Flying h4x0r
Pre-Flight
After much preparation and studying, I passed my IFR check ride!
I found other people's posts about their check ride experiences extremely helpful while preparing, and reading their silly mistakes put me at great ease. So I'll contribute what I can remember here. I ended up making quite a few silly mistakes myself, and it was certainly far from my best flying, but I never dipped below MDA and overall felt like I did a great job staying ahead of the airplane.
It started out pretty casual. We started off by talking about how I got interested in flying, and he told some brief stories about his flight training and early career and how he ended up in the airlines. Once we got passed the jitters, we went through the paper work. He inspected my medical, PPL, and driver's license and made sure everything matched what was on my application, and then he glanced through my log book, and the airplane's logbooks (I bookmarked each page with post-it notes for each necessary inspection).
He then unfold my en-route chart and pointed to an airport about 150 nm away, and asked me how I'd plan an IFR flight there. We basically went through each block of the Flight Plan form, and he asked me what to put in. He asked me where I can find the aircraft equipment codes (the AIM). Thankfully, he didn't ask anything about preferred routes (which I don't feel like I quite understand, but my CFII said not to worry about those). He asked about picking an alternate, when you're required to list an alternate (3-2-1 rule), and what the requirements must be for the alternate (800, 2/600, 2, unless there are non-standard alternate minimums, which he had me look up in the approach plate binder for this particular airport). What tools I would use to find a good alternate (surface analysis chart, weather depiction chart, FSS, etc.) He pulled up the METAR and TAF to that airport and asked me to read them to him, and asked if it would work as an alternate. Then he asked me about fuel requirements with and without the alternate, and what I need to legally fly this (6 IAPs, holding/tracking NAV in the past 6 months). What if you go passed 6 months? (you can do them in VMC with a hood with a safety pilot). What qualifications must a safety pilot have? (at least a PPL for the category/class you're flying) Does s/he need a current medical? (yes). What if you go passed 1 year, can you still use a safety pilot? (No, you need to do an IPC from a CFII). What would the airplane need to be legal (VOR checks, xpnd/annual/100 hr/etc/etc)
He then tells me, ok, so we begin flying this flight plan. We take off and you're cleared as filed and told to climb and maintain 3000 ft, but then your radio goes out. What do you do? (if you are in VMC, land as soon as "practicable" at the closest suitable airport) We're in solid IMC. (Then you squawk 7600 and continue the flight as per your last clearance. Maintain you're cleared altitude, climb to the expected altitude at the expected time, climb to the MEA if it is higher than you're assigned altitude, but come back down if the MEA becomes lower, then when you reach your airport, at the ETA, you can do any approach to land). He then traced my flight path along and asked me when I'd climb and when I'd descend. Why I'd wait to start my climb after crossing the fix? (because there's no MCA listed).
He picked out an ILS approach and says if you pick this one, how would you fly it? We discussed the different parts of the approach plate, the feeder route, the procedure turn, DA and visibility requirements, aircraft categories. Is it ok to go below DA? (yes, you can dip below it but you have to have started executing the missed approach at DA). He then asked me if when you come to DA, you see the approach lights, but not the runway, can you land? (I said no, but you can descend another 100'.) What if the glide slope is out of service? (talked about the localizer approach and minimums). When you reach the MDA on a loc approach, do you have to go missed? (No, the MAP is based of time so you can descend to the MDA and you don't have to go missed until it has been 4 minutes since you passed the FAF). What do you need to leave MDA? (runway environment, required visibility, and be in a position to make a normal descent and landing). What if you're at MDA and you see the approach lights, but not the runway? (I said you can descend another 100 ft, however this was incorrect. He showed me in the FAR where it says if you see the approach lights, you can descend to 100 ft above TZDE.)
He then flipped to another approach and asked me what the upside down caret symbol meant (Visual Descent point), and we talked about the significance of the VDP for a bit (how a 747 would use it as a MAP, but in a 152 you can get away with making a somewhat normal landing beyond this point).
We talked about a bunch of other things that I can't remember, but nothing too crazy or unusual. We didn't touch too much on weather, which I was a little disappointed about (Weather is my strongest area). He asked me what a contact approach was and the difference between that and a visual approach.
We then switched gears and talked about the airplane systems. He drew an instrument panel on the white board and asked me how each instrument works. (airspeed -> ram air pressure from pitot tube and static air from static port, VSI and altimeter use static port, attitude and heading indicators use vacuum powered gyros, turn coordinator uses electric gyro) What would you expect to see if you have pitot icing? (acts like an altimeter) What if your static port ices over? What do your instruments show and how can you get them back? (some airplanes have alternate static air, otherwise you can break the glass on the VSI). Does this make them normal? (not exactly because cabin air pressure is usually lower than outside air pressure so airspeed and altimeter would read higher than actual). How do you check the electric gyro? (you hear it spin up when you turn on the master switch) We then talked about the vacuum system at length and how he had 3 vacuum failures in his 4000 hours of flying and how you should always be prepared to fly partial panel. He told me that the engine driven vacuum pumps should be changed every 800 hours, and you can tell that they're getting old during your run up. A brand new one will go into the green arc right after you start the engine, and as it gets older it will take longer to get into that green arc, and when it's on it's last breath, it will only make it to the bottom of the green arc after your run up.
He told me one of our approaches that we get to do today will be partial panel. He told me we'll be doing an ILS, a localizer backcourse, and a VOR approach, and he asked me which one I'd like to do partial panel (I chose the VOR approach). He told me that we'll be doing this all under VFR and he'll be acting as ATC and he handled most of the CTAF calls (I really appreciated this). We then briefed the whole check ride. We'll start out by flying a heading of 090 and we'll do some unusual attitudes, and then I'll get vectors to the ILS final approach course, followed by a missed approach. Missed approach instructions are to fly runway heading and climb 2500, and this will set us up to do the localizer BC approach with the procedure turn. After the Loc BC, we'll be circling to land on another runway. We won't actually land, just go far enough to see that we can assume a safe landing can be made. Then we'll do the published missed approach and hold over the VOR. After the hold, we'll go partial panel and do the complete VOR approach with the procedure turn under partial panel.
He told me that he knows it's not going to be my best flight, but he's not looking for perfection, just safety and proficiency.
We then took a little break while we got our stuff together to go fly. I looked over all the approaches again, collected my thoughts, and figured out how I would enter the published hold after the missed approach.
While taxiing to the runway, I talked about each instrument and how I'd check it during taxiing and turning. My taxiing was awful. I was a bit off the centerline and I was very nervous and sometimes sudden while tapping the breaks, but he didn't say anything. I ID'd all the nav aides we'd be using during our run up, hoping it would give me more time to fly the airplane, but I ended up IDing them again before each approach out of habit. We took off, and he had me put the hood on at 200 ft AGL. He was acting as ATC, and gave me a heading and altitude to fly to.
Once we were level at 3000 ft, he had me look down and he took the airplane for some unusual attitudes. He trimmed the nose all the way down, and put it in about 45 degrees of bank and asked me to look up and recover. I immediately pulled power back to idle and leveled the wings and tried to pull back, but there was too much pressure I was fighting from the trim. I started pulling some trim back and he asked me what I was doing. He saw I was adjusting the trim, and yelled PULL BACK and almost took the yoke. YIKES. I pulled back HARD and got back to level flight, and started climbing back to 3000 ft. He admonished me greatly. Told me FLY the airplane--pull back on the yolk, before messing with the trim. I had let it get within about 7 kts of Vne and was only about 600 ft from the ground. He was very upset, but didn't say that I failed. We did two more, and these went very well. He told me good job, and he started giving me vectors of the ILS.
The localizer needle started coming in and I did my pre landing checklist and slowed to approach speed. The glideslope started coming in and I began my descent. I did a great job keeping the GS centered, but the localizer needle kept drifting to the right, but no more than 2 dots deflection. I mentioned that our wing from the north was stronger aloft than it is closer to the ground and that I need less crab angle for compensation. He acknowledged that, and I was pretty close to having them centered by DA. About 50 ft above DA, I said airport not seen and added full power and went missed.
He gave me a new vector to fly, and a few minutes later, he told me I was at the IAF and cleared for the loc BC approach. The air started getting a bit bumpy at this point. We flew outbound, did the procedure turn, and I got back on the localizer. I forgot for a second that I was flying a BC and got to about a half scale deflection before I realized I was flying the wrong way, but the needle was speeding up in it's deflection and I freaked! I thought I was going to bust for sure. I over corrected my heading to prevent the needle from getting pegged, and this led me to do a few S turns around the localizer before getting it stabilized. This was before the FAF and he didn't say anything, so I just continued. The rest of the approach went ok. I couldn't get the needle centered but it was within 1 dot. I got to the MDA right at the MAP and he told me to take the foggles off and circle for Rwy 4. I maintained my altitude and stayed close to the airport. I started descending when we were in our base leg, and I had to make kind of a steep turn to final to stay lined up with the runway. Once we were on final, he told me to go missed.
We flew direct to the VOR and I told him I'm going to do a parallel entry. The hold went fine. I got about 100 ft above my assigned altitude at one point but immediately corrected. I had about 5 deg of wind correction inbound, so I tripled this for the outbound leg, but ended up overshooting the inbound course a little bit. I told him I guess I needed more wind correction, and he was ok with that. After a few loops in the hold, he took the plane and said he was setting me up outbound on the VOR approach. He covered the AI and the DG with post-it notes and told me I'm cleared for the approach. This approach went great. I had the needle centered all the way outbound, and started my procedure turn. Did a standard rate turn for 15 seconds and looked up at my mag compass, and I was right on my outbound heading. One minute later, I did a standard rate turn for 1 minute, and I was right on my inbound heading. Reported PT inbound, and did my before landing check list.
I intercepted the inbound course and kept that needle centered until 0.2 DME from the VOR! After passing the VOR, the needle came right back in and I started my descent. I knew there would be a wind shift closer to the surface from my ILS earlier and I anticipated this. While briefly looking up at my mag compass I got a glance of the runway straight ahead and it was a real confidence booster. I knew I was almost done and I hadn't been told I failed yet! In my excitement I kind of let the airspeed get about 12-15 kts high. I immediately said "bringing my airspeed under better control" and got that back down right away. Kept the needle centered, and got down to our step down minimums. I then asked him if I can take the foggles off at the VDP, and he said "please!" The last .2 DME to the VDP seemed like an eternity, but I kept the scan going and kept the needle centered.
My landing was a little hard, since I didn't flare fast enough, but it was done! My taxiing back to parking was much better. He didn't say anything until I shut the airplane down, when he said "well, good job." I immediately told him "I was sure you were going to bust me for that BC approach!" He told me "Nope, you corrected right away and you were within the PTS." The only debriefs he had for me were for about using the trim to fly the airplane out of an unusual attitude and over correcting on the BC. He told me my flying was great and that he was very impressed with my performance on the oral portion (I have Bob Gardner to thank for that! I highly recommend his book "The Complete Advanced Pilot" It is a very easy read, and is very thorough and concise. Makes things easy to understand). I bet my good performance on the oral played a part on his leniency on my unusual attitude recover.
He took my PPL and exchanged it for a temporary paper certificate with a rating for Instrument Airplane! (He punched a hole in my old plastic PPL and gave it back to me as a souvenir). I filed IFR for the trip back home, and was constantly requesting altitude changes (from 5000 to 8000) so I could go through some clouds! It was bumpy and I had a 20 kts head wind, but it was a blast. I can only imagine how painful that return trip would have been if I had failed.
I found other people's posts about their check ride experiences extremely helpful while preparing, and reading their silly mistakes put me at great ease. So I'll contribute what I can remember here. I ended up making quite a few silly mistakes myself, and it was certainly far from my best flying, but I never dipped below MDA and overall felt like I did a great job staying ahead of the airplane.
It started out pretty casual. We started off by talking about how I got interested in flying, and he told some brief stories about his flight training and early career and how he ended up in the airlines. Once we got passed the jitters, we went through the paper work. He inspected my medical, PPL, and driver's license and made sure everything matched what was on my application, and then he glanced through my log book, and the airplane's logbooks (I bookmarked each page with post-it notes for each necessary inspection).
He then unfold my en-route chart and pointed to an airport about 150 nm away, and asked me how I'd plan an IFR flight there. We basically went through each block of the Flight Plan form, and he asked me what to put in. He asked me where I can find the aircraft equipment codes (the AIM). Thankfully, he didn't ask anything about preferred routes (which I don't feel like I quite understand, but my CFII said not to worry about those). He asked about picking an alternate, when you're required to list an alternate (3-2-1 rule), and what the requirements must be for the alternate (800, 2/600, 2, unless there are non-standard alternate minimums, which he had me look up in the approach plate binder for this particular airport). What tools I would use to find a good alternate (surface analysis chart, weather depiction chart, FSS, etc.) He pulled up the METAR and TAF to that airport and asked me to read them to him, and asked if it would work as an alternate. Then he asked me about fuel requirements with and without the alternate, and what I need to legally fly this (6 IAPs, holding/tracking NAV in the past 6 months). What if you go passed 6 months? (you can do them in VMC with a hood with a safety pilot). What qualifications must a safety pilot have? (at least a PPL for the category/class you're flying) Does s/he need a current medical? (yes). What if you go passed 1 year, can you still use a safety pilot? (No, you need to do an IPC from a CFII). What would the airplane need to be legal (VOR checks, xpnd/annual/100 hr/etc/etc)
He then tells me, ok, so we begin flying this flight plan. We take off and you're cleared as filed and told to climb and maintain 3000 ft, but then your radio goes out. What do you do? (if you are in VMC, land as soon as "practicable" at the closest suitable airport) We're in solid IMC. (Then you squawk 7600 and continue the flight as per your last clearance. Maintain you're cleared altitude, climb to the expected altitude at the expected time, climb to the MEA if it is higher than you're assigned altitude, but come back down if the MEA becomes lower, then when you reach your airport, at the ETA, you can do any approach to land). He then traced my flight path along and asked me when I'd climb and when I'd descend. Why I'd wait to start my climb after crossing the fix? (because there's no MCA listed).
He picked out an ILS approach and says if you pick this one, how would you fly it? We discussed the different parts of the approach plate, the feeder route, the procedure turn, DA and visibility requirements, aircraft categories. Is it ok to go below DA? (yes, you can dip below it but you have to have started executing the missed approach at DA). He then asked me if when you come to DA, you see the approach lights, but not the runway, can you land? (I said no, but you can descend another 100'.) What if the glide slope is out of service? (talked about the localizer approach and minimums). When you reach the MDA on a loc approach, do you have to go missed? (No, the MAP is based of time so you can descend to the MDA and you don't have to go missed until it has been 4 minutes since you passed the FAF). What do you need to leave MDA? (runway environment, required visibility, and be in a position to make a normal descent and landing). What if you're at MDA and you see the approach lights, but not the runway? (I said you can descend another 100 ft, however this was incorrect. He showed me in the FAR where it says if you see the approach lights, you can descend to 100 ft above TZDE.)
He then flipped to another approach and asked me what the upside down caret symbol meant (Visual Descent point), and we talked about the significance of the VDP for a bit (how a 747 would use it as a MAP, but in a 152 you can get away with making a somewhat normal landing beyond this point).
We talked about a bunch of other things that I can't remember, but nothing too crazy or unusual. We didn't touch too much on weather, which I was a little disappointed about (Weather is my strongest area). He asked me what a contact approach was and the difference between that and a visual approach.
We then switched gears and talked about the airplane systems. He drew an instrument panel on the white board and asked me how each instrument works. (airspeed -> ram air pressure from pitot tube and static air from static port, VSI and altimeter use static port, attitude and heading indicators use vacuum powered gyros, turn coordinator uses electric gyro) What would you expect to see if you have pitot icing? (acts like an altimeter) What if your static port ices over? What do your instruments show and how can you get them back? (some airplanes have alternate static air, otherwise you can break the glass on the VSI). Does this make them normal? (not exactly because cabin air pressure is usually lower than outside air pressure so airspeed and altimeter would read higher than actual). How do you check the electric gyro? (you hear it spin up when you turn on the master switch) We then talked about the vacuum system at length and how he had 3 vacuum failures in his 4000 hours of flying and how you should always be prepared to fly partial panel. He told me that the engine driven vacuum pumps should be changed every 800 hours, and you can tell that they're getting old during your run up. A brand new one will go into the green arc right after you start the engine, and as it gets older it will take longer to get into that green arc, and when it's on it's last breath, it will only make it to the bottom of the green arc after your run up.
He told me one of our approaches that we get to do today will be partial panel. He told me we'll be doing an ILS, a localizer backcourse, and a VOR approach, and he asked me which one I'd like to do partial panel (I chose the VOR approach). He told me that we'll be doing this all under VFR and he'll be acting as ATC and he handled most of the CTAF calls (I really appreciated this). We then briefed the whole check ride. We'll start out by flying a heading of 090 and we'll do some unusual attitudes, and then I'll get vectors to the ILS final approach course, followed by a missed approach. Missed approach instructions are to fly runway heading and climb 2500, and this will set us up to do the localizer BC approach with the procedure turn. After the Loc BC, we'll be circling to land on another runway. We won't actually land, just go far enough to see that we can assume a safe landing can be made. Then we'll do the published missed approach and hold over the VOR. After the hold, we'll go partial panel and do the complete VOR approach with the procedure turn under partial panel.
He told me that he knows it's not going to be my best flight, but he's not looking for perfection, just safety and proficiency.
We then took a little break while we got our stuff together to go fly. I looked over all the approaches again, collected my thoughts, and figured out how I would enter the published hold after the missed approach.
While taxiing to the runway, I talked about each instrument and how I'd check it during taxiing and turning. My taxiing was awful. I was a bit off the centerline and I was very nervous and sometimes sudden while tapping the breaks, but he didn't say anything. I ID'd all the nav aides we'd be using during our run up, hoping it would give me more time to fly the airplane, but I ended up IDing them again before each approach out of habit. We took off, and he had me put the hood on at 200 ft AGL. He was acting as ATC, and gave me a heading and altitude to fly to.
Once we were level at 3000 ft, he had me look down and he took the airplane for some unusual attitudes. He trimmed the nose all the way down, and put it in about 45 degrees of bank and asked me to look up and recover. I immediately pulled power back to idle and leveled the wings and tried to pull back, but there was too much pressure I was fighting from the trim. I started pulling some trim back and he asked me what I was doing. He saw I was adjusting the trim, and yelled PULL BACK and almost took the yoke. YIKES. I pulled back HARD and got back to level flight, and started climbing back to 3000 ft. He admonished me greatly. Told me FLY the airplane--pull back on the yolk, before messing with the trim. I had let it get within about 7 kts of Vne and was only about 600 ft from the ground. He was very upset, but didn't say that I failed. We did two more, and these went very well. He told me good job, and he started giving me vectors of the ILS.
The localizer needle started coming in and I did my pre landing checklist and slowed to approach speed. The glideslope started coming in and I began my descent. I did a great job keeping the GS centered, but the localizer needle kept drifting to the right, but no more than 2 dots deflection. I mentioned that our wing from the north was stronger aloft than it is closer to the ground and that I need less crab angle for compensation. He acknowledged that, and I was pretty close to having them centered by DA. About 50 ft above DA, I said airport not seen and added full power and went missed.
He gave me a new vector to fly, and a few minutes later, he told me I was at the IAF and cleared for the loc BC approach. The air started getting a bit bumpy at this point. We flew outbound, did the procedure turn, and I got back on the localizer. I forgot for a second that I was flying a BC and got to about a half scale deflection before I realized I was flying the wrong way, but the needle was speeding up in it's deflection and I freaked! I thought I was going to bust for sure. I over corrected my heading to prevent the needle from getting pegged, and this led me to do a few S turns around the localizer before getting it stabilized. This was before the FAF and he didn't say anything, so I just continued. The rest of the approach went ok. I couldn't get the needle centered but it was within 1 dot. I got to the MDA right at the MAP and he told me to take the foggles off and circle for Rwy 4. I maintained my altitude and stayed close to the airport. I started descending when we were in our base leg, and I had to make kind of a steep turn to final to stay lined up with the runway. Once we were on final, he told me to go missed.
We flew direct to the VOR and I told him I'm going to do a parallel entry. The hold went fine. I got about 100 ft above my assigned altitude at one point but immediately corrected. I had about 5 deg of wind correction inbound, so I tripled this for the outbound leg, but ended up overshooting the inbound course a little bit. I told him I guess I needed more wind correction, and he was ok with that. After a few loops in the hold, he took the plane and said he was setting me up outbound on the VOR approach. He covered the AI and the DG with post-it notes and told me I'm cleared for the approach. This approach went great. I had the needle centered all the way outbound, and started my procedure turn. Did a standard rate turn for 15 seconds and looked up at my mag compass, and I was right on my outbound heading. One minute later, I did a standard rate turn for 1 minute, and I was right on my inbound heading. Reported PT inbound, and did my before landing check list.
I intercepted the inbound course and kept that needle centered until 0.2 DME from the VOR! After passing the VOR, the needle came right back in and I started my descent. I knew there would be a wind shift closer to the surface from my ILS earlier and I anticipated this. While briefly looking up at my mag compass I got a glance of the runway straight ahead and it was a real confidence booster. I knew I was almost done and I hadn't been told I failed yet! In my excitement I kind of let the airspeed get about 12-15 kts high. I immediately said "bringing my airspeed under better control" and got that back down right away. Kept the needle centered, and got down to our step down minimums. I then asked him if I can take the foggles off at the VDP, and he said "please!" The last .2 DME to the VDP seemed like an eternity, but I kept the scan going and kept the needle centered.
My landing was a little hard, since I didn't flare fast enough, but it was done! My taxiing back to parking was much better. He didn't say anything until I shut the airplane down, when he said "well, good job." I immediately told him "I was sure you were going to bust me for that BC approach!" He told me "Nope, you corrected right away and you were within the PTS." The only debriefs he had for me were for about using the trim to fly the airplane out of an unusual attitude and over correcting on the BC. He told me my flying was great and that he was very impressed with my performance on the oral portion (I have Bob Gardner to thank for that! I highly recommend his book "The Complete Advanced Pilot" It is a very easy read, and is very thorough and concise. Makes things easy to understand). I bet my good performance on the oral played a part on his leniency on my unusual attitude recover.
He took my PPL and exchanged it for a temporary paper certificate with a rating for Instrument Airplane! (He punched a hole in my old plastic PPL and gave it back to me as a souvenir). I filed IFR for the trip back home, and was constantly requesting altitude changes (from 5000 to 8000) so I could go through some clouds! It was bumpy and I had a 20 kts head wind, but it was a blast. I can only imagine how painful that return trip would have been if I had failed.
CONGRATS!!