Proper Instrument Scan

Jaybird180

Jaybird180

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Jaybird180
How do you (if you are a CFI) know that your student knows how to interpret instruments properly? Seems pretty basic, right? Demonstration should solve it, but can you be fooled?

For example, the typical kid who has several hundred hours on PC Sims - he knows what all the instruments do.
Do you have to "teach" him to read the instruments?
What bad habits do you have to help him break in PPL training?
What about when he becomes your instrument student?
If he somehow manages to squeeze past another CFI (not you) and a DPE and get his PPL, how do you demonstrate to your new IR trainee a need for better scan technique - really convince him?
What is "proper scan techique" and how long does it take to learn the new scanning paradigm?
 
LOL ask an easy one.

There are multiple scan patterns, and several different ways of interpreting the instruments. They all work, but some work better for some people than others. In many cases I think it's a case of "try this, and try this, and try this" and the student selects what works best or makes up his own without knowing it.

As for how effective a scan is, you determine that by failing stuff and making sure that the cross-check that's part of a scan is working. You put the student in high-workload situations - a climbing turn at a specific VS, with a specific target altitude and heading. Doing this in a sim is great because it's much more effective to make an instrument give incorrect info than it is to give NO info (by covering it up in the airplane).

In my experience, by the time I was done with basic attitude flying (four fundamentals and combinations), I had a pattern down that worked. I could not, and still can't, tell you how I do it. I think I tend more towards the "Control/performance" school than the "primary/supporting" because I use the AI to put the airplane in the attitude I want and then cross check the other instruments to see how I'm doing at meeting my goal.

Edit: Now that I think about it a little more... I previously established the attitudes for that airplane for various things by trial and error using the primary/supporting method. So if I'm in a NEW (to me) airplane my scan is probably different than a familiar airplane. Example, in the 182 I know 8 degrees nose up at full power is the good initial climb or go-around attitude that gives me a good rate of climb, good forward speed, and good engine cooling.
 
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I can tell a "bad scan" right away if there is a occasional "jerking" of the airplane on any axis. This usually points to fixation on the attitude indicator.

The first thing that usually goes in a scan is heading control. This is mainly because the student doesn't believe that that the D.G. really is the best way to derive bank info and fly a precise heading. To that point, sometimes you have to bank a little to hold a heading. I usually cover all instruments except the attitude indicator and show the student that

-Just because you are wings level doesn't mean that the aircraft wont turn. You have to find the bank that hold the heading.

-Same thing with altitude, just because you are level doesn't mean you cant climb or descend. For a given power setting you have to find the pitch to hold the altitude...not to mention you can see a change coming on the VSI/AS

I really dont "scan" I kind of try and focus on a spot on the panel that lets me see more than one instrument at a time...but thats just me... I focus on D.G, Altimeter, then attitude indicator if I had to put an order to it.

Bottom line...figure out what makes you not "jerk" the airplane and constantly makes you the master of the airplane.
 
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If you can fly the airplane precisely with full panel and partial panel then you have a good scan. If you are not scanning well it will show. The instructor can offer tips but really, practice is the only way to develop a good scan.
 
Occasionally, a PoA neophyte will come aboard and post that they intend to practice with a Safety Pilot. The common advice is DON'T. The few answers above seem to conflict with that advice :stirpot:
 
Get SVT, scan learns itself in 5 minutes. Problem solved. You can casually monitor your attitude even hand flying IFR.
 
Jaybird180 said:
Occasionally, a PoA neophyte will come aboard and post that they intend to practice with a Safety Pilot. The common advice is DON'T. The few answers above seem to conflict with that advice :stirpot:
Click to expand...

Not what the OP stated or asked about here.
 
Jaybird180 said:
How do you (if you are a CFI) know that your student knows how to interpret instruments properly? Seems pretty basic, right? Demonstration should solve it, but can you be fooled?
Click to expand...
If they're performing all the tasks to standards, they must be scanning effectively -- can't do it otherwise unless they've got a bionic gyro built into their head. The real problem for the instructor is trying to figure out what they're doing wrong with they're not performing the tasks to standards. That's when the hood really gets in the way because I cannot, as I can in the sim, watch their eyes to see what they're looking at (another reason why the sim is a great teaching/learning tool).

For example, the typical kid who has several hundred hours on PC Sims - he knows what all the instruments do.
Click to expand...
Sometimes yes, sometimes no.
Do you have to "teach" him to read the instruments?
Click to expand...
Sometimes yes, sometimes no.
What bad habits do you have to help him break in PPL training?
Click to expand...
Any number of possibilities, but at the PP level, the biggest issue is usually fixation inside the cockpit.
What about when he becomes your instrument student?
Click to expand...
Folks self-taught on instruments usually lack the fundamentals of control and performance, and just flail around trying to reach the desired performance. Also, they usually lack fundamental understanding of orientation to VOR radials and how to intercept and track them smoothly with nothing but a CDI and heading data.
If he somehow manages to squeeze past another CFI (not you) and a DPE and get his PPL, how do you demonstrate to your new IR trainee a need for better scan technique - really convince him?
Click to expand...
Easy -- just let them try it their way and see if they can meet standards. After flailing around the sky for a while, they get the idea.
What is "proper scan techique"
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The one which works for that individual. Those books with diagrams with arrows from one instrument to another are worse than useless -- the trainee spends so much time trying to remember which instrument s/he's supposed to look at next, they forget what the last one told them and they're too late reading the next one.
and how long does it take to learn the new scanning paradigm?
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It usually 4-5 hours before the trainee develops a solid scanning technique. FWIW, many of my trainees have told me that during training, they had dreams at night involving my voice chanting "Scan, scan, scan, scan..." -- and said that was actually a good thing for them.
 
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Jaybird180 said:
Occasionally, a PoA neophyte will come aboard and post that they intend to practice with a Safety Pilot. The common advice is DON'T. The few answers above seem to conflict with that advice :stirpot:
Click to expand...

What are you confused about?

The only 'common advice' about not practicing with a safety pilot is that you should get some instruction first before going up with a safety pilot.
 
Jaybird180 said:
For example, the typical kid who has several hundred hours on PC Sims - he knows what all the instruments do.

What bad habits do you have to help him break in PPL training?
Click to expand...
The biggest challenge that a prospective pilot who started on PC sims has is early on in the PPL because they want to do everything on the guages. They have a more challenging time with the basic VFR look out the window/attitude flying.

Once that bad habit is broken and the PPL is achieved, going into instrument training is fairly easy.
 
TMetzinger said:
LOL ask an easy one.

There are multiple scan patterns, and several different ways of interpreting the instruments. They all work, but some work better for some people than others. In many cases I think it's a case of "try this, and try this, and try this" and the student selects what works best or makes up his own without knowing it.
Click to expand...

Tim -- read Gene Hudson's Instrument Flying Made Easy (I'd lend it to you but it's packed somewhere -- not everything has been unpacked from the hangar yet).

He provides several simple scans that work all the time, every time, are teachable, and are readily evaluated.
 
dmccormack said:
Tim -- read Gene Hudson's Instrument Flying Made Easy (I'd lend it to you but it's packed somewhere -- not everything has been unpacked from the hangar yet).

He provides several simple scans that work all the time, every time, are teachable, and are readily evaluated.
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I'll look for it... but I'm not sure it will change my mind. Machado has similar patterns, and they ARE useful, in the beginning. But a fully-developed instrument pilot goes beyond those patterns somewhere along the line and starts to see things as a gestalt, in my opinion.
 
TMetzinger said:
I'll look for it... but I'm not sure it will change my mind. Machado has similar patterns, and they ARE useful, in the beginning. But a fully-developed instrument pilot goes beyond those patterns somewhere along the line and starts to see things as a gestalt, in my opinion.
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Sure, but we're talking about teaching and diagnosing -- it won't become art until the basics are mastered.

The basics in this case is looking at, interpreting, and acting on the right instruments for the situation, and no more.
 
Fearless Tower said:
What are you confused about?

The only 'common advice' about not practicing with a safety pilot is that you should get some instruction first before going up with a safety pilot.
Click to expand...

From what I read above, it seems the trainee still has to find his/her own way. What I didn't read in the posts is what the instructor does to help guide the trainee through the trees, forest, wilderness, etc.
 
Ron Levy said:
If they're performing all the tasks to standards, they must be scanning effectively -- can't do it otherwise unless they've got a bionic gyro built into their head. The real problem for the instructor is trying to figure out what they're doing wrong with they're not performing the tasks to standards.
Click to expand...

This is where SVT revolutionizes IFR, you eliminate all of this as you eliminate the need to "scan" You have a one point graphically displayed on your surrounds vector point. You always immediately and instantly know where you're going in relationship to your surrounding at a moments sideways glance and the format is such that it represents the view that your muscle memory has train for through both nature and every moment of pilot training you have already had.

There is no more "scan" as we know it to determine situational awareness. It is one glance.

With SVT IR becomes like CFI, a bunch of ground and a couple hours in the plane to polish up your basics and get adjusted to a slightly different picture.
 
Henning said:
This is where SVT revolutionizes IFR, you eliminate all of this as you eliminate the need to "scan" You have a one point graphically displayed on your surrounds vector point. You always immediately and instantly know where you're going in relationship to your surrounding at a moments sideways glance and the format is such that it represents the view that your muscle memory has train for through both nature and every moment of pilot training you have already had.

There is no more "scan" as we know it to determine situational awareness. It is one glance.

With SVT IR becomes like CFI, a bunch of ground and a couple hours in the plane to polish up your basics and get adjusted to a slightly different picture.
Click to expand...
I must say that this post leaves me speechless.
 
Henning,

In another post I was reading of yours from 2008, you boast of learning to fly without AI, now you're sold on solid state devices(???), but I digress...
 
Jaybird180 said:
From what I read above, it seems the trainee still has to find his/her own way. What I didn't read in the posts is what the instructor does to help guide the trainee through the trees, forest, wilderness, etc.
Click to expand...
That is not what I was commenting about - I was referring to your claim that people here discourage the use of a safety pilot...where are you getting that from? I sure haven't seen it.
 
Some folks have thought it a good idea to go get a bunch of hood time with a safety pilot BEFORE working with a CFII - this is not a good idea as bad habits will be reinforced rather than corrected.

But many CFIIs I have worked with are fine with letting an instrument student practice with a safety pilot to build up the necessary hood time once the student is proficient. This doesn't happen often because most students need more than the minimum amount of instrument instruction to achieve proficiency in the first place.
 
TMetzinger said:
Some folks have thought it a good idea to go get a bunch of hood time with a safety pilot BEFORE working with a CFII - this is not a good idea as bad habits will be reinforced rather than corrected.

But many CFIIs I have worked with are fine with letting an instrument student practice with a safety pilot to build up the necessary hood time once the student is proficient. This doesn't happen often because most students need more than the minimum amount of instrument instruction to achieve proficiency in the first place.
Click to expand...
Totally agree with that, but Jay was making it sound like folks were down on safety pilots in general.
 
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