Spreadsheet for Takeoff Performance

AggieMike88

Touchdown! Greaser!
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The original "I don't know it all" of aviation.
Does anyone have a spreadsheet for calculating the take off performance info for a PA-28-161?

The FBO I'm renting from (a flight school) requires that all renters turn in a dispatch sheet to obtain the keys. Take off and landing distances are part of the data I'm required to fill out.

Currently I'm still using the chart from the copy of the FIM I purchased (but verified it's the same as the aircraft's POH). This is the one where you start with the OAT, then go up to the diagonal altitude lines, then go right to the reference line, follow downward along the takeoff weight line, then the headwind line, then get the answer on the far right showing epxected takeoff for no obstacle, or 50-foot obstacle. And then there is a similar chart for landing performance.

I'm thinking that having the spreadsheet would be much faster and a bit more accurate. I already have a sheet that takes the weather info and does the altitude, wind, and W&B calculations. I'd like to add the Take Off and Landing performance so that I can just plug in the METAR data and the sheet does all the "work" for me.

If you don't have one for the Piper, but another aircraft that I can follow along and then modify, that works too.
 
It's not a quick solution to your problem, but you may want to get the Kindle edition of this book...

http://www.amazon.com/Understanding...6798/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1327851292&sr=8-1

It has spreadsheet formulas that will allow you to do exactly what you want.

If you spend the big bucks for a hard copy, it comes with a 3.5" floppy that has the formulas.

WTF am I supposed to do with a 3.5 floppy? :dunno::dunno::dunno: You'd think they would use an SD chip. I'm supposed to pay for technical stuff from these guys?
 
WTF am I supposed to do with a 3.5 floppy? :dunno::dunno::dunno: You'd think they would use an SD chip. I'm supposed to pay for technical stuff from these guys?

No doo-doo. Back when I got my copy, I had to hunt down a computer that still had a floppy drive. Unfortunately, the book is out of print and is way overpriced for the hardcopy. That's why I recommended the Kindle copy. $20 vs up to $273. All the spreadsheet formulas are there, you just don't have them already plugged into the spreadsheets like you would with the floppy (albeit ancient media).
 
I probably have an external 3.5floppy drive, now all I need is a computer with a port for it...
 
I probably have an external 3.5floppy drive, now all I need is a computer with a port for it...

Right. A couple years ago I REALLY needed something off a floppy that someone left me before having the gall to pass away thereby removing any chance of recovering the data any other way...

... which is when I learned that for a cool $50 (!) you can buy an external USB floppy drive.
 
Just do the calculation once for max gross, hotter than anything, 50 foot obstacle and use that same number over and over (assuming it is shorter than the actual runway).
 
The decription on Amazon is that it comes with a CD-Rom (the book does). I'm sort of surprised that you couldn't download the content of the CD from McGraw-Hill.
 
Just do the calculation once for max gross, hotter than anything, 50 foot obstacle and use that same number over and over (assuming it is shorter than the actual runway).


That's what I do for the most part. Twins getting close enough where making a go/cut decision may be a reality I'll figure my distances and options more accurately.
 
I have a weight and balance spreadsheet for that aircraft. If that is helpful let me know.
 
I have a weight and balance spreadsheet for that aircraft. If that is helpful let me know.
Thanks, but already have that part figured out.

And I use Jesse's W&B Pro (with my aircraft's specific data) to double check and provide a visual.

The suggestion about using a fully loaded aircraft on a hot as blazes day with no wind will work in the mean time for the rental dispatch sheet until I puzzle out the spreadsheet.
 
No doo-doo. Back when I got my copy, I had to hunt down a computer that still had a floppy drive. Unfortunately, the book is out of print and is way overpriced for the hardcopy. That's why I recommended the Kindle copy. $20 vs up to $273. All the spreadsheet formulas are there, you just don't have them already plugged into the spreadsheets like you would with the floppy (albeit ancient media).


Did you find one in a museum somewhere?

I'm pretty sure that I have an old laptop with a 3 1/2 floppy, but it doesn't have a USB port and it would be difficult to network it. I'm not at all sure how I would move files from it to a modern PC.

BTW, 3.5 is the modern floppy drive. The first PC I ever had, ca. 1983 had two 5 1/4 floppy's with no hard drive.

The first computer I ever worked with was a PDP8 DEC. Paper tape and a MASSIVE 6.5 MB(12 bit bytes) hard drive unit that was much bigger than a large executive desk. I wrote assembly code on that monster. This was 1974.
 
Ah yes, back when people programmed on cards, and a "winchester" wasn't a rifle.

I think I have one of Grace Hopper's "nanoseconds" in my box of "don't throw this away although it has no practical value" stuff.
 
<<< Is old enough to remember playing Crystal Caves on a mainframe.
 
Ah yes, back when people programmed on cards, and a "winchester" wasn't a rifle.

I think I have one of Grace Hopper's "nanoseconds" in my box of "don't throw this away although it has no practical value" stuff.


I did some work with punch cards, but that was on a Data General Nova 1210. It was a 16 bit byte machine similar to a DEC PDP11. The PDP8 you toggled in your instructions by hand in octal, since it was an 8 bit machine. You could then dump them to paper punch tape, so next time you didn't have to toggle it in one instruction at a time.

This era predated Winchester drives by about 6 or 8 years.
 
I've still got the basic code for star trek on the TRS-80 model 1 somewhere. It runs ok on my model 100.
 
Did you find one in a museum somewhere?

I'm pretty sure that I have an old laptop with a 3 1/2 floppy, but it doesn't have a USB port and it would be difficult to network it. I'm not at all sure how I would move files from it to a modern PC.

BTW, 3.5 is the modern floppy drive. The first PC I ever had, ca. 1983 had two 5 1/4 floppy's with no hard drive.

The first computer I ever worked with was a PDP8 DEC. Paper tape and a MASSIVE 6.5 MB(12 bit bytes) hard drive unit that was much bigger than a large executive desk. I wrote assembly code on that monster. This was 1974.

Youngster!! I remember working with 8" floppies!!
 
While or before you were using 8" floppies, I was toggling instructions one at a time into a PDP8, then capturing them on paper punch tape so I didn't have to toggle them in again. I was writing assembly code for that monster. This was ca. 1974.
 
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