And the learning continues....

[Kaye]

Had a good workout yesterday practicing approaches. My original game plan had to be scratched because of nav outages at the 2 airports I wanted to use. Made a change of plans and set off with the CFII. The whole flight was a learning session, of course….isn’t that what I’m paying the CFII for…..but he did pull a new trick on me. We were returning to JYO on an IFR flight plan, and there was plenty of turbulence with the weather system that was passing through. I was hand flying the plane and trying to review and set up for the approach…..yeah, I know, those without AP’s do it all the time, but it’s certainly challenging for me, especially with the wx. I have a slaved HSI, and the CFII reached over, flipped the slave switch to free and then turned the heading card so I now had a failed HI. This was a first for me. Sure we’ve worked with failed instruments, but they were just covered up. Makes it real easy to switch your brain gears to change your scan. But this time, it’s not covered, and damn, it’s hard to ignore that HSI….it’s right there in your view as you’re scanning the AI.

Of course, that’s why you carry stickies so failed instruments can be covered. But my stickies are in the flight bag sitting in the back seat. And I’m already working hard to maintain altitude and heading, oh yeah….and reset the localizer in to nav2…..etc. etc. There was no way I could reach in the back seat to dig out the stickies. And then my GPS and MFD “died” so I no longer had their help. ATC didn’t know I had an “emergency”, so my final vector to intercept the localizer was really tight….guess who blew thru it cause I couldn’t completely ignore that stinkin’ HSI. My instructor let me struggle, ATC let me know I went thru the localizer and gave me a new heading, and I finally completed the approach without “crashing”.

Wow, what an experience to have the distraction of a failed instrument. Oh, and I’ve learned my lesson….ALWAYS have my stickies handy.

 

[dmccormack]

Wow, what an experience to have the distraction of a failed instrument. Oh, and I’ve learned my lesson….ALWAYS have my stickies handy.

Sounds like good training! But a Fundamental Law of Aviation is that you will have the least resources when in the deepest Poop -- including stickies.

So rip off a piece of paper from your notepad, tear off the corner of your chart, take a page out of the approach book -- whatever, and jam it over the failed instrument.

Even a dollar bill folded in half will fit nicely over most round gauges.

 

[Kaye]

Sounds like good training! But a Fundamental Law of Aviation is that you will have the least resources when in the deepest Poop -- including stickies.

So rip off a piece of paper from your notepad, tear off the corner of your chart, take a page out of the approach book -- whatever, and jam it over the failed instrument.

Even a dollar bill folded in half will fit nicely over most round gauges.

You think I'm coordinated enough to all do that??? Shucks, I was bearly keeping the dirty side down!

Just kidding, those are good ideas to store away.

 

[dmccormack]

You think I'm coordinated enough to all do that??? Shucks, I was bearly keeping the dirty side down!

Just kidding, those are good ideas to store away.

Try "flying" less -- in other words, release the yoke, do what you need to do while keeping the wings level with slight rudder pressure.

IFR flying is all about reducing workload (though it doesn't seem that way now!).

 

[TMetzinger]

....or (if this happens for real), tell ATC you've had a gyro failure, and you want to miss, get things adjusted, and come around again. Don't get fixated on completing the approach.

 

[Ted]

Tim's right. If that happened for real, you'd want to give yourself more time to fix the situation. But for practice it's a good exercise.

Since my AP doesn't work still I'm used to doing all this stuff at the same time, but I tend to believe that for those used to flying the autopilot it's worthwhile to practice AP failures more for that reason.

Sounds like a good lesson!

 

[Kaye]

Try "flying" less -- in other words, release the yoke, do what you need to do while keeping the wings level with slight rudder pressure.

Not sure that would have been appropriate with the conditions we had. We were really being tossed around....I had earlier than planned taken over from the AP because of the turbulence. But, I've never tried that in bouncy air, so I'll give it a shot to see what happens.

Yep, Tim, if it was real, ATC would've known about it. You'll like this....ATC had me going direct to STILL, and he asked if I wanted vectors for the approach or the procedure turn. What procedure turn???

 

[dmccormack]

Not sure that would have been appropriate with the conditions we had. We were really being tossed around....I had earlier than planned taken over from the AP because of the turbulence. But, I've never tried that in bouncy air, so I'll give it a shot to see what happens.

This is just web board advice, of course -- your instructor will work with you on this.

I've flown with lots of folks with a death grip on the yoke, especially in turbulence. They are surprised when I ask if I can fly a while and the severity and frequency of the bumps magically decreases.

Too often folks raise a wing with aileron only, causing adverse yaw, compounding the "bounciness."

The airplane wants to fly straight (more or less) and your job is to nudge it back when it strays from that.

Gene Hudson does a great job outlining this phenomenon in his book, IFR Flying made Easy.

 

[DutchessFlier]

Ahhhh...Grip on the yoke theory.....and when and how much to trim issues

Death Grip (A no no...it leaves the imprint of the yoke in your hand for days)
One Finger (A possible no no)
Hands Off (Well maybe, can you say multitasking?)
Whatever Works For You (Is this the best approach?)

Is it always pitch-power-trim?

I find these tidbits a little more interesting for my IR work...and wonder how you all feel about them.

 

[dmccormack]

Ahhhh...Grip on the yoke theory.....and when and how much to trim issues

Death Grip (A no no...it leaves the imprint of the yoke in your hand for days)
One Finger (A possible no no)
Hands Off (Well maybe, can you say multitasking?)
Whatever Works For You (Is this the best approach?)

Is it always pitch-power-trim?

I find these tidbits a little more interesting for my IR work...and wonder how you all feel about them.

Death Grip != Good
One Finger = Sometimes
Hands off = Once in a while or with A/P
WWB = Yep

PPT? No, not always, but it helps simplify things until reactions become instinctive.

 

[Ted]

Bruce, the real answer is you'll get the feel of how to properly hold the yoke with practice. The death grip tends to come with anxiety and being nervous. This then makes the flying experience less pleasant, making you more nervous, which makes the death grip worse... you get the idea. Big thing is relax and get practice so you're comfortable with it. The planes we fly are inherently stable and will tend to want to maintain straight and level with minimal drift if trimmed out properly. So the inputs you should require in smooth air should be minimal.

Flying is always learning. Instrument flying doubly so.