One thing that should have been taught to you in basic training, but was not.

Never landed at an unpaved airfield. Other than that my instructor went over basically everything most people here would have liked.
 
ircphoenix said:
Never landed at an unpaved airfield. Other than that my instructor went over basically everything most people here would have liked.
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Same here. Mine was very thorough and covered pretty much everything that people have said.
 
Timbeck2 said:
I went around for javalena on a runway at night that I saw at the last moment. I bought an Alphabeam the next day.
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I had to google that, I thought you had forgot your coffee or something.
 
Kritchlow said:
Ahh... so the jet pilot departing an uncontrolled field who will be accelerating to 250 kts (at least 300 mph at a high altitude field), doesn't have any business knowing about a Cessna three miles from the field because he had not yet made a call. He may not realize the direction or speed of the jet departure so may not feel it necessary to announce.
As one who has been in the jet's position more times than I can count, I want the big picture of where the local traffic is.
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My experience is that the pilots who will respond will do so, and the pilots who don't won't. Regardless of what you say on the radio.
 
A few things I've noticed.

Sight picture on landing.

Slipping often

Landings at other than hard surface runways

Spins

Actually fueling the ground handling your plane for yourself (filling to the tabs for every student is a big disservic IMO)
 
Interesting to read the things folks think are missing in ppc training. A particular one is spin training. Why do you suppose the FAA deleted the spin requirement?

I think the current requirements are reasonable and variations with each instructor and student account for many of the perceived shortcomings. The ppc is truly a cert to learn on.

Now with that said the system that encourages 250 hour CFIs is just a bit disconcerting. Inexperienced instructors may be fine in a highly structured environment. A guy who just knows the pattern and practice area is just going to teach the pattern and practice area. Of course the other end of the spectrum can be just as bad. It is what it is and that may be why some of us have sought to fly with many instructors.
 
Pretty much everything mentioned above was something that my CFI and I did. The more I look back on the training I got, the more I appreciate it.

Except: Fueling. The FBO where I trained always used full-service. I even brought it up with my CFI one day, but I can't remember if we self-served on any lessons or not. I do remember stopping at a place on my own so I could learn how to DIY. It turned out to be a sleepy little airport with a bored manager who came out and started fueling the plane for me while it was at the self-serve pump. I had to stop him and explain that I wanted to do it myself. He gave me lessons, we talked for a while, then he tossed me the keys to the airport car so I could get something to eat. Good times.
 
Wow, I guess my training has been pretty good. I've done all of this except spins and actual IMC & "on top" work. Flying out of a class C to an un-towered airport for training/practice has definitely given me exposure to a little of everything. I asked about spin training, and he said that he doesn't do it anymore. I'll have to ask why (Cherokee is rated for spins). Might be an insurance thing (like can't take a buddy in the back seat during a lesson anymore either).

My list (so far) that I want to accomplish before PPL or soon after:
- Actual IMC, fly into a cloud, find way back out.
- On top, find hole, get back under and find a field to land
- Spin training (might go for basic aerobatics training soon after PPL)
- Grass field landings (we will do some when it dries out, already planned)
- Tailwheel (just sent in my app for the Joe Whitford club this week, J3 cub here I come)
- (Edit-added): Fly with another instructor. I would like to do this pre-checkride if I can. Problem is I don't want to switch planes at this time and I'm not sure if I can make it happen. Might be silly to worry about before checkride.
 
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Dealing with snow and ice. Not in flight but on the ground.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
How much snow can the typical airplane take on its wings anyway? If snow weighs 20lbs a square foot, and the wings are 16' x 3' thats 48sq ft times 20 which is rounded 1000lbs on each wing. 2000lbs for both wings. The plane weighs about 2000lbs gross weight and the wings can support the planes weight (down force). Then maybe 1' of snow is about all she can safely hold? I dunno for sure. We get as much as 30" of snow here in the past 10 years and I don't see collapsed airplanes on the ramp. Hmmm. Probably hold more than that but I think 1' is safe.

As for flying in the snow, Ive flown in the snow. So long as you can see and it isnt clinging much or building ice you can do it ok. Same with flying in the rain. You can fly in the rain.

Of course we all learned you have to rub the frost off on a frosty morning, right?
 
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I won't take off with ANY snow on my wings. Why would you? If you're on the ground, clear it off in case it stays put and ruins the lift you're supposed to be generating.

If you're asking how much can it hold while it's parked uncovered at an airport, I would imagine you can look up your wing loading factors for your plane and determine a rough guess as to how much weight it can take. Depends on if the tanks are full or empty probably and whatever other conditions apply.

This past winter, as I was basically finished with my PPL and waiting on DPE/my schedule to marry up, we would heat the planes up in the hangar, wipe the entire plane down to ensure there was no ice/snow before even pulling it out to begin the lesson or flight. Those were valuable lessons.

I second learning how to completely self-serve by towing and fueling on your own (not just doing it with your CFI, but completely on your own). I do wish I had spin training but I'll seek it out on my own. Otherwise I wish I learned more about how the plane would feel with more weight/passengers. Also agree that, having done my training at a non-towered airport that I had at least started up and contacted ground at a Class C. I did land at one, drop my instructor off, and do some patterns before picking him back up at an FBO, but tower had me just stay on frequency the whole time.

Lastly, I also hate the "any traffic please advise" call at a non-towered field. I've been at my airport with jets and they monitor the CTAF still. If a guy is going to wait until he is 3 miles out to make his first call then he's probably not going to respond to a generic "please advise" call either. It seems like a calculated risk of flying a jet into a non-towered field to me. You're going to be moving relatively fast through that potentially busy airspace, which is why all pilots should make the appropriate calls and "please advise" is not one of them.
 
The other thing about snow is snow plows plow the snow and leave ridges here and there. Those ridges can freeze and become a hazard for a small plane that is taxiing. Dont just bash through a frozen ridge. You might have to stop, get out and kick the ice out so your wheels can pass through it because you cant make it over it at all at very slow taxi speed and you might break something if you take a run at it.
 
coloradobluesky said:
How much snow can the typical airplane take on its wings anyway? If snow weighs 20lbs a square foot, and the wings are 16' x 3' thats 48sq ft times 20 which is rounded 1000lbs on each wing. 2000lbs for both wings. The plane weighs about 2000lbs gross weight and the wings can support the planes weight (down force). Then maybe 1' of snow is about all she can safely hold? I dunno for sure. We get as much as 30" of snow here in the past 10 years and I don't see collapsed airplanes on the ramp. Hmmm. Probably hold more than that but I think 1' is safe.

As for flying in the snow, Ive flown in the snow. So long as you can see and it isnt clinging much or building ice you can do it ok. Same with flying in the rain. You can fly in the rain.

Of course we all learned you have to rub the frost off on a frosty morning, right?
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The guidance has changed on frost. Now we aren't supposed to fly with any frost on aerodynamic surfaces.

As for snow weight remember that water weighs 8.33 pounds/gallon. If you've got 20 pounds of snow per square foot then that's about 2.5 gallons of water. How much snow does 2.5 gallons of water make?
 
coloradobluesky said:
The other thing about snow is snow plows plow the snow and leave ridges here and there. Those ridges can freeze and become a hazard for a small plane that is taxiing. Dont just bash through a frozen ridge. You might have to stop, get out and kick the ice out so your wheels can pass through it because you cant make it over it at all at very slow taxi speed and you might break something if you take a run at it.
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Don't forget your pants. If you're operating on a warm winter day and the tarmac/runway is snow packed and slushy in areas, it might behoove you to do a quick touchn'go to break things apart, lest you be in for a surprise when you set down.
 
coloradobluesky said:
The other thing about snow is snow plows plow the snow and leave ridges here and there. Those ridges can freeze and become a hazard for a small plane that is taxiing. Dont just bash through a frozen ridge. You might have to stop, get out and kick the ice out so your wheels can pass through it because you cant make it over it at all at very slow taxi speed and you might break something if you take a run at it.
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Shop near me had a buetiful Mooney Acclaim with a high end custom paint job that bent his wing tip badly on a snow bank a few years back. So for us low wing flyers yet another issue to watch out for.

I actually trained a day after a snow storm during my PPL. CFI basically told me runway is going to be slushy and wet as long as you have plenty of runway plan on doing a short field landing and just don' t touch the brakes once down. Use every inch of blacktop you safely have.

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk
 
coloradobluesky said:
How much snow can the typical airplane take on its wings anyway? If snow weighs 20lbs a square foot, and the wings are 16' x 3' thats 48sq ft times 20 which is rounded 1000lbs on each wing. 2000lbs for both wings. The plane weighs about 2000lbs gross weight and the wings can support the planes weight (down force). Then maybe 1' of snow is about all she can safely hold? I dunno for sure. We get as much as 30" of snow here in the past 10 years and I don't see collapsed airplanes on the ramp. Hmmm. Probably hold more than that but I think 1' is safe.

As for flying in the snow, Ive flown in the snow. So long as you can see and it isnt clinging much or building ice you can do it ok. Same with flying in the rain. You can fly in the rain.

Of course we all learned you have to rub the frost off on a frosty morning, right?
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Snow on top of the wing would translate to negative G'S. Don't forget to multiply the weight of the snow by that number G's its certified for.
 
Stuff simply comes from experience, too: Landing on that rwy that's patchy with soft snow, getting a bite to eat, and later realizing that the temps dropped one or two degrees during that burger stop and all that slush has now frozen.

There's no reason that any of the above mentioned items can't be done during training. All you have to do is ask your CFI. And it's called a "license to learn", so even after you finish that checkride there's no reason not to grab a CFI for extra lessons.
 
coloradobluesky said:
How much snow can the typical airplane take on its wings anyway?
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Depends... if you are in Russia quite a bit (I'm sure there is a Vodka or "in Russian..." joke in there somewhere)

jordane93 said:
Taking off with contaminated wings is a very bad idea.
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That's what I always thought too.. mind you, the snow on that wing doesn't look like light powdery stuff either, it seems relatively wet and heavy. Even after TO you see some snow on the wings and flaps

 
Skates97 said:
One thing I would have liked to have covered is how to properly tie down the plane with chains. (Depending on the size of the links/hooks and the tie-downs on the plane it can be a little tricky). I watched a few youtube videos on it prior to my first XC after getting my PPL when I was going to be parking the plane overnight.
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What was your solution?

I carry a carabiner to allow using a chain with my tail tie-down, but haven't had to use it yet as chains seem to be uncommon east of the Rockies.
 
NoHeat said:
I carry a carabiner
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That's a great idea... I am going to toss a few in my flying bag. The club here has chains but there are multiple hooks on it, so you can hook the pane and use the other hooks to "tighten" the chain as necessary

I used to dislike chains, but found that most people did not have good rope tying skills, so the chains with the hooks seem like a better option? For ropes I've seen loose single loops that won't do anything in a wind storm to quadruple knots that took a little time to untie
 
Kritchlow said:
I was thinking he meant while parked on the ramp how much snow before the structure nay fail.
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A lot I would bet.

cessna-men-on-wing.jpg
 
I never did like using chains. They have no give to them. A rope will stretch a little when winds pick up but chains won't. Maybe it doesn't make much difference, but I still prefer ropes.
 
Tie-down hitch.
Backing plane into hanger unassisted.
Fueling the plane.
 
Everyone says spins, but the owner of the rental isn't going to want to replace gyros and most of the rentals can't be caged. Like everyone else, I did spins post PPL, except I was lucky and got my time in a Pitts with 3 hours ground and 1.5 in the air (first time wearing a parachute as well).
 
I'm going to go with self-fueling, although I'm not sure that was common back then. I can't remember seeing a self-fueling station for quite a long time after I got my private.
 
I'm with the OP, I've never done a spin and would like some training. Also, I wish my instructors would have had me call flight service more and actually file flight plans. To this day, I don't know if I could file and open a VFR filght plan. I'm getting more experience with flight following but still not comfortable with flight plans.
 
jordane93 said:
I do that all the time with my students, especially when we practice electrical fires. Avionics go off, master switch goes off and we land at a non towered airport then turn everything back on.
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If a CFI or CFII suggested or tried to turned off the plane like this while I was in it they would be fired as soon as we got back to the ramp.
 
Let's see. Things that should be taught that I *did* do during PP training:

1) Actual IMC. Whole different ball o' wax than the hood. Disorientation was very strong the first time. Luckily, actual is not in short supply here in WI and I had an excellent instructor who was willing to do actual with me - First actual for me was as I was ticking over 10 hours. On a later flight, when I shut down, he said "Congratulations, you now have more actual than I did when I got my instrument rating."
2) Landing at unpaved fields. It's really pretty easy, but I think a lot of people are afraid of it at first, and I think a lot of people discount all of the good unpaved possibilities when they're required to land in an emergency.
3) Aborted takeoffs. This wasn't so much something that was specifically taught, but I got the "opportunity" when we had a tire go flat during a T&G. I felt an unusual vibration and pulled the throttle back, and felt it pulling to one side when I slowed down.
4) Experienced lots of different airspace. Trained at a C, but did TRSA, D, and plenty of uncontrolled fields.

BTW, all of the above was in just 42.6 hours, so I don't think any of those things really take extra time - You just have to actually do them.

Things that should be taught that I didn't do during PP training:

1) Fueling an airplane at a self-serve pump. With the number of accidents caused by people running out of gas, this ought to be required. I think late at night a lot of people decide to stretch to make it home rather than stop at a self-serve pump simply because it's not in their comfort zone and they don't know how to do it. Required training here would be very beneficial.
2) Flying in legal but less-than-ideal weather. I went flying in soupy 4-5 mile vis a few months after getting my Private, and it was a real eye-opener. I'm normally the first person in the plane to spot traffic, but on that day I got a traffic call from ATC for a plane 1/2 mile off my wing at the same altitude and never saw him. These days, I'd be going IFR in those conditions.
3) Going for a $100 hamburger. New pilots don't know the ins and outs of non-flight school FBOs, courtesy cars and the etiquette involved with them, etc. so it's not in their comfort zone to do something like this right off the bat. I think it'd be a great help to GA if we taught people what they need to know to both use and have fun with GA after they're done with their certificate.
 
citizen5000 said:
If a CFI or CFII suggested or tried to turned off the plane like this while I was in it they would be fired as soon as we got back to the ramp.
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Why?

Anything you really need will come right back on when you turn the master back on... And it's not really good enough to just go through the motions. You'll react how you've trained and practiced when it really happens, so best to actually flip the switch when the checklist says to do so.
 
lancie00 said:
I'm with the OP, I've never done a spin and would like some training. Also, I wish my instructors would have had me call flight service more and actually file flight plans. To this day, I don't know if I could file and open a VFR filght plan. I'm getting more experience with flight following but still not comfortable with flight plans.
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You have a computer? Go set yourself up an account here: https://www.1800wxbrief.com
You can make templates and it'll fill in most of what you need for you every time. You can use that web site to put it in the system, then just call them on the phone to activate and again to close.(if you don't have a device with internet that you carry with you, if you do then you can even activate and close electronically)
 
I did spins. Went up in a Decathlon with an acrobatic instructor. It was fun. We went through some other maneuvers first, to get a feel of the plane and to see if the student (me) was going to get motion sick. I don't. We had extra time since I didn't have to recover at any point from motion sensitivity, so we did a couple of aileron rolls. :cool:

Didn't learn much about traveling other than the basic flight planning. Nothing about crew cars, self-serve fueling and more. Found out about ramp fees, parking fees and more on my own on forums such as this. I thought about flight lessons back in the early/mid 80's in college, but being a poor college student I decided that wasn't a great use of my limited dollars. Can't imagine figuring all that out back then.

I learned not long after getting my PPL about why more cruise speed is a good thing. We had headwinds up to 50 knots on the way home. Kinda painful watching traffic on the Interstate pass you. :( Percentage of speed impact.

I also learned soon after the PPL that an instrument rating is very beneficial for traveling. Didn't get stuck anywhere, but had to delay a day trip with the family two or three times for very benign weather. On the day of the 2nd or 3rd cancellation I walked back into the club/flight school and found an instructor and asked if he was busy that afternoon because I was going to start my instrument training now. He had open time so I started that afternoon. We've made plenty of flights that would have been hard, risky or impossible flying VFR. Often in nice sunny skies above the cloud layer. :D
 
flyingcheesehead said:
Why?
Anything you really need will come right back on when you turn the master back on...
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There is never a need to kill an entire panel or an engine in the air during training. Pulling a breaker to simulate a partial panel loss is okay, but there is no guarantee a full panel kill will be benign.

The Instrument Checkride PTS for example: "When flight TASKS are accomplished in an aircraft, certain TASK elements may be accomplished through “simulated” actions in the interest of safety and practicality..." "For example, when in an aircraft, a simulated engine fire may be addressed by retarding the throttle to idle, simulating the shutdown of the engine, simulating the discharge of the fire suppression agent, if applicable, simulating the disconnection of associated electrical, hydraulic, and pneumatics systems."
 
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