Is this too far?

[dell30rb]

Why would the DPE care how you planned the course? Doing it with a ruler, pencil and chart only shows that the applicant is willing to suffer bureaucratic nonsense to obtain the rating. By learning how to do "busy work" during the time that he/she could have otherwise spent learning more recent technology, like an ADF or something.


I've never had to do an emergency flight plan before, but I suppose if my computer crapped out, I could find another one, or a myriad of other things before looking though 5 years worth of stuff in the attic for a plotter, ruler and pencil.

While I use foreflight and e-tools.. for everything too, I disagree with you.

Even if you can use ipads and thing a magigs, you still need a good understanding of how to use a map. Even with 'moving map' technology, you're still using a map. Having the ability to draw out on paper etc.. lets you show the DPE you know how to use a map, and understand things like magnetic variation and all that.

For my PP ride I did everything on paper. On my instrument ride I was allowed to use e-tools and I did. The DPE thought it was a good thing that I was familiar with this technology and knew how to get the most out of it.

 

[dell30rb]

Why should a DPE care or be limited to whether the route is limited to one sectional? Without much effort I can think of a number of reasons an examiner might want to see a flight plan to a place that's on another chart, the easiest is when the departure airport is close to the edge of a sectional. And how does the DPE know that a student is capable of the monkey motions required to draw the line on the chart(s)? Many posts allude to keeping a finger on the chart during XC trips, for which having the line drawn in the correct place can be handy.

My x/c was specifically planned so that I had to use two sectionals.

Right after i got my PPL and a checkout in a warrior with 60 hours TT my dad and I flew it over 800 nm round trip to ohio using sectionals and VOR's.

good stuff

 

[steingar]

Anyone who'll balk at buying a couple charts should think twice about aviation. It just isn't an activity for the penurious.

 

[bbchien]

A favorite DPE tool for shortening the required Flight Planning trip requirement is to tell the applicant that he is going to have 650 lbs of humans aboard.....(172, Archer).

 

[N801BH]

A favorite DPE tool for shortening the required Flight Planning trip requirement is to tell the applicant that he is going to have 650 lbs of humans aboard.....(172, Archer).

So... Is that 3 ..or 4 trips around the pattern ?

 

[Meanee]

Why should a DPE care or be limited to whether the route is limited to one sectional? Without much effort I can think of a number of reasons an examiner might want to see a flight plan to a place that's on another chart, the easiest is when the departure airport is close to the edge of a sectional. And how does the DPE know that a student is capable of the monkey motions required to draw the line on the chart(s)? Many posts allude to keeping a finger on the chart during XC trips, for which having the line drawn in the correct place can be handy.

You can have the same effect to plan XC to the other side of the sectional. The suggestion I had is to prevent people from scrambling at last minute. I had 5 days to prepare flight plan, and 3 of them were waiting on "overnighted" sectional. And DPE didn't even look at the other sectional's part of the flight plan, that I carefully plotted out with a pencil.

 

[wabower]

He's only required to look at the required items. OTOH, he might have been a devious old fart who figured it would be good practice for you and he was pretty sure you wouldn't blow it off since it was part of the check ride. Just purely hypothetical, not that I would ever have done anything like that as an examiner. No sir, not me.

You can have the same effect to plan XC to the other side of the sectional. The suggestion I had is to prevent people from scrambling at last minute. I had 5 days to prepare flight plan, and 3 of them were waiting on "overnighted" sectional. And DPE didn't even look at the other sectional's part of the flight plan, that I carefully plotted out with a pencil.

 

[Jeanie]

I think that PP applicants should be able to plan XC flights using a plotter and pencil/marker as well as using whatever online flight planner that they like. Whether the DPE looks over the complex planning that was requested is moot, going through the motions and thinking about the plan was possibly the point. I had a student ask me why do I have to ..... My answer was because knowing these things are partly airmanship, partly safe your butt and partly jump through the testing hoop.

Musicians play lots of scales before they play sonatas. I doubt it hurt anyone to learn to navigate across country the "old fashioned" way even if the electronics never die and they have to rely on their basic training. It simply makes you a better pilot to have those abilities. It helps you judge if the gizmos are correct.

Anyway, I would think that the DPE is wanting to see the applicant think. Planning a short XC with only one chart and then discussing what ifs using another chart would work too I suppose. He has his way of doing things... Id just buy the extra chart and then use it to wrap my CFIs Christmas gift

 

[Jaybird180]

My examiner had me plan a flight from W29 to ACY to HGR and back to W29 for a grand total of 330 miles. The devilish thing about it was that that route happens to go through every single kind of airspace imaginable. You go through a surface area Class E on descent to ACY, which is a Class C, then you just barely get into Philly's Class B, then skirt Wilmington's Class D, and then you go through P40 up by Camp David if you (foolishly) choose to go direct, then you land at HGR, which is a Class D, then you pass through FDK's Class D, before predictably going through that nasty little corridor in the DC SFRA between the DCA's and BWI's Class B.

Gee, what a crazy idea for a checkride? I wonder how long it took that examiner to come up with a route which did that?

Just ask your buddy Frank. Very similar to the route he had me plan for my checkride. We had significant discussion about the town of Thurmont. W&B for the planned flight forced a fuel stop. I think the flight planning exercise made it's point.

Actual- We went to the 1st checkpoint, then he started changing his mind about where we're going and what's broken...

Anyone who'll balk at buying a couple charts should think twice about aviation. It just isn't an activity for the penurious.

I bought new charts right before my checkride even though I had plans to not use them afterwards.

 

[Jeanie]

Wayne, we posted at the same time. Maybe we're both devious.....

 

[JHW]

One other thing, while foreflight is great and I use it almost exclusively, there are some trivial things like legend infiormation that is missing or hard to find. If youre forced to do things the old fashioned way for awhile, you'll have the background to understand the limitations as well as the capabilities of new tools.

 

[wabower]

Wayne, we posted at the same time. Maybe we're both devious.....

I was pretty sure i'm not the only who doesn't feel like it's cheating to make a student think just a little more than they had planned. I think it's much better training than hammering the same nail every day.

 

[tlglenn]

I remember that the DPE during my commercial oral exam pulled-out an E6B and double-checked a randomly-selected leg from my flight plan.

 

[Kevin H.]

The oral part of my commercial checkride consisted of a 580nm flight from Fresno(FAT to Salt Lake City(SLC) and I thought that was extreme, really isn't of course. And this was before Iphone's and Ipads and Foreflight and all that fancy stuff. Heck at the time we only had 1 plane with GPS in it and it was forbidden to be used so everything was done by map of course. Thank god for technology now a days.

This 477nm flight may seem kind of crazy but who's to say a Private Pilot won't ever plan a 500nm flight in his or her life so It may give the instructor some idea as to how well the students factor in all of the obstacles that will come up on a flight that long. There's a lot of things to discuss and go over while talking out the flight with the instructor and a lot of good knowledge for the student can come out of it.

They can also go to www.skyvector.com and plan any route they want easily before putting it on a sectional. That's what I like to do.

 

[NineThreeKilo]

This thread got me thinking.

Anyone remember this gem
http://m2.tbo.com/content/2011/nov/22/221746/pilot-mistakes-pasco-road-for-runway-during-landin/

DumbDumb landed in the middle of a residential community because the little screen in his Cirrus said it was a runway.

I wonder how many people would not have their licenses had it not been for modern technology compensating for their lack of ability to nav and fly with a window and EYES.

A buck says dumbdumb would have never made it past the x-country part of his flight training had it not been for his "modern tools"

 

[cirrusmx]

you need to learn arithmetic before using a calc. Thats probably the reason they insist on PENCIL and RULER planning.

 

[Henning]

I'm having to send some of my students to a new examiner for either weight reasons or certificate reasons. The other examiners have my students plan their cross country to somewhere in the state or next state over. This guy wants my student to plan a 477 mile one way flight. I understand the idea behind students needing to know how to plan big flights but this seemed a bit much especially when they will be buying charts they probably wont use before they expire. It's a lot of work to plan out especialy when the examiners dont ask about every leg of the trip. Am I wrong?

Planning it? No, that's fine, that's a pretty normal length trip. I think I planned from Long Beach to Vegas/Boulder City for my PP ride. If he made him fly the whole route on the checkride yeah, I would think that a bit excessive. To use the cost of a couple charts as a reason to oppose is a non starter, flying is expensive, charts are the cheapest thing involved, if he can't pony up for an extra sectional, he has no business flying. If they think that doing that plan is "too much work" he has absolutely no business flying since he should be able to work up a 500nm XC in about 20 minutes filling in all the blanks.

 

[kimberlyanne546]

I'm having to send some of my students to a new examiner for either weight reasons or certificate reasons. The other examiners have my students plan their cross country to somewhere in the state or next state over. This guy wants my student to plan a 477 mile one way flight. I understand the idea behind students needing to know how to plan big flights but this seemed a bit much especially when they will be buying charts they probably wont use before they expire. It's a lot of work to plan out especialy when the examiners dont ask about every leg of the trip. Am I wrong?

Haven't read the two pages of this thread by reply to the OP's original post is:

My DPE did the same. Made us plan an XC from San Francisco area (actually North of that) to Los Angeles area. Had to buy another sectional that I would never use again.

He does that for ALL PRIVATE PILOTS and he is one of the only DPE's in the area.

When he called me, I told him we would need many fuel stops due to his weight and my weight and his flight bag in the 152 so at the last minute he said "OK then why don't you just show me a flight plan to the very first fuel stop we will need to make?"

That was great but I'd already bought the sectional and drawn a course line etc. Oh well.

 

[Henning]

The oral part of my commercial checkride consisted of a 580nm flight from Fresno(FAT to Salt Lake City(SLC) and I thought that was extreme, really isn't of course. And this was before Iphone's and Ipads and Foreflight and all that fancy stuff. Heck at the time we only had 1 plane with GPS in it and it was forbidden to be used so everything was done by map of course. Thank god for technology now a days.

This 477nm flight may seem kind of crazy but who's to say a Private Pilot won't ever plan a 500nm flight in his or her life so It may give the instructor some idea as to how well the students factor in all of the obstacles that will come up on a flight that long. There's a lot of things to discuss and go over while talking out the flight with the instructor and a lot of good knowledge for the student can come out of it.

They can also go to www.skyvector.com and plan any route they want easily before putting it on a sectional. That's what I like to do.

LOL, I took off on a nearly 4000 mile trip around the country right after my checkride.

 

[Henning]

My x/c was specifically planned so that I had to use two sectionals.

Right after i got my PPL and a checkout in a warrior with 60 hours TT my dad and I flew it over 800 nm round trip to ohio using sectionals and VOR's.

good stuff

Yeah, I went to see my dad in Ft Wayne In, only used VOR to the Grand Canyon though where I lost both NAV radios, I got vectors and fly pilotage the rest of the trip.

 

[poadeleted21]

While I use foreflight and e-tools.. for everything too, I disagree with you.

Even if you can use ipads and thing a magigs, you still need a good understanding of how to use a map. Even with 'moving map' technology, you're still using a map. Having the ability to draw out on paper etc.. lets you show the DPE you know how to use a map, and understand things like magnetic variation and all that.

For my PP ride I did everything on paper. On my instrument ride I was allowed to use e-tools and I did. The DPE thought it was a good thing that I was familiar with this technology and knew how to get the most out of it.

2 questions, 8 seconds and the DPE will know the answer to that. I don't think there's a need to make someone demonstrate they know how to use an abacus before allowing them to use a computer. Do you want people dwelling on crap they'll never give a second thought to or do you want them using the best possible tools available? You have to know the concepts to make the tools work for you.

 

[Henning]

2 questions, 8 seconds and the DPE will know the answer to that. I don't think there's a need to make someone demonstrate they know how to use an abacus before allowing them to use a computer. Do you want people dwelling on crap they'll never give a second thought to or do you want them using the best possible tools available? You have to know the concepts to make the tools work for you.

You have to know the concepts to make the tools work, but it takes practice and experience to make it work without the tools, and that is part of the test requirements.

If you need any tool besides a chart, a clock and a compass, you are not ready to be PIC yet. In order to be in Command you need to have navigation mastered from every angle you have at your disposal, and that includes doing, get this now, it's really scary..., mental math.

Seriously though, if a person can't navigate using any method, they have no business in the front seats of a plane.

 

[Kevin H.]

^^^ I have to agree with Henning. I'm really glad my Single/Multi Commercial IFR and Complex training all went perfect without ever touching a GPS once. My instructor never wanted me to put my life in the hands of a bunch of batteries. At that time everyone used handheld GPS devices and the owner of the flight school I went to was waaaaaay to cheap to purchase GPS devices for $12,000 Piper Tomahawk's. LOL. He always asked what I would do if my GPS battery died if that was all I relied on while never learning to fly by map and using that map to help identify where I was if I got lost. Still to this day I've never used a GPS to fly anywhere. Maybe next year with the new plane purchase. I think I would at least settle for a Nexus 7 with Foreflight hehe.

BTW Henning... That 310 of yours makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. It's absolutely stunning and phenomenal.

 

[spiderweb]

The point is valid, also, for music, martial arts, sports, etc. You have to be able to do exceptionally well with the most difficult elements--THAT is what makes you a master.

 

[poadeleted21]

^^^ I have to agree with Henning. I'm really glad my Single/Multi Commercial IFR and Complex training all went perfect without ever touching a GPS once. My instructor never wanted me to put my life in the hands of a bunch of batteries. At that time everyone used handheld GPS devices and the owner of the flight school I went to was waaaaaay to cheap to purchase GPS devices for $12,000 Piper Tomahawk's. LOL. He always asked what I would do if my GPS battery died if that was all I relied on while never learning to fly by map and using that map to help identify where I was if I got lost. Still to this day I've never used a GPS to fly anywhere. Maybe next year with the new plane purchase. I think I would at least settle for a Nexus 7 with Foreflight hehe.

We're talking flight planning here... You know where you get out an E6B and calculate TOC, Fuel burn and your heading based on winds aloft forecasts 12 hours in advance of your PPL checkride for a flight that you're not even going to fly. You calculate fuel burn using the same E6B. Then when you go to plan a real flight that you're actually going to make you use a computer based flight planner because it provides you with more, better and dynamic real time information almost instantly and eliminates common errors and is far more accurate than a blurry dot on the back of an E6B? Unless the power goes off in your home and someone is holding a gun to your head and you have to make an emergency flight plan... I don't see the need. Nothing for VFR PPL quality flight plans is rocket surgery or requires more than a basic understanding of 4th grade level math. "Busy work" is what I would call it. If you understand the concepts enough to use the Jeppesen Flight planner, you understand the concepts well enough to me.. Even my non-GPS/non-VOR flights I make by looking out the window and seeing where I am. I don't recall ever needing or flying the heading I calculated in a flight plan. For fuel burn, I know the direction I'll be flying, and call a briefer on the way to the airport, they give me a general idea of the winds, that's all I need. If you can't instantly "guesstimate" your groundspeed within a couple of knots based on the direction your going and the winds and derive your fuel burn from that.... well.

 

[poadeleted21]

The point is valid, also, for music, martial arts, sports, etc. You have to be able to do exceptionally well with the most difficult elements--THAT is what makes you a master.

So all you guys posting on this forum have an intimate knowledge of silicon chip design and have a working knowledge of how to use VHDL or similar to program integrated circuits? My architecture is a little fuzzy, assembly ( MASM at that), is about as in depth as I go these days, am I qualified to even be USING the internet? Heck I can't even remember how to wire up a carry-lookahead adder using NAND gates, much less how to build a RISC 5 stage pipeline burst processor (and that is ancient old technology, but a good concept to know if one wants to use a computer). It's amazing I can even figure out how to post. Don't even get me started on how bad I am at sub-atomic particle physics, no way I could explain how all the data flows through the circuits. Where's my 100000000000 hours free (for one month) internet AOL CD when I need it?

 

[wabower]

Nope, don't know any of that but have all the pilot and instructor ratings we will ever need or want. Do you?

So all you guys posting on this forum have an intimate knowledge of silicon chip design and have a working knowledge of how to use VHDL or similar to program integrated circuits? My architecture is a little fuzzy, assembly ( MASM at that), is about as in depth as I go these days, am I qualified to even be USING the internet? Heck I can't even remember how to wire up a carry-lookahead adder using NAND gates, much less how to build a RISC 5 stage pipeline burst processor (and that is ancient old technology, but a good concept to know if one wants to use a computer). It's amazing I can even figure out how to post. Don't even get me started on how bad I am at sub-atomic particle physics, no way I could explain how all the data flows through the circuits. Where's my 100000000000 hours free (for one month) internet AOL CD when I need it?

 

[Henning]

^^^ I have to agree with Henning. I'm really glad my Single/Multi Commercial IFR and Complex training all went perfect without ever touching a GPS once. My instructor never wanted me to put my life in the hands of a bunch of batteries. At that time everyone used handheld GPS devices and the owner of the flight school I went to was waaaaaay to cheap to purchase GPS devices for $12,000 Piper Tomahawk's. LOL. He always asked what I would do if my GPS battery died if that was all I relied on while never learning to fly by map and using that map to help identify where I was if I got lost. Still to this day I've never used a GPS to fly anywhere. Maybe next year with the new plane purchase. I think I would at least settle for a Nexus 7 with Foreflight hehe.

BTW Henning... That 310 of yours makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. It's absolutely stunning and phenomenal.

Thanks, as you can see, while I'm perfectly comfortable crossing the country with a Rand McNally Truckers Atlas, I like having extra information. I've been making a living as a captain over 25 years and have seen a lot of technology develop in that time, I actually used the first Furuno GPS installed in a private vessel (on the first leg of the trip to SF the GPS was all over indicating anywhere from NYC to Hawaii due to a bad board Furuno came down ad replaced in SF) and I like it all, and realize all of it is junk that sucks which is why you always need multiple forms of navigation to go by.

I don't cotton onto the whole "don't train with GPS", it's ridiculous, the reality is that using the GPS correctly is more difficult than pilotage. People should be getting training ON the GPS while PP students, not avoiding it. The long and the short of it is you need to learn it ALL! Every last bit. Students need to be trained to use all methods available to them concurrently cross checking systems accuracy against each other. Heck when I shoot an LPV approach I'll typically have the ILS tuned in as well, this not so much as a cross check but in order to have a system up and running to provide guidance for the missed should the GPS fail. When I'm cruising along the Magenta Line of Death, I'll use #2 to check position with the VOR system.

The long and short of it is we are operating machines and machines break. This is not a bad thing as it has allowed me to make a fairly comfortable living, that's also why I have redundancy in what I consider critical systems, including engines.

 

[Kevin H.]

We're talking flight planning here... You know where you get out an E6B and calculate TOC, Fuel burn and your heading based on winds aloft forecasts 12 hours in advance of your PPL checkride for a flight that you're not even going to fly. You calculate fuel burn using the same E6B. Then when you go to plan a real flight that you're actually going to make you use a computer based flight planner because it provides you with more, better and dynamic real time information almost instantly and eliminates common errors and is far more accurate than a blurry dot on the back of an E6B? Unless the power goes off in your home and someone is holding a gun to your head and you have to make an emergency flight plan... I don't see the need. Nothing for VFR PPL quality flight plans is rocket surgery or requires more than a basic understanding of 4th grade level math. "Busy work" is what I would call it. If you understand the concepts enough to use the Jeppesen Flight planner, you understand the concepts well enough to me.. Even my non-GPS/non-VOR flights I make by looking out the window and seeing where I am. I don't recall ever needing or flying the heading I calculated in a flight plan. For fuel burn, I know the direction I'll be flying, and call a briefer on the way to the airport, they give me a general idea of the winds, that's all I need. If you can't instantly "guesstimate" your groundspeed within a couple of knots based on the direction your going and the winds and derive your fuel burn from that.... well.

You're missing the point... We had this kid in flight school... His daddy was pretty rich and bought him a brand new Cessna with all the Garmin goodies in it. After that I never once saw that kid use an E6B or flight planner or chart for any flight he took people on. He was too busy looking spoiled. I flew with him once, it was the last time I ever got into a plane with him.

You'd be surprised that with the amount of technology now a days, how simple it is to stump pilots on the basics of flight planning cause all they rely on is that fancy little computer screen. These things may have come easy to you, that's great, but not every person is you. Everyone is different. That's why some ppl get their PPL in 40 hours and for some it can take 140 hours. But in this day and age with all the great technology available, you still read about pilots crashing from running out of fuel from getting lost.... Go figure.

 

[poadeleted21]

Nope, don't know any of that but have all the pilot and instructor ratings we will ever need or want. Do you?

You sir are highly unqualified to be using computers, especially for such complex tasks as communicating on the internet and have had sub-par training.

I suggest reading the complete set of Donald Knuth's "The Art of Computer Programming" then you may post in a sandboxed forum for noobs under the supervision of a guy who at least knows smalltalk until you have a full grasp on what's going on at the electron level when you press a key down on the keyboard.

I have all the ratings I need to know that a a ruler is an outdated, unnecessary and largely inadequate, in comparison to the other options available, tool for VFR flight planning.

In computer science, your first course will spend half the first class showing you abacuses, slide rules, and other attempts at calculators over the ages, then they'll move to front panels and punch cards, laugh at them and talk about how arduous and unduly complex they are to use for little reward given modern day technology. You'll get "war stories" from the older professors about dropping all their carefully ordered punch cards etc... For some reason, that extremely outdated technology is embraced and even declared superior in the aviation community, I dunno, maybe it's nostalgia or something. For inflight stuff, check my posts, I'm not an iPad fan, the tool has to work and IMHO the iPad aint it for inflight stuff. For "in your living room the night before a flight" it's excellent and superior to a ruler,plotter,sectional and E6B.

 

[poadeleted20]

You folks can argue all you want about the merits of using an abacus and a sun dial all you want, but on a Private/Rec/Sport practical test, the FAA's Flight Standards folks want to see you use the tools you'll actually use tomorrow, not the tools pilots used to use half a century ago. Like, do you think engineering schools today should require their students to use slide rules rather than calculators on their final exams? Or liberal arts colleges to require their students to do their term papers on typewriters rather than PC's?

 

[wabower]

Which ignores the fact that DPE's and not standards people do the check-rides.

You folks can argue all you want about the merits of using an abacus and a sun dial all you want, but on a Private/Rec/Sport practical test, the FAA's Flight Standards folks want to see you use the tools you'll actually use tomorrow, not the tools pilots used to use half a century ago. Like, do you think engineering schools today should require their students to use slide rules rather than calculators on their final exams? Or liberal arts colleges to require their students to do their term papers on typewriters rather than PC's?

 

[Henning]

You sir are highly unqualified to be using computers, especially for such complex tasks as communicating on the internet and have had sub-par training.

I suggest reading the complete set of Donald Knuth's "The Art of Computer Programming" then you may post in a sandboxed forum for noobs until you have a full grasp on what's going on at the electron level when you press a key down on the keyboard.

I have all the ratings I need to know that a a ruler is an outdated, unnecessary and largely inadequate, in comparison to the other options available, tool for VFR flight planning.

In computer science, your first course will spend half the first class showing you abacuses, slide rules, and other attempts at calculators over the ages, then they'll move to front panels and punch cards, laugh at them and talk about how arduous and unduly complex they are to use for little reward given modern day technology. For some reason, that extremely outdated technology is embraced and even declared superior in the aviation community, I dunno, maybe it's nostalgia or something.

The most important measuring device in a plane is your pinky and pointer finger. Place them on 2 lines of latitude along a line of longitude on a sectional and you have 30 miles which in the 310 is 6 minutes and 2.2 gallons of gas. Using 2 fingers across a chart I can have my time and fuel to any destination on the chart in 15 seconds. Using this technique on my PP-XC checkride diversion is what ended the test portion of the flight and began the instructional part, IOW, in his mind I had passed and now we were cleaning it up and heading home. When the DE gave me a diversion and in 20 seconds of waving my hand over the chart I told him we would not have the fuel to make it but we would make another airport in that direction 'away from the IMC that caused the diversion' and had the plane heading that way. He was kinda amazed that I came up with all that that quick without picking up the E-6B or plotting tool or anything. The neat thing is it's easier and faster to play with routes this way than using any form of electronics.

What the electronics do best is buy you time in an emergency by reducing your ongoing workload allowing processing of other information, especially when in IMC.

 

[jpower]

You folks can argue all you want about the merits of using an abacus and a sun dial all you want, but on a Private/Rec/Sport practical test, the FAA's Flight Standards folks want to see you use the tools you'll actually use tomorrow, not the tools pilots used to use half a century ago. Like, do you think engineering schools today should require their students to use slide rules rather than calculators on their final exams? Or liberal arts colleges to require their students to do their term papers on typewriters rather than PC's?

Well actually...now that you mention it...on my Calc 4 exam next Monday, we aren't allowed a calculator or a slide rule. Not even an abacus. We have to do all the arithmetic out by hand. Which isn't difficult, just time consuming. Thankfully there isn't a lot of it, because it's just diff eq, but still...

 

[Henning]

You folks can argue all you want about the merits of using an abacus and a sun dial all you want, but on a Private/Rec/Sport practical test, the FAA's Flight Standards folks want to see you use the tools you'll actually use tomorrow, not the tools pilots used to use half a century ago. Like, do you think engineering schools today should require their students to use slide rules rather than calculators on their final exams? Or liberal arts colleges to require their students to do their term papers on typewriters rather than PC's?

Are you saying examiners are no longer testing on pilotage nav? There are still plenty of University level math courses that require longhand calculations be done.

 

[poadeleted21]

Well actually...now that you mention it...on my Calc 4 exam next Monday, we aren't allowed a calculator or a slide rule. Not even an abacus. We have to do all the arithmetic out by hand. Which isn't difficult, just time consuming. Thankfully there isn't a lot of it, because it's just diff eq, but still...

I have a math degree, never owned a calculator. Didn't need one, the math department knew what was important. a typical question would be take the derivative of x^2. Then they'd ask you 10 questions about what you just did. If you couldn't remember a certain formula, you could ask right in the middle of test. I'll never forget, during a LA test, we were asked to calculate the orthogonal projection of a line onto a plane, I had no idea what that meant (I think I was sick the day that was covered). I asked the prof, what the heck that meant, trying to stretch the "Ask for the formula" policy as far as I could. He one upped me. He had me come up to the chalk board, explained what it meant and had me derive the formula myself, for the class on the chalk board.. in the middle of a test. I don't remember much about Linear Algebra, but I still know what Orthogonal Projection means.

 

[Henning]

I have a math degree, never owned a calculator. Didn't need one, the math department knew what was important. a typical question would be take the derivative of x^2. Then they'd ask you 10 questions about what you just did. If you couldn't remember a certain formula, you could ask right in the middle of test. I'll never forget, during a LA test, we were asked to calculate the orthogonal projection of a line onto a plane, I had no idea what that meant (I think I was sick the day that was covered). I asked the prof, what the heck that meant, trying to stretch the "Ask for the formula" policy as far as I could. He one upped me. He had me come up to the chalk board, explained what it meant and had me derive the formula myself, for the class on the chalk board.. in the middle of a test. I don't remember much about Linear Algebra, but I still know what Orthogonal Projection means.

I had a Chemistry teacher like that. Nobody got worse than a B because anything less and you meet with him and sitdown and rework the problems with him until you understood how to do it right. When you were done, you had an A.

 

[poadeleted21]

The most important measuring device in a plane is your pinky and pointer finger. Place them on 2 lines of latitude along a line of longitude on a sectional and you have 30 miles which in the 310 is 6 minutes and 2.2 gallons of gas. Using 2 fingers across a chart I can have my time and fuel to any destination on the chart in 15 seconds. Using this technique on my PP-XC checkride diversion is what ended the test portion of the flight and began the instructional part, IOW, in his mind I had passed and now we were cleaning it up and heading home. When the DE gave me a diversion and in 20 seconds of waving my hand over the chart I told him we would not have the fuel to make it but we would make another airport in that direction 'away from the IMC that caused the diversion' and had the plane heading that way. He was kinda amazed that I came up with all that that quick without picking up the E-6B or plotting tool or anything. The neat thing is it's easier and faster to play with routes this way than using any form of electronics.

What the electronics do best is buy you time in an emergency by reducing your ongoing workload allowing processing of other information, especially when in IMC.

I'm talking flight planning here. I cannot come up with a scenario where I'm going to go hunt down my POH, pencil, highlighter, plotter, E6B and sectional. Then, sit down at my dining room table find my waypoints, measure the distances, call up a briefer, get the winds aloft, plug that in, spin it in on the E6B, calculate my heading and fuel burn (or god forbid TOC) except to pacify a flight instructor or bureaucrat. I don't see any utility whatsoever in EVER doing it. IMHO CFIs/DPEs should familiarize themselves with current tools and embrace them, there's much better things a student could be spending their time on, like learning the tools they're actually going to use for that task, which are much more robust and complex. I got a panel GPS, a watch GPS, 2 iPhones an iPad and a portable GPS. I still have my sectional and AFD subscriptions and I still know how to use them. I don't use it for flight planning though. When my panel goes dark and the VOR's die, and all the GPS satellites cease to work, I know where I'm at and I'm diverting to the nearest airport on the sectional because I obviously have a problem. My first few hours I was scared of getting lost and intimidated, not saying I'm incapable of getting lost these days (that's why I still carry a sectional) but I no longer fear it.

 

[denverpilot]

So all you guys posting on this forum have an intimate knowledge of silicon chip design and have a working knowledge of how to use VHDL or similar to program integrated circuits? My architecture is a little fuzzy, assembly ( MASM at that), is about as in depth as I go these days, am I qualified to even be USING the internet? Heck I can't even remember how to wire up a carry-lookahead adder using NAND gates, much less how to build a RISC 5 stage pipeline burst processor (and that is ancient old technology, but a good concept to know if one wants to use a computer). It's amazing I can even figure out how to post. Don't even get me started on how bad I am at sub-atomic particle physics, no way I could explain how all the data flows through the circuits. Where's my 100000000000 hours free (for one month) internet AOL CD when I need it?

They're more into Verilog.

 

[poadeleted21]

They're more into Verilog.

To be fair, I said "or similar". Nahh... that's too modern.