When money was no object in pilot training

i believe that money has always been an object in pilot training
 
ebetancourt said:
We are using the same words to define different things.
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Okay.


BTW, I hope I'm not coming off as saying a stabilized approach is the ONLY way or that technique is a RULE. It's not. What works for you, well... works. But I have yet to see a plane where a non-stabilized approach is preferable IMO. I do realize there are those who preach and teach and swear by being able to land with now power from the pattern. I just disagree. It's okay to have differing opinions on these things...
 
Captain said:
I wouldn't teach it or fly it that way. I don't think passengers would like it much either. Landing is scary enough (for them) without giving them a death plummet followed by a yank-and-save.



edit to add (for them). thought it made it clearer what I meant...
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I'm curious. How long has it been since you flew a piston single training aircraft? Pulling the throttle to idle in a C-172 is NOT anything resembling a death plummet followed by a yank and save. I give lots of first rides and while I do tell the passengers what's coming ("I'm pulling power now to descend...") it's just not that abrupt.

John
 
ebetancourt said:
Well the book says fly into the wind between 1,000 and 1,500 feet and cut the power directly over the selected landing spot. "Common faults: (1) usual faults in gliding turns, (2) Improper allowance for drift, and (3) Faulty planning of flight path.

Sounds like an exercise in aircraft control to me, but I wasn't there.
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About five minutes after I laid down to sleep I realized the technique for dropping through a cloud deck way back when was to intentionally spin over top of the airport....
 
It was when I started in 1957. An hour in the trainer was equivalent to a day's pay, neither of which would buy your lunch today.

tonycondon said:
i believe that money has always been an object in pilot training
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rottydaddy said:
Are they really that much more reliable than in 1941? They haven't changed much. Brand-new engines have failures due to manufacturing flaws or improper maintenance/operation, and there are 1941 engines that haven't quit yet. :dunno:
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Yes, they are much more reliable. While the designs haven't changed, the materials quality and process controls have improved dramatically, and the result is a lot fewer engine failures for mechanical reasons. Yes, there are still occasional problems, but those problems get caught and fixed a lot faster. If you dig into the accident reports, you'll see there are very few real mechanical engine failures these days other than engines which were seriously neglected.

As for "1941 engines that haven't quit yet," I suspect they are very few and far between. More likely those whose data plates date from 1941 don't have too many parts left that weren't replaced much more recently with new construction pieces.
 
Tracey said:
I'm consistently landing with no power. "When you see that you have the runway made, pull power to idle" has been drilled into my head.

Am I learning everything the wrong way???? Or does learning it the "harder" way make me a better pilot? (Not sure if that is the "harder" way... I'm just taking a stab at why I might be being taught this way).
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Cutting power to idle when the runway is made is not contrary to the FAA's Stabilized VFR Approach concept. In fact, most light airplanes really need to have the power pulled to idle or they don't want to land at all. The question is how you get from the abeam position to the point of having the desired touchdown point made, i.e., the approach, not the landing maneuver. I suspect that you are flying partial-power stabilized approaches up to that point, and then cutting power to land, yes? If so, you're doing just what the FAA and I both recommend.
 
Captain said:
I wouldn't teach it or fly it that way. I don't think passengers would like it much either. Landing is scary enough (for them) without giving them a death plummet followed by a yank-and-save.
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I disagree -- she's flying a light GA plane, not an RJ. In jets, yes, you often carry power to touchdown (always, in a Navy carrier jet). However, in a light GA plane, you have to go to idle once the touchdown point is made and the transition to landing is begun or the darn thing won't quit flying. And the result of that is hardly a "death plummet followed by a yank-and-save" if you approach at 1.3 Vs0 and then make a smooth reduction to idle as you reach the transition point.
 
Ron Levy said:
Because power-off landings require you to cut the power at just the right point (and that point changes with wind direction and velocity) and then you have to manage speed and glide path with only angle of attack. That complicates matters significantly because then neither speed nor glide path are stable during the approach. If you use angle of attack to manage speed, and power to manage glide path, you have a lot easier time keeping both stable, and that makes for better landings.
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Yeah, but if you're a little short, what's wrong with adding a little power to make the threshold?
 
My training 20 years ago and my training when I started flying again last year were both with older than me instructors and I MYSELF am old as dirt.

My instructor 20 years ago and who started with me again last year before changing instructors for geographical reasons, was the son of a WWII pilot and started flying when he was 12. He was old school all the way.

We started in his Champ and I don't remember EVER landing with him under power. He started me on power off landings from the very first time I ever went up with him. He also started pulling the power on me and making me look for somewhere to set it down almost from the very beginning.

As a result I developed a feel for gliding it in right from the get go. Not long after I solo'd, he got me, I don't remember how high above the threshold of the runway on a day with no traffic in the area, and he cut the power. I don't mean pulling the throttle back but he shut the engine off. He then told me to spiral around and the spiral at the threshold and land.

After I finally got my composure and decided we weren't going to die because he killed the engine, I spiraled around a number of times and set it on the numbers to my complete amazement.

I am not saying that I'm related to Chuck Yeager. I'm saying that there is lots of merit in his training methods. And for me there's lots of merit for the power off landing method.

The old fellow would not sign me off for the checkride until I had done spins. We took his Champ up to about 6,000 feet and I recovered from a spin twice, but niether time did I come out of the spin headed toward the airport as he had required, so he did not sign me off for spins.

He did some other old school training that doesn't come to mind right this minute. Is any of this necessary to make a pilot? I have no idea, but I don't think any of it made me less of a pilot.

I should point out that I have never been pilot in command of any aircraft with more than two seats, but I STILL land with no power. That's also the way my second instructor who's not much younger than my first, taught me to land the taildragger.

As far as I'm concerned, power off landings Rock!
 
Ron Levy said:
I disagree -- she's flying a light GA plane, not an RJ. In jets, yes, you often carry power to touchdown (always, in a Navy carrier jet). However, in a light GA plane, you have to go to idle once the touchdown point is made and the transition to landing is begun or the darn thing won't quit flying. And the result of that is hardly a "death plummet followed by a yank-and-save" if you approach at 1.3 Vs0 and then make a smooth reduction to idle as you reach the transition point.
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I agree with everything you just said. Maybe I miss-understood what she meant by 'once the runway was made you pull power'. I was taking that to mean hundreds of feet in the air. You seem to be visualizing in or near the flare. If she's flying stabilized to, or even nearly to the round out then that's exactly how I'd teach it.

I understand a C172 isn't a jet and doesn't need to arrest descent with power like an airliner. I think we're just hearing different things from her.
 
Ron Levy said:
Not a darn thing, but I've seen folks so intent on making their power-off approach work that they forget the throttle exists.:eek:
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You seem to consistently fly with the most incompetent pilots I have ever heard of.
 
Henning said:
You seem to consistently fly with the most incompetent pilots I have ever heard of.
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No, I've just flown with a lot of pilots over the four decades I've been an instructor, and the Law of Large Numbers applies -- you fly with enough of 'em, you'll see just about everything. And then just when you think you've seen everything, somebody shows you something you haven't seen before. You really should go get your CFI -- you could learn a lot from your trainees. I know I have.
 
When I was first taught landings, it went like this -

stabilized approach, 65 knots, 20 degrees of flaps and ~1400 rpm

when you cross threshold, my instructor had me roundout and pull the power off at the same time

then the rest is just a power-off flare and touchdown hopefully mains first, on centerline and nice and slow

^ Breaking a landing down into three clearly defined phases is good for an 8 hour student pilot

When I make a 'normal' landing (usually only at night or with passengers) I still fly this way - only exception being that I pull the power off and begin slowing earlier so that my roundout and flare are not prolonged
 
jaybee said:
I'm curious as to how many engine out to water landing Cap'n Sully practiced....
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And if it could have helped.

Then again, not being smart enough to know you can't do something can be a major advantage sometimes.
 
Captain said:
...Second, even in a GA plane with the power at idle there is some thrust. For proof walk behind a C-152 in the chocks at idle power setting up for flight while holding a birthday cake with the candles lit...
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A C152 sitting on the ramp at idle with near-zero airspeed produces a little bit of thrust. But at typical pattern airspeeds, a prop turning at 1,000 RPM is going to produce a bunch of drag, even more than if it the prop was completely stopped.

Want proof? Get some altitude over a safe landing area, reduce airspeed to almost a stall, kill the engine and let the prop stop, then put the nose down to obtain best glide and see what your descent rate is. Repeat with the engine running, and you'll find you need something like 1,500 RPM to reduce the descent rate back to that of a stopped prop.
 
PW_Plack said:
A C152 sitting on the ramp at idle with near-zero airspeed produces a little bit of thrust. But at typical pattern airspeeds, a prop turning at 1,000 RPM is going to produce a bunch of drag, even more than if it the prop was completely stopped.

Want proof? Get some altitude over a safe landing area, reduce airspeed to almost a stall, kill the engine and let the prop stop, then put the nose down to obtain best glide and see what your descent rate is. Repeat with the engine running, and you'll find you need something like 1,500 RPM to reduce the descent rate back to that of a stopped prop.
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If that were not so, we wouldn't feather the dead engine on a twin. Flight thrust/drag and static thrust are significantly different. For a really god example of that, set zero thrust on the simulated dead engine at approach speed, and then leave it there during landing. Just make sure you have a lot of runway in front of you when you do that. That's why one of an ME instructor's responsibilities is to retard the simulated dead engine's throttle to idle during landing.
 
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Great article, thanks for posting.

So back to LOC-I... What needs to happen? More instructor training? I hear loud and clear: no spins, no power off landings. How about slips? I don't fly with other pilots much, but I have flown with at least two CPs who couldn't really slip.

It seems to me that if loss of control inflight is a problem there needs to be a focus on aircraft control at the margin which doesn't exist today. Should BFRs get serious with PTS-like requirements? Type rating like requirements for airplanes that have higher than average accident rates?

To me this is as important to save GA as more starts.
 
What's really needed is for people to fly more and spend less time with the cockpit gadgets...
 
ebetancourt said:
There are lots of reasons 121 is safer. I would put stabilized approaches toward the bottom of the list. There are a lot of reasons to fly stabilized approaches in a jet in my very limited experience (1,700 /H hours); essentially a requirement. BUT 121 training, lot's of flying (proficiency), equipment, rules (enforced), multiple crew members, CRM, stricter regulations (e.g, can't start an approach if field is below minimums), and much more. Most 121 pilots fly more in a month than most GA pilots in a year.

I admit, I like to discuss engine failure with my student (singular) and we practice forced landings. The reason I practice engine out with her though is more about learning aircraft control than worrying about having an engine quit. (Although since her love is antique cabin Wacos, that is something for which she should be well prepared.)

I think there is some question about your idle thrust comment. The truth is that a prop, unless you are full decrease with a constants speed prop, is a high drag item even at "idle" thrust. the engine is not adding much at idle, and having it quit isn't going to make much difference. And if you have a choice, why would you aim for the numbers with no power?
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Yes, when the instructor KILLED the engine on me and made me spiral down to the runway, I could tell no difference in the way the plane glided as compared to engine idle.
 
MBDiagMan said:
Yes, when the instructor KILLED the engine on me and made me spiral down to the runway, I could tell no difference in the way the plane glided as compared to engine idle.
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You weren't being observant enough.
 
PW_Plack said:
A C152 sitting on the ramp at idle with near-zero airspeed produces a little bit of thrust. But at typical pattern airspeeds, a prop turning at 1,000 RPM is going to produce a bunch of drag, even more than if it the prop was completely stopped.

Want proof? Get some altitude over a safe landing area, reduce airspeed to almost a stall, kill the engine and let the prop stop, then put the nose down to obtain best glide and see what your descent rate is. Repeat with the engine running, and you'll find you need something like 1,500 RPM to reduce the descent rate back to that of a stopped prop.
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You sold me. I revise my position on 'some thrust at idle'. Id still prefer a nice stabilised approach with power, but have NO problem with folks chopping the power to land. If that's the way you were taught and that works for you then chop away.
 
Try a "stabilized approach" in a Pitts Special, see how that works for you. Yeah, in a multi-engine, turbine powered aircraft, a stabilized approach below 1,500ft. or so makes complete sense. For that matter, on any instrument approach it's essential. Otherwise, I agree most with Nosehair's take on the subject.
Since most light aircraft manufacturers (mostly Cessna) have been building airplanes that don't require pilots...in the same way a paint-by-numbers canvas doesn't require an artist, an intructor has to demand extraordinary precision of his or her students, to overcome the nosewheel airplane's shortcomings. Bottom line: Whatever kind of approach allows the pilot to land the airplane on the runway where he want to touch down...properly configured, on speed, on centerline works for me. My only recurring compaint about 'stabilized approaches' is having to follow the 172 with the future 747 pilot at the controls - judging by the size of his pattern.
 
j1b3h0 said:
Try a "stabilized approach" in a Pitts Special, see how that works for you.
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No reason for it not to work fine other than the need for a slightly curved final so you can keep the runway in sight.

eah, in a multi-engine, turbine powered aircraft, a stabilized approach below 1,500ft. or so makes complete sense. For that matter, on any instrument approach it's essential. Otherwise, I agree most with Nosehair's take on the subject.
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What a lot of folks don't seem to follow is that the basic concept of the stabilized approach can be used in any airplane regardless of size or propulsion or desired glide path angle (which is usually more like 4-5 degrees in light singles for VFR patterns). There are different guidelines on how to do it for light GA planes versus turbine-powered transport types, but the fundamental concept (use of AoA via trim/pitch to manage speed while using power to manage sink rate and thus glide path) applies equally well to all.

My only recurring compaint about 'stabilized approaches' is having to follow the 172 with the future 747 pilot at the controls - judging by the size of his pattern.
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There is nothing in the stabilized approach concept about making traffic patterns larger than necessary. Anyone who suggests that a two-mile final is necessary for a stabilized approach in a 172.
 
Ron -

I think our discussion is really about semantics...in order to (consistantly) land on the runway with precision, a stabilized approach is neccesary. I just think the focus should be on the the landing rather than on the approach.
 
j1b3h0 said:
Ron -

I think our discussion is really about semantics...in order to (consistantly) land on the runway with precision, a stabilized approach is neccesary. I just think the focus should be on the the landing rather than on the approach.
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I see your point, but I'm a firm believer that consistently good landings require consistently good approaches, and the stabilized approach is the best way to achieve that. It's kind of like the old Navy safety poster showing the bits and pieces of what used to be an A-4 Skyhawk laid out neatly on a hangar floor in the shape of the airplane, each part in its proper location relative to the others. The caption was "There's No Approach Which Can't Be Salvaged." Make a good approach, and there's nothing to salvage.
 
Henning said:
You weren't being observant enough.
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I don't know if it's a lack of observation capability, which I do not possess, or the pucker factor. My eyeballs were out so far that they were making smudge marks on the inside of my glasses.:D

Either I couldn't tell the difference or my brain compensated for it quickly because it was amazingly natural and the outcome amazed me as well.
 
MBDiagMan said:
I don't know if it's a lack of observation capability, which I do not possess, or the pucker factor. My eyeballs were out so far that they were making smudge marks on the inside of my glasses.:D

Either I couldn't tell the difference or my brain compensated for it quickly because it was amazingly natural and the outcome amazed me as well.
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That could all be true, but I think what Henning was hinting at in his own way is that there is plenty of test data to show that your glide ratio is significantly increased when the prop is stopped. However, the difference between throttle-dle versus ignition/fuel-off with the prop still windmilling is not, to my knowledge significant, which would explain why you didn't notice any difference if you didn't stop the prop.

Also, in typical trainers, you have to nearly stall the plane after engine shutdown to stop the prop, and unless you're below about 7000-8000 AGL, the glide range you gain will be outweighed by the altitude you lose while stopping the prop. That's why we don't normally teach that as part of the typical training exercise where the engine failure is simulated at 1000-3000 AGL.
 
ebetancourt said:
Great article, thanks for posting.

So back to LOC-I... What needs to happen? More instructor training? I hear loud and clear: no spins, no power off landings. How about slips? I don't fly with other pilots much, but I have flown with at least two CPs who couldn't really slip.

It seems to me that if loss of control inflight is a problem there needs to be a focus on aircraft control at the margin which doesn't exist today. Should BFRs get serious with PTS-like requirements? Type rating like requirements for airplanes that have higher than average accident rates?

To me this is as important to save GA as more starts.
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FAA Safety is requiring the following Positive Aircraft Control course for Basic WINGS certification:

http://www.faasafety.gov/gslac/ALC/CourseLanding.aspx?cId=36

Positive Aircraft Control is the opposite of Loss of Control, so this course applies. Take a look at it, enroll in the course and run through it and the quiz. You'll find there are more common causal factors to LOC than engine failures. It's usually the pilot's doing... or not doing, as the case may be.
 
MBDiagMan said:
I don't know if it's a lack of observation capability, which I do not possess, or the pucker factor. My eyeballs were out so far that they were making smudge marks on the inside of my glasses.:D

Either I couldn't tell the difference or my brain compensated for it quickly because it was amazingly natural and the outcome amazed me as well.
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I think that's probably what would happen with a real engine failure too. You just do what is necessary to get the airplane down in the correct spot, hopefully. I don't necessarily think that all kinds of calculations are going to help. I'm guessing the wind will affect your glide angle more than the prop anyway.
 
I don't think there's really anyone disagreeing with that. It's just a matter of what your envelope of stable is. If I am stably decelerating and descending while maintaining constant bank and load factor, that is a stable approach regardless the angles and rates so long as it leaves me at the threshold with the gear down, full flaps and <1-3% energy to spare.
 
Henning said:
I don't think there's really anyone disagreeing with that. It's just a matter of what your envelope of stable is. If I am stably decelerating and descending while maintaining constant bank and load factor, that is a stable approach regardless the angles and rates so long as it leaves me at the threshold with the gear down, full flaps and <1-3% energy to spare.
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That may be your personal definition, but by the generally accepted definition as given in the various FAA and industry docuements, if the airspeed is changing (even at a steady rate of change), it's not a stabilized approach.
 
TangoWhiskey said:
FAA Safety is requiring the following Positive Aircraft Control course for Basic WINGS certification:

http://www.faasafety.gov/gslac/ALC/CourseLanding.aspx?cId=36

Positive Aircraft Control is the opposite of Loss of Control, so this course applies. Take a look at it, enroll in the course and run through it and the quiz. You'll find there are more common causal factors to LOC than engine failures. It's usually the pilot's doing... or not doing, as the case may be.
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Thanks for the reference.

If I have said anything to argue against stable approaches, it had to be a miswriting on my part. I do believe the basic airspeed with pitch, approach angle with power landing. Absolutely. I just think learning airspeed with pitch, approach angle with slip has great value in learning to control an aircraft all the way to the ground. (And building confidence.)

I got to ride through three great approaches and landings yesterday, and they were all "stable" except for a turning final (trees) flown by a 15y/o. She learned to fly a stable approach early by flying a "not landing" to a 5,000 ft runway. At 5' she added enough power to level off while maintaining airspeed. Landing was a simple matter of "hold it off" and slowly reduce the power to idle when she had mastered alignment and drift control. But at the "home field" she can slip over the trees on the other end to steepen her approach after spending lots of time making power-off landings.

Airspeed control is king in my book and in the small airplanes we are mostly talking about it is sadly not always treated that way because you can get away with so much variation.
 
Some of the interpretations (by FSDO folks) have bordered on ludicrous. King Air SOP per book is (and has been since Noah) flaps 20 for approach, flaps full when runway assured.

Then somebody at FTW FSDO decreed that a change in flap position during the approach was a de-stabilizing event and pilots taking checkrides were busted.

It was finally resolved, but not without undue angst and numerous re-tests.

Ron Levy said:
That may be your personal definition, but by the generally accepted definition as given in the various FAA and industry docuements, if the airspeed is changing (even at a steady rate of change), it's not a stabilized approach.
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Ron Levy said:
feather the dead engine on a twin. Flight thrust/drag and static thrust are significantly different. For a really god example of that, set zero thrust on the simulated dead engine at approach speed, and then leave it there during landing. Just make sure you have a lot of runway in front of you when you do that. That's why one of an ME instructor's responsibilities is to retard the simulated dead engine's throttle to idle during landing.
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You're talking about the beginning of training in landing with a dead engine, right?
At some point, the ME student should be able, and experienced, at landing with one engine set to zero thrust - that's a single engine landing in a twin. If you are consistently retarding the zero thrust engine for your student, your student may bust it up on a real engine out landing due to the long float and awkward yaw.
 
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