Follow-Up: Lost Trust in Foreflight

[StinkBug]

So, I take it plan A is to use your ipad for navigation??


Plan A should be VFR, as in visual, as in chart and look out the window.

Plan B should be using that GNS430

Plan C should be Vectors / VORs

The ipad is for planning, not navigating. I use one for work all the time, mos times its closed and used as a pad for my scratch paper, that's flying late night hard IFR too.

I think you need to take another look at your priorities in the air.

I disagree. Plan A should be whatever is the most convenient, familiar tool that gets the job done and allows you to keep a good lookout. For him, and I suspect many of us, it's the iPad. It's not an official or certified device, but it works well enough that in combination with VFR it's a good easy way to fly. The important thing is that you be ready for it to fail at any time, because it will. If you can easily switch over to Plan B or C then it really doesn't matter what plan A was.

 

[Jaybird180]

I've been looking for that spec for a while and have never been able to find it. Source please?

Thanks,

Jim

Best research I've found is that it used to be published in prior versions of the IFH, but the specs differed.

and then there are these posts ....

The book answer for instrument flying is that if it drifts more than 3 degrees in 15 minutes, it's past its sell-by date and needs overhaul or replacement.

Now, how many degrees does your DG precess in 12 minutes while holding a constant compass heading?

A DG with perfect bearings, no friction and running at speed should not show any random drift. But it will always show apparent drift. This is the drift that manifests because the gyro points to the same place in space, but the earth turns, so it appears to be drifting. The amount of apparent drift per hour can be calculated by multiplying the sine of the local latitude by 15. For instance, at Leesburg, VA, with a latitude of 39.1°N, you could calculate apparent drift as sin(39.1) x 15 = 14.8, Any drift more or less than 14.8° per hour is random drift (the bad kind). So Ron is about on the money. At your latitude, 3° drift every 15 minutes is about what you can expect from a good gyro.

sin(39.1 degrees) * 15 deg/hr = 9.4 deg/hr

You were taking the sin of 39.1 radians

 

[Greg Bockelman]

So, I take it plan A is to use your ipad for navigation??


Plan A should be VFR, as in visual, as in chart and look out the window.

Fore Flight IS a chart.

 

[mswmsw]

I've been flying personally and professionally for over 45 years. I was only recently dragged kicking and screaming away from paper and into the world of ForeFlight and the iPad. They now go with me on every flight of course - whether in my own Cherokee or in the cockpit of the Gulfstreams I occasionally do contract flying in - BUT, for a lot of the time, I actually find FF a distraction and kind of an "in-flight time-waster" with me looking at it far more often than I really need to, because ........... Well, it's Fun, like most toys! So I now make it a point when I am flying the big stuff, to try to (mostly) only look at it when I need to look at a chart (the G's I fly have all gone to dual iPads and paperless cockpits). And when I fly my Cherokee VFR, I rarely look at it at all, preferring Ded Reckoning and pilotage.

To the OP, I suggest taking some additional instruction to refresh yourself on the basics of Ded Reckoning and pilotage that you (and all of us) learned once upon a time. Central California, where I think you are based, with it's generally good weather and fairly simple topography, is a great area for flying with nothing more than a map (even a paper one!) and a compass, and a great view out the window. Just a thought.

 

[Sam D]

(the G's I fly have all gone to dual iPads and paperless cockpits).

That's the case with our G200.

 

[MAKG1]

Fore Flight IS a chart.

Yup, and it's legit -- even in IMC -- when used in that manner, provided it's backed up adequately (not with another copy of Foreflight or an identical device).

Virtually all the spam can drivers on this board use it in a rather different manner, though.

 

[MAKG1]

Central California, where I think you are based, with it's generally good weather and fairly simple topography, is a great area for flying with nothing more than a map (even a paper one!) and a compass, and a great view out the window. Just a thought.

Yup, I fly where he does fairly often, and that describes it pretty well.

The pilotage is pretty easy. It can get a little challenging to find dinky airports in the Central Valley (I take advantage of that on occasion to keep my skills sharp), but it's trivial anywhere near the mountains or around the Bay or Delta.

 

[acluffpoa]

I try to make pre flighting my iPad a part of my planning process well in advance of even driving to the airport.

OP, I travel to your neck of the woods for my job once a month and would love to go flying with you sometime.

 

[James331]

Fore Flight IS a chart.

However we both know many VFR pilots don't use it as just a chart.

Where am I? Where's the little airplane on foreflight!

That's not good no matter who you are.