How do you stay current with holds?

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abraxas

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abraxas
I generally get enough real approaches to stay current but holds are something that I never get. Wondering how the rest of you stay current by needing to do a hold under IMC or simulated IMC conditions? That is the one area I am usually forced to find a safety pilot every six months and practice. I suppose one strategy would be to ask to do a course reversal and do a full circuit in the hold.
 
Approaches with a safety pilot and fly the missed.
 
Last time I just asked to hold after the miss. Think I went around three times just to feel better about it.
 
EppyGA said:
Approaches with a safety pilot and fly the missed.
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Or do it solo in actual. You can always ask to fly the published missed including the hold.

Another way is to ask for a full procedure approach with a HILPT.
 
While in actual, I choose a nonprecision (VOR) approach that has a hold located at the IAF, and I ask ATC to let me do a lap or two around the hold before finishing the rest of the approach.

That way, I don't have to do a missed. I can just do it at the end of a cross-country flight, adding a few minutes to the trip.
 
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You got to do it once in 6 month, at some point you'll end up starting an approach from the wrong side and will have to do a procedure turn. That's a hold.
 
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MachFly said:
You got to do it once in 6 month, at some point you'll end up flying an approach from the wrong side and will have to do a procedure turn. That's a hold.
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Is it though? It's not technically a full circuit around the hold.
 
abraxas said:
Is it though? It's not technically a full circuit around the hold.
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It is the way I understand it, I can technically be wrong...

I wouldn't worry too much about it. It's not like you have a column in your logbook for holds.
 
MachFly said:
It is the way I understand it, I can technically be wrong...

I wouldn't worry too much about it. It's not like you have a column in your logbook for holds.
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No, but you have to log holds even if the company who publishes your logbook chose not to add a column for it. And what you place in your logbook needs to be accurate with the potential penalties for false information being revocation of all pilot certificates and ratings.

While a HILPT arguably qualifies, a standard barbed PT probably doesn't even if you choose to fly it in the form of a holding pattern.
 
midlifeflyer said:
While a HILPT arguably qualifies, a standard barbed PT probably doesn't even if you choose to fly it in the form of a holding pattern.
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I would say there is no arguing that a Holding In Lieu of a Procedure Turn counts.

To stay current I do them in a sim every 3-4 months. As long as you can do the entry, wind drift to stay on the protected side, and hold altitude, you've accomplished pretty much all there is to stay proficient at. If the holding entry or wind drift are a little confusing, have someone give you some holding examples and do them with a pen and paper every now and then. That will definitely help keep you sharp.

As far as logging goes, I wouldn't worry about doing a full circuit around the hold, the entry is the most important and one that gets screwed up the most. Once you cross the fix for the entry you are technically "established in the hold" anyways.
 
Gucci Pilot said:
As far as logging goes, I wouldn't worry about doing a full circuit around the hold, the entry is the most important and one that gets screwed up the most. Once you cross the fix for the entry you are technically "established in the hold" anyways.
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Regarding the HPILPT, the AIM says, "The holding pattern maneuver is completed when the aircraft is established on the inbound course after executing the appropriate entry." I've always taken that to mean once you cross the fix the second time (first to start the entry, second to continue inbound), you've done a "holding maneuver", and that should fill the "holding" square in 61.57(c) -- and nobody in the FAA has ever disagreed with me (not that I'm going to put this question before the Chief Counsel unless someone from Flight Standards says otherwise, and so far, none of them have).

As for me, I get plenty of HPILPT's in both my own plane, and enough regular holds practicing missed approaches in actual conditions with my trainees that never have to worry about how I'm going to fill this particular square.
 
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Ron Levy said:
Regarding the HPILPT, the AIM says, "The holding pattern maneuver is completed when the aircraft is established on the inbound course after executing the appropriate entry." I've always taken that to mean once you cross the fix the second time (first to start the entry, second to continue inbound), you've done a "holding maneuver", and that should fill the "holding" square in 61.57(c) -- and nobody in the FAA has ever disagreed with me (not that I'm going to put this question before the Chief Counsel unless someone from Flight Standards says otherwise, and so far, none of them have).

As for me, I get plenty of HPILPT's in both my own plane, and enough regular holds practicing missed approaches in actual conditions with my trainees that never have to worry about how I'm going to fill this particular square.
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...and I was really looking forward to your answer.:sad:

Same question, but you're not doing any training for 12 months. Go!
 
Jaybird180 said:
...and I was really looking forward to your answer.:sad:

Same question, but you're not doing any training for 12 months. Go!
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Five of the eight approaches (the five I'm most likely to fly) have HPILPT's. I'll just make sure I'll skip the VTF and do one of them every six months.

That said, what works for a 10,000-hour ATP/CFI-I may not work so well for a 200-hour PP-ASEL-IA. I can tell you for sure a lot of such folks do very poorly on holding pattern entries and intercept/wind corrections on their IPC's and other refresher training, so I think that for those who haven't done a thousand holding pattern entries. So, for such folks, a bit more practice than one every six months may be necessary for proficiency (which I think is more important than legal currency). How you do that is up to you, but some Saturday when you're looking to avoid being bored on your way to that $100 hamburger, try stopping at a VOR along the way. Make up a hold (preferably one requiring a teardrop or parallel entry -- directs are too easy), do the entry, and go around enough times to get your wind correction right (both outbound heading and timing for one minute inbound). If you can't nail the entry, and then nail the outbound heading for intercept and the timing within two full laps, you need more practice. :wink2:
 
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I like to do them needle/ball & airspeed only.
It's a good place to practice up on that, also.
 
midlifeflyer said:
No, but you have to log holds even if the company who publishes your logbook chose not to add a column for it. And what you place in your logbook needs to be accurate with the potential penalties for false information being revocation of all pilot certificates and ratings.

While a HILPT arguably qualifies, a standard barbed PT probably doesn't even if you choose to fly it in the form of a holding pattern.
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Maybe that would be true in a court type scenario, in the real world I've yet to meet anyone who cared about those details.
 
nosehair said:
I like to do them needle/ball & airspeed only.
It's a good place to practice up on that, also.
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Hopefully that's needle/ball/airspeed and some minimal navigational radio.,
 
MachFly said:
Maybe that would be true in a court type scenario, in the real world I've yet to meet anyone who cared about those details.
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That's true of everything in your logbook, isn't it? No one cares what you put in it unless some question is raised about your currency or qualifications.

But I thought the question was about properly meeting FAA requirements ("a person may act as pilot in command under IFR or weather conditions less than the minimums prescribed for VFR only if...Within the 6 calendar months preceding the month of the flight, that person performed and logged"), not about what one can get away with when avoiding them.
 
MachFly said:
Maybe that would be true in a court type scenario, in the real world I've yet to meet anyone who cared about those details.
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You should meet the FAA Chief Counsel's staff, because it was a letter to them which triggered the specific logging of interception and tracking which Flight Standards had never cared about as long as you'd logged some SIAP's. Of course, I've never heard of the Flight Standards people busting anyone's chops over this issue even after the Chief Counsel spoke (or, rather, wrote), but if you screw up while operating IFR, it's just one more charge for them to pile onto the violation heap.
 
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nosehair said:
I think it was because people were counting GCAs...
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GCA's do count -- for the six approaches. And that's why John Lynch (then of AFS-810) added the I&T requirement when he wrote 61.57(c). He was concerned that Army helo pilots (for whom anything other than a PAR/ASR is unusual) would go fly a civilian plane on an SIAP without having tracked a needle since flight training. But he never expected anyone to worry about logging I&T if they had logged an approach requiring the interception and tracking of nav courses. That was purely the Chief Counsel's office at work long after John wrote that requirement into the reg (after he retired from the FAA, too, IIRC), and they cited only the plain language of the regulation with no mention of PAR/ASR's as the reason for requiring you to log it explicitly.

BTW, my source on this is John Lynch himself, with whom I discussed this on the phone 15+ years ago.
 
Ron Levy said:
GCA's do count -- for the six approaches. And that's why John Lynch (then of AFS-810) added the I&T requirement when he wrote 61.57(c). He was concerned that Army helo pilots (for whom anything other than a PAR/ASR is unusual) would go fly a civilian plane on an SIAP without ...
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Does anybody besides Ron have a clue what he's talking about?

It's nice that he mentioned a name somewhere in the middle of all these cryptic acronyms, rules, and what-not, but it's still unreadable to me.
 
midlifeflyer said:
That's true of everything in your logbook, isn't it? No one cares what you put in it unless some question is raised about your currency or qualifications.

But I thought the question was about properly meeting FAA requirements ("a person may act as pilot in command under IFR or weather conditions less than the minimums prescribed for VFR only if...Within the 6 calendar months preceding the month of the flight, that person performed and logged"), not about what one can get away with when avoiding them.
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No that isn't true regarding anything in my logbook.

The question was how it's done in the real world, not how to win a lawsuit.
 
Ron Levy said:
You should meet the FAA Chief Counsel's staff, because it was a letter to them which triggered the specific logging of interception and tracking which Flight Standards had never cared about as long as you'd logged some SIAP's. Of course, I've never heard of the Flight Standards people busting anyone's chops over this issue even after the Chief Counsel spoke (or, rather, wrote), but if you screw up while operating IFR, it's just one more charge for them to pile onto the violation heap.
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I haven't meet the FAA Chief Counsel, and I'm willing to bet that no one here has.
So thanks for confirming that no one at flight standards really cares about it. If your screw up is significant enough for FAA to start looking through your logbook, one missing logged hold will be the least of your worries.
 
MachFly said:
I haven't meet the FAA Chief Counsel, and I'm willing to bet that no one here has.
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You'd probably be right. :rolleyes:

MachFly said:
So thanks for confirming that no one at flight standards really cares about it. If your screw up is significant enough for FAA to start looking through your logbook, one missing logged hold will be the least of your worries.
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Yep. :thumbsup:
 
NoHeat said:
Does anybody besides Ron have a clue what he's talking about?

It's nice that he mentioned a name somewhere in the middle of all these cryptic acronyms, rules, and what-not, but it's still unreadable to me.
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It's just part of the illusion. :rolleyes:
 
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NoHeat said:
Does anybody besides Ron have a clue what he's talking about?

It's nice that he mentioned a name somewhere in the middle of all these cryptic acronyms, rules, and what-not, but it's still unreadable to me.
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Some of it are terms used mostly by military pilots.

GCA = Ground Controlled Approach
AFS-810 = FAA Airmen Certification & Training Branch
I&T = Intercepting and Tracking
PAR = Precision Approach Radar
ASR = Approach Surveillance Radar
61.57(c) = IFR currency requirements
SIAP = Standard Instrument Approach Procedure

It's fun to fly a PAR approach. The controllers at Fort Smith AR used to be very accommodating if you asked for one as a civilian.
 
MachFly said:
No that isn't true regarding anything in my logbook.

The question was how it's done in the real world, not how to win a lawsuit.
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If you haven't logged your hold(s) and your I&T...how do you know that you're current?
 
jason said:
If you haven't logged your hold(s) and your I&T...how do you know that you're current?
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Your missing my point. I'm saying that if you log a procedure turn as a hold, realistically no one is going to care.
 
MachFly said:
No that isn't true regarding anything in my logbook.

The question was how it's done in the real world, not how to win a lawsuit.
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I didn't see any mention of lawsuits in this thread other than by you. Just discussions of what the FAA requires in the entries to show FAA currency and qualification.

If your point is "no one cares until a question comes up" well, Duh.

Since ignorance is not a defense anyway, it's probably best to try to understand a rule before deciding it's ok to disregard it.
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Ron Levy said:
GCA's do count -- for the six approaches. And that's why John Lynch (then of AFS-810) added the I&T requirement when he wrote 61.57(c). He was concerned that Army helo pilots (for whom anything other than a PAR/ASR is unusual) would go fly a civilian plane on an SIAP without having tracked a needle since flight training. But he never expected anyone to worry about logging I&T if they had logged an approach requiring the interception and tracking of nav courses. That was purely the Chief Counsel's office at work long after John wrote that requirement into the reg (after he retired from the FAA, too, IIRC), and they cited only the plain language of the regulation with no mention of PAR/ASR's as the reason for requiring you to log it explicitly.

BTW, my source on this is John Lynch himself, with whom I discussed this on the phone 15+ years ago.
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I seem to recall there was some issue where he was accused of being rogue??? Do I have the wrong guy?
 
Jaybird180 said:
I seem to recall there was some issue where he was accused of being rogue???
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By whom? Certainly not by his bosses in AFS-800. However, some people in the Chief Counsel's office objected to some things he did in his efforts to help people understand how to comply with the rules in Part 61, and that changed a few things about how the FAA handles that. In any event, he'd been retired for some time now.
 
Jaybird180 said:
I seem to recall there was some issue where he was accused of being rogue??? Do I have the wrong guy?
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The way I heard it, the Chief Counsel's office didn't like the fact that he posted on the Internet a list of frequently asked questions and answers about regulations and their interpretation.
 
Ron Levy said:
GCA's do count -- for the six approaches. And that's why John Lynch (then of AFS-810) added the I&T requirement when he wrote 61.57(c). He was concerned that Army helo pilots (for whom anything other than a PAR/ASR is unusual) would go fly a civilian plane on an SIAP without having tracked a needle since flight training. But he never expected anyone to worry about logging I&T if they had logged an approach requiring the interception and tracking of nav courses. That was purely the Chief Counsel's office at work long after John wrote that requirement into the reg (after he retired from the FAA, too, IIRC), and they cited only the plain language of the regulation with no mention of PAR/ASR's as the reason for requiring you to log it explicitly.

BTW, my source on this is John Lynch himself, with whom I discussed this on the phone 15+ years ago.
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Not sure about his logic. The UH-60 has at it's disposal NDB, VOR, ILS and GPS. GCA is just another approach option. Even the soon to be retired OH-58 can track a digital needle on its MFD by using it's EGPS / INS. While not instrument certified, the 58 guys still get plenty of tracking under the hood for periodic instrument evals.
 
61.57 doesn't tell you to physically fly holds. It tells you to perform "Holding procedures and tasks."
 
Velocity173 said:
Not sure about his logic. The UH-60 has at it's disposal NDB, VOR, ILS and GPS. GCA is just another approach option. Even the soon to be retired OH-58 can track a digital needle on its MFD by using it's EGPS / INS. While not instrument certified, the 58 guys still get plenty of tracking under the hood for periodic instrument evals.
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This reg was originally written when many or most of the helos the Army operated were TACAN-only, many or most Army aviators held only a "tactical instrument card", and the only way many or most of them flew instruments was radar vectors to a PAR. Now that things have changed and there's a recently retired Army aviator who may know better at the head of AFS-800, perhaps someone can convince them to eliminate the requirement. Personally, I lack the motivation.
 
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Palmpilot said:
The way I heard it, the Chief Counsel's office didn't like the fact that he posted on the Internet a list of frequently asked questions and answers about regulations and their interpretation.
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It was up too long for it to have been a general dislike for the concept. But it definitely involved a need for consistency in the public answers to regulatory questions. There have been FAQ answers that conflict with Chief Counsel interpretations and I know of at least certificate action where it turned out to be a problem for the FAA in part because of a FAQ answer. It was chronologically consistent with the FAQ coming down.

Ron periodically mentions that the FAQ still exists as an internal guidance document. I've had one experience with that when I corresponded with John Lynch about one of the 2009 Part 61 changes. Answering my question, Lynch included a copy of the brand new FAQ answer my question generated.

It was wrong.
 
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