, and didn't know to recover since I had no pitch reference. It was a little surprising when I broke out of the "clouds" considering I thought I was in a climb.
 
jeremyk13 said:
This was in a non-motion simulator. He had the weather set up with something like 2 miles of visibility and 200 foot ceilings. Tops at 6000'. My instructor progressively killed the instruments "en route", starting with my vacuum system, then pitot/static, then nav and comms. It was not a successful landing. First response was to divert to a closer airport with an ILS when he failed the vacuum system. Once the pitot/static was failed, I could still use GPS for ground speed and was already tracking the localizer/glide slope on the way down. Nav and comms went next, and I made the mistake of trying to climb to MSA. Turn coordinator kept me wings relatively level, but I got slow, stalled, and didn't know to recover since I had no pitch reference. It was a little surprising when I broke out of the "clouds" considering I thought I was in a climb.
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Did you forget the alternate static and pitot heat?

The usual reason those fail is ice.
 
MAKG1 said:
Did you forget the alternate static and pitot heat?

The usual reason those fail is ice.
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I don't think the Redbird is that sophisticated. You can fail individual instruments or entire systems but I as far as I remember you couldn't just simulate an iced up pitot tube or something like that.

Then again if the instructor sees the student turn on the pitot heat I suppose the instructor could then unfail it.
 
I did partial panel during my training in IMC. Actual condition are no comparison to being under the hood. Do the real thing whenever possible.
 
I was trying to give more of an overview instead of the full play by play, but no I didn't forget. Turned the pitot heat on and the instructor said "it didn't fix it". For the static, I switched to alternate static, which fixed the problem for all of 10 seconds while my instructor figured out how to fail the alternate static. I asked if we had a hammer, which got a laugh and recommendation not to break the panel if I didn't want to buy a new one.
 
jeremyk13 said:
I was trying to give more of an overview instead of the full play by play, but no I didn't forget. Turned the pitot heat on and the instructor said "it didn't fix it". For the static, I switched to alternate static, which fixed the problem for all of 10 seconds while my instructor figured out how to fail the alternate static. I asked if we had a hammer, which got a laugh and recommendation not to break the panel if I didn't want to buy a new one.
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I have to ask what the point of the lesson was.

Yes, if everything fails at once, you're in deep doo-doo.

Usually, the point is to work through a scenario. Sometimes that can involve cascading failures, or perhaps serious failures. Like, an in-flight electrical fire will blow all the electrical equipment at once. But you'll still have your vacuum AI, perhaps a DG, and all the pitot-static instruments.
 
Point was that we were finished for the lesson. We had gone through the criteria in the syllabus and he decided to mess with me since we were done. Turns out simulators are great for messing with students who have a sense of humor.
 
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