Noise canceling headsets.

John, this is not the fault of the ANR Headsets. ANRs cancel sounds in the lower decibel range where most engine noise manifests itself. I have ANRs and can hear the gear and stall horns without problems, as the higher decibel noises come through quite clearly.

This cockpit crew just blew it.

-Skip
 
Skip Miller said:
John, this is not the fault of the ANR Headsets. ANRs cancel sounds in the lower decibel range where most engine noise manifests itself. I have ANRs and can hear the gear and stall horns without problems, as the higher decibel noises come through quite clearly.

This cockpit crew just blew it.

-Skip
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Skip you've got the right idea but wrong terminology. ANR targets the lower end of the frequency range we can hear (typically about 30-300 Hz). Cockpit alarms are usually in the 500-1500 Hz range (the bicycle horn used by many GA airplanes for audible gear and stall warning provides a fairly wide spectrum with content extending above that) and only the passive noise reduction provides any attenuation of that.

ANR generally makes it easier to hear warning horns and beepers because those sound sources don't have to compete with as much engine and prop noise with ANR.
 
What Lance said. Wasn't the ANR headset.

I can hear gear horns quite well with my Zulus, Bose, etc...
 
Ted DuPuis said:
What Lance said. Wasn't the ANR headset.

I can hear gear horns quite well with my Zulus, Bose, etc...
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Me too. As well as certain other engine sounds I can't hear otherwise with standard headsets. Like, the grinding noise my turbocharger made one flight. It was inspected, deemed to be within minutes of failure and replaced.
 
The Aircraft horn was speaking French, the Swiss didn't understand it.
 
GULP... the noise you make when you realize you didn't GUMP.
 
It is hard to believe that the pilot was able to hear that long gear not down warning, then be so completely brain dead as to being unable to discern something might be awry, all the while continuing with the landing.

The only thing I can think of, is if the headset did not cancel out the warning, then he must never have heard the warning before, and had no clue as to what that noise was all about.

Even though he is a foreigner, he must still have gotten some rudimentary flight training somewhere, and had enough knowledge to abort his landing until he figured out why his airplane was making all that noise...you'd think.

Is it possible he had defective headsets?

I'm not so sure it was caused by a bent propeller as Sean pointed out. Maybe so though. Perhaps that warning horn had nothing to do with the gear, it was a bent propeller warnig horn.

-John
 
John Baker said:
I'm not so sure it was caused by a bent propeller as Sean pointed out. Maybe so though. Perhaps that warning horn had nothing to do with the gear, it was a bent propeller warnig horn.

-John
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Thats not what I was implying haha.

I found it funny at that moment in the video how the guy was just standing there looking at it like that.
 
After they get out they talk about how fast the approach was. With the gear up it would certainly have felt fast. "ça va vite" - "It goes fast" is a loose translation. Also "things move fast" or something like that.

Supposedly this is a tricky obstructed approach and they were fixated on that.

I still don't understand how you could possibly miss that gear warning horn!
 
John Baker said:
It is hard to believe that the pilot was able to hear that long gear not down warning, then be so completely brain dead as to being unable to discern something might be awry, all the while continuing with the landing.

The only thing I can think of, is if the headset did not cancel out the warning, then he must never have heard the warning before, and had no clue as to what that noise was all about.

Even though he is a foreigner, he must still have gotten some rudimentary flight training somewhere, and had enough knowledge to abort his landing until he figured out why his airplane was making all that noise...you'd think.

Is it possible he had defective headsets?

I'm not so sure it was caused by a bent propeller as Sean pointed out. Maybe so though. Perhaps that warning horn had nothing to do with the gear, it was a bent propeller warnig horn.

-John
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You would be able to hear that horn even better with an ANR headset. As others have said, the ANR just drowns out the droning noises (like the engine). Allowing other noises to become more easily heard. There isn't an aviation headset on the market that would keep that sound from being heard. He was just too focused on getting it down and stopped.

The prop became bent when he landed without landing gear. It was not bent before the airplane touched the ground.
 
jason said:
The prop became bent when he landed without landing gear. It was not bent before the airplane touched the ground.
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Umm...I was being factitious. I know the bent propeller warning horn sounds completely different than the one in the video.;)

-John
 
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spinfire said:
I still don't understand how you could possibly miss that gear warning horn!
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A lot of people don't actually know what the gear horn sounds like in their planes. It would probably surprise you how many owners of complex aircraft have never heard that sound before.

You need to be familiar with the sound so that, when you hear it, your instinct is to push the throttle(s) forward and do a go-around. This is something I drill into my complex students.

Obviously, the best thing you can do is remember to put the gear down in the first place. But most airplanes have a neutral position for the gear as well as an up and a down. It is possible to move the switch from "up" to "neutral", which will leave the gear firmly in the up position. Obviously one should confirm the gear is down, but again, mistakes happen.
 
What's the purpose of neutral? It's a binary system (or so I thought- either up or down).
 
One of the things my transition training instructor did with me was an emergency gear extension and part of the point was to have me hear the horn. But I recognize he was a good instructor and not all of them are :(

Thanks for drilling it into your students.
 
Jaybird180 said:
What's the purpose of neutral? It's a binary system (or so I thought- either up or down).
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If there is some failure in the gear system and you need to put it down manually, the neutral position is where to put the switch so that the plane doesn't somehow engage the motor and rip your hand off as you're cranking it down.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
If there is some failure in the gear system and you need to put it down manually, the neutral position is where to put the switch so that the plane doesn't somehow engage the motor and rip your hand off as you're cranking it down.
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Make sense. Thanks.
 
On the single engine Cessna retracts I've flown it doesn't work that way. The handle is a hydraulic routing valve and it must be in the down position for the handle to have any effect. You pull the breaker to disable the pump.

It is always good to read the PoH for your particular aircraft :)
 
Perhaps it's the camera or surrounding obstacles but am I the only one that things that is descent was pretty steep? Maybe he was focusing on getting the plane down and just blocked out the gear warning.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
If there is some failure in the gear system and you need to put it down manually, the neutral position is where to put the switch so that the plane doesn't somehow engage the motor and rip your hand off as you're cranking it down.
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There are also several aircraft with hydraulic or pneumatic actuators for the gear where the neutral position unloads the pump(s) and the lever moves there by itself at the end of a gear up or down cycle.
 
spinfire said:
On the single engine Cessna retracts I've flown it doesn't work that way. The handle is a hydraulic routing valve and it must be in the down position for the handle to have any effect. You pull the breaker to disable the pump.

It is always good to read the PoH for your particular aircraft :)
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I don't think Ted meant to imply that all hydraulic gear systems have a neutral or even that all the ones that do require the selector to be in neutral for manual extension.
 
txnightster said:
Perhaps it's the camera or surrounding obstacles but am I the only one that things that is descent was pretty steep? Maybe he was focusing on getting the plane down and just blocked out the gear warning.
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I was thinking that same thought. It's entirely possible he never heard it, and if his passengers didn't know any better they didn't say anything.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
What Lance said. Wasn't the ANR headset.

I can hear gear horns quite well with my Zulus, Bose, etc...
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No problem hearing the horn in the Arrow with my C-90s. None, whatsoever. And I can't believe that people can get checked out in a complex without ever hearing it. Just pull back all the way on the power without lowering the gear. The Arrow yells at me for doing that.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
A lot of people don't actually know what the gear horn sounds like in their planes. It would probably surprise you how many owners of complex aircraft have never heard that sound before.

You need to be familiar with the sound so that, when you hear it, your instinct is to push the throttle(s) forward and do a go-around. This is something I drill into my complex students.
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So you don't do slow flight or any other maneuvers that start with extended low power settings in Cessna retracts? ;)

Damn thing is going off all the time. If you've got the gear tucked away.

One of the instructors here has the opposite problem of what you're describing. Students hear the horn so often that they get inadvertently taught to ignore it.

He adds a required "Gear warning - acknowledged." call-out the student must say when it goes off for any reason. The hope is that the one time it goes off when it's a real warning, the act of saying it will trigger thought... and hopefully action.
 
gismo said:
There are also several aircraft with hydraulic or pneumatic actuators for the gear where the neutral position unloads the pump(s) and the lever moves there by itself at the end of a gear up or down cycle.
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Correct, the Aztec and Navajo are two such aircraft. I was referring to the neutral position that most electric gear aircraft have.

denverpilot said:
So you don't do slow flight or any other maneuvers that start with extended low power settings in Cessna retracts? ;)

Damn thing is going off all the time. If you've got the gear tucked away.

One of the instructors here has the opposite problem of what you're describing. Students hear the horn so often that they get inadvertently taught to ignore it.
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Simple, put the gear down. That way, you don't condition pilots to inadvertently ignore the gear horn. Simply saying "Gear horn - acknowledge" really isn't very useful towards that. Besides, most slow flight and such you may as well do with the gear down.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
Simple, put the gear down. That way, you don't condition pilots to inadvertently ignore the gear horn. Simply saying "Gear horn - acknowledge" really isn't very useful towards that. Besides, most slow flight and such you may as well do with the gear down.
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Heh. So departure stalls, step one is to drop the gear and dirty up? Haha. Got it. ;)

I think there's a reason they have the gear up, but I don't remember why.
 
denverpilot said:
Heh. So departure stalls, step one is to drop the gear and dirty up? Haha. Got it. ;)

I think there's a reason they have the gear up, but I don't remember why.
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Fewer gear cycles?:dunno: those things have a numbered limit ya know; don't wanna go wastin em on trainin an all:D
 
denverpilot said:
Heh. So departure stalls, step one is to drop the gear and dirty up? Haha. Got it. ;)

I think there's a reason they have the gear up, but I don't remember why.
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The Arrow has a gear horn and a stall light. No confusion there. :D
 
denverpilot said:
Heh. So departure stalls, step one is to drop the gear and dirty up? Haha. Got it. ;)

I think there's a reason they have the gear up, but I don't remember why.
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The gear horn will only be on if you pull the throttle back beyond the point where the microswitch gets tripped. Shouldn't be an issue on a power-on stall.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
The gear horn will only be on if you pull the throttle back beyond the point where the microswitch gets tripped. Shouldn't be an issue on a power-on stall.
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Yeah, yeah... the other one... whatever. Just passing along the concerns a CFI related to me three years ago.

He didn't like that the horn is ignored by too many people for legitimate reasons in flight, far away from the ground, so he made students acknowledge it.

I really don't have an opinion either way... my training was the gear is down before you enter the pattern, period... or at the very latest, midfield downwind, and two more GUMPS checks (turning base, and turning final) after that.

I've gotten lazy about the base turn GUMPS after many years of not flying retracts.
 
denverpilot said:
Yeah, yeah... the other one... whatever. Just passing along the concerns a CFI related to me three years ago.
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And I think I've explained how I address it to minimize that.

He didn't like that the horn is ignored by too many people for legitimate reasons in flight, far away from the ground, so he made students acknowledge it.
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In training, yes. But outside of that, I have never heard a gear horn blare in a piston aircraft for normal flight. If you do hear it blare, you probably are pulling the throttle(s) back more than you should.

The Commander 690 (turbine) is the only plane I've flown that the gear horn is set way, way too sensitive. So much so that they certified it with a horn silencer. Don't like that feature at all.

I really don't have an opinion either way... my training was the gear is down before you enter the pattern, period... or at the very latest, midfield downwind, and two more GUMPS checks (turning base, and turning final) after that.

I've gotten lazy about the base turn GUMPS after many years of not flying retracts.
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Which is why I tend to recommend people who are transitioning to a complex aircraft to only fly the complex aircraft for a while. Drill that procedure in.

Oh, and don't forget that when you hear the gear horn 2 feet off the runway, push that throttle all the way forward.
 
denverpilot said:
Yeah, yeah... the other one... whatever. Just passing along the concerns a CFI related to me three years ago.

He didn't like that the horn is ignored by too many people for legitimate reasons in flight, far away from the ground, so he made students acknowledge it.
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Chances are if one of his students was in that gear-up video they could be heard saying "Gear warning - acknowledged." on the tape.;)

I really don't have an opinion either way... my training was the gear is down before you enter the pattern, period... or at the very latest, midfield downwind, and two more GUMPS checks (turning base, and turning final) after that.

I've gotten lazy about the base turn GUMPS after many years of not flying retracts.
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I find myself getting a bit complacent on GUMPS calls too although I seem to manage to make at least one or two on every landing (and I have an electronic backup as well). And rather than going with a particular point in the pattern for dropping the gear I much prefer to do it based on altitude. The rule is "Gear down to go down" (below pattern altitude or the altitude coming into the FAF on an approach). There are just too many variations in how a pattern gets flown with some lacking a base and/or downwind leg to rely on a positional cue IMO.
 
gismo said:
I find myself getting a bit complacent on GUMPS calls too although I seem to manage to make at least one or two on every landing (and I have an electronic backup as well). And rather than going with a particular point in the pattern for dropping the gear I much prefer to do it based on altitude. The rule is "Gear down to go down" (below pattern altitude or the altitude coming into the FAF on an approach). There are just too many variations in how a pattern gets flown with some lacking a base and/or downwind leg to rely on a positional cue IMO.
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I'd agree with this. There are a number of variations in patterns, and while one can establish procedures for these variations, it makes more sense to me just to pay attention to the situation and put down the gear and flaps at an appropriate time.
 
Mid field downwind, drop the gear and check "three green".

Turn base, check "three green"

Turn final, check "three green"

Short final, check "three green"

Was my CFI paranoid? If so, so am I. In our club we are responsible for the first $1000 towards repairs. I could write the check for $1000, but the embarrassment would kill me.
 
Ghery said:
Mid field downwind, drop the gear and check "three green".

Turn base, check "three green"

Turn final, check "three green"

Short final, check "three green"

Was my CFI paranoid? If so, so am I. In our club we are responsible for the first $1000 towards repairs. I could write the check for $1000, but the embarrassment would kill me.
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Having now done a number of requested by controllers straight-in visual IFR approaches now, I can see where this multiple checks in a standard pattern falls apart. All of my retract flying years ago was VFR with standard patterns.

I like the "gear down to go down" one for a future additional supplement. Along with the short final GUMPS.
 
Funny I get this far down the thread, and no one has yet mentioned how steady that camera work was from someone who just experiences a plane crash.

Guy/girl must have ice-water running through there veins.
 
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