Scudrunners

[quote]pilots getting upgrading training had no idea what the rudders were used for.[/quote]

Aviation in the 21st Century, Chuck.

Try not to hurt their feelings.

[quote author=Chuck Ellsworth link=topic=9454.msg26451#msg26451 date=1547841536]
Most of the PPL and commercial pilots I pilots  did upgrading training with had no idea what the rudders were used for.
[/quote]
The vast majority that I train nowadays are decent but could use the occasional reminder to get the ball back in the centre.  Then there’s the rare outliers like a guy last year who couldn’t coordinate the plane to save his life, or at least not to save his job.  I’d never seen anything like it, totally oblivious to a slip so steep I’m not sure I could do it myself.

I remember, a few years back, a young fellow failed
his initial class 4 instructor ride because he couldn’t
use the rudder pedals.  I have no idea how he passed
his PPL and CPL.

He wasn’t a bad guy, or stupid.  Simply, no one had
ever taught him how to use the rudder pedals.

So, I took him up in the Maule, which is far less forgiving
than I am, and we did some rolls around a point and
some falling leaf stalls.

Then we jumped into a 172 and did some more rolls
around a point, and some more falling leaf stalls.

Sent him back home, he passed his class 4 ride, then
I heard he was a class one / CFI at an FTU.  I’m sure
he’s flying for an airline now.  They all are.

PS Given the above, you can see why TC is so strongly
opposed to me instructing.  Can’t have that sort of
thing going on.  Arlo Speer and Joe Schwantz can't
stand competent pilots.

[quote]A good instructor should be able to impress the importance of basic flying skills upon their students[/quote]

Yes, but these days people have difficulty finding instruction.  It's nearly
impossible to find [u]good[/u] instruction, so count on people being taught horribly.


[quote]as for radios, there's a priority to be understood[/quote]

Evidence would suggest it is not.


[quote]If you don't suck at landing a trike you should be able to switch to tailwheel with little fuss[/quote]

That's what ShinySideUp thought, but see my point about about shitty instruction
being the norm.  Since tailwheel trainers tolerate being landed in a crab, that's
what pilots do, and when they jump into a taildragger, hilarity results, because
it will tolerate NO CRAB at touchdown, at least on dry pavement, which is what
pilots oddly prefer but is often death for a taildragger, which vastly prefers a
so-called "contaminated" runway (the horror).

tl;dr  Fly a Boeing different from a Piper Cub

Here's a taildragger landing tip from someone who isn't allowed to instruct in
Canada any more ...

Ever note that when you touch down in a taildragger, you always end up taking
a run at the right side of the runway?  Ever wonder why?

I spent many years watching people teach themselves to fly tailwheel, and the
normal sequence of events was that they would get behind the airplane (surprise!)
and flare rapidly right before touchdown.

Doing anything rapid in an airplane is generally not a good idea.

In this case, the rapid flare is a pitch up, which pushes the prop disc up from the
bottom, resulting in a yaw right because the prop spins clockwise, viewed from
behind.  90 degree lag in gyro precession, remember.

This kind of pitch-yaw coupling can really make a neophyte taildragger pilot's
life difficult.  Best if you can avoid creating problems to solve.

In this case, the aircraft yaws right immediately before touchdown, and off
to the right side of the runway you go.  Better get on the rudder pedals in a
most skillful and immediate manner.

Suggestion, from a shitty & stupid pilot: flare a taildragger slowly, to give
yourself time to feed in the left rudder, and touch down perfectly aligned
with the direction of travel of the taildragger.

Secret:  if you touch down a taildragger perfectly aligned with the direction
of travel, and if the undercarriage is not bent (which it often is from previous
undocumented groundloops) it will continue travelling straight down the
runway with absolutely no rudder input from the pilot.  It is not stable by
any means, but it will stay there, like a connecting rod at TDC with 80 PSI
on it during a leakdown test.

Or, if you're a Good Canadian, you should listen more to Justin Trudeau
about PeopleKind and ignore all of the technical stuff above:

[img width=500 height=375]https://static.independent.co.uk/s3fs-p ... crying.jpg[/img]

[quote]John Patrick McEnroe Jr. (born February 16, 1959) is an American retired tennis player, often considered among the greatest in the history of the sport.

McEnroe attained the No. 1 ranking in both singles and doubles, finishing his career with 77 singles and 78 doubles titles; this remains the highest men's combined total of the Open Era. He won seven Grand Slam (also referred to as Majors) single titles, including four US Open titles and three Wimbledon titles, and added nine men's Grand Slam doubles titles. His singles match record of 82–3 in 1984 remains the best single season win rate of the Open Era.

McEnroe also excelled at the year-end tournaments, winning eight singles and seven doubles titles, both of which are records. Three of his winning singles year-end championships were at the Masters Grand Prix (the ATP year-end event) and five were at the World Championship Tennis (WCT) Finals, an event which ended in 1989. Since 2000, there has been only one year-end men's singles event, the ATP Finals (the new name for the Masters Grand Prix). He was named the ATP Player of the Year and the ITF World Champion three times each: 1981, 1983 and 1984.

McEnroe contributed to five Davis Cup titles for the U.S. and later served as team captain. He has stayed active in retirement, often competing in senior events on the ATP Champions Tour. For many years he has also worked as a television commentator during the majors.[/quote]

Damn you are up early Colonel

Quiet hands and feet is one of the secretes that never seems to be drilled into initial training. I get exhausted just watching. It has turned into busy hands and lazy feet, I sit back and watch the video game, particularly ailerons, it's a wonder the aeroplane doesn't ejaculate.

For the most part schools are geared up to churn out commercial pilots. They are in a hurry and just want that job so they can find a flight attendant, get married and not necessarily in that order. I pity guys who start out who are engaged or married, most of them are fucked up from the start -- haha.

They don't take time to enjoy themselves, experience flying in the "raw". It's changed from the past where most we flying because they got the bug. It's now turning into just another job where you are pissed off most of the time, worried more about time off, pay, seniority list, holidays and not enjoying going to work. It has just become a job and nothing else.

Time will march on and ironically it will eventually be only the hobbyist left. Computers will be doing all of it and the need for pilots will diminish to the point that they would not have the skills to take over and fly anyway. With the miniaturization of powerful computers they will be able build in enough redundancy that will far surpass the skill and ability of any human. They would be emergency links to "ground pilot" who could give any human response input needed but that would only be a feel good thing for the customers. Lets face it we are in a dying industry and I wonder what happens when automation takes over everything. I guess I'm going out and buying my Beemer M2 competition very soon. I still plan to drift into the MTO parking lot when I turn 80 and need that drivers ed. My only bitch is I might be driving an automatic transmission by then. Damn -- will I ever get a sequential gearbox.   

As a foot note - right now it's a lovely -39 here, one more degree and no conversion necessary -- my kind of day -- haha

I like what the colonel says, look outside. In addition to that , I like folks to call in more than 3 miles out, and if you think about it, 3 to 5  mins back  would be 6 to 10 miles  miles in lotsa planes. that gives time to sort out who is where in the circuit, what their plans are, and if there are others in bound they can chime in too. Being a bit further away means that other nearby inbounds have a bit of spacing, but as we all get closer (cause just about everybody is flying the gps line) we all get closer together.. Looking for airplanes a few miles from me    does not do me much good anymore, cause i dont see other airplanes as well as i used to , glasses or no glasses...
look outside, chat when you can (after listening for a bit!)

[quote]right now it's a lovely -39 here[/quote]

Jesus!  That's insane Cold Lake wx ... where I am from, and will never return.

Son Eric is skiing in Tahoe this weekend:

[img width=500 height=375][/img]

What's all that white stuff, on the ground?

I'm babysitting Eric's dog Dennis (named for K&R C) this MLK weekend.  Took
him for a walk this morning.  I love his expression, in front of the neighbor's
orange tree:

[img width=375 height=500][/img]

[quote]Damn you are up early Colonel[/quote]

Early bird gets wormed.  And three dogs don't let you sleep in  :)

[quote]Quiet hands and feet[/quote]

Less is more, LC.  One of the aviation lessons, lost to antiquity.

[quote]They don't take time to enjoy themselves, experience flying in the "raw"[/quote]

We have a very different aviation experience than the youngsters.  Makes
me sad.  Kids don't get to have fun any more.  I am happy that the statute
of limitations has run out on all the fun I had, growing up.

[img width=500 height=218][/img]

That's me in 1980.  Edelbrock intake and Holley carburetor and headers
with 2.5 inch exhaust on the 350 V-8.  I found a route to take to high school,
I could touch 120 mph indicated every day.  When I pulled the heads for a
valve job, the old guy at the machine shop was amazed - he said he'd never
seen a set of heads come in for a rebuild with no carbon in them (!)

I won't talk about what I used to do, in airplanes.  Maybe in a few years.

A nice high school song for you:

[quote]Kids don't get to have fun any more[/quote]

Ok, maybe one story, now that I'm not allowed to hold an instructor
rating any more.

My friend Bobby (on the subject of stories I can't tell ...) landed and
taxiied up in his 150hp Citabria to my hangar.  We were talking, and
I told son Eric (age 15),

"Hey kid, why don't you take the Citabria up?"

Bobby thought it was a grand idea.  Eric of course was solo on the
Maule at age 14, but didn't know a goddamned thing about the
Citabria.  But he climbed in, I showed him how to start it (often the
hardest thing in aviation) and off he went, flying solo for the first
time in a new type.  At age 15.

Took a photo when he landed.  Check out that fucking grin:

[img width=500 height=371][/img]

There's a reason Fern Villeneuve, after watching Eric fly, said
"He's so far ahead of everyone else".

Not everyone approved of my parenting.  Had Children's Aid called
on me.  Twice.

Oh yeah, got him riding a dirtbike at a very young age.  His mother
thought that was a fabulous idea.  NOT.  But by the time he was 16,
and started riding on the road, he had nearly 10 years of riding experience
which is the key to safety.  He effortlessly rides a literbike these days,
and that's why.

Jesus.  A few weeks back, he was on the CBR1000RR and I was on
the RC51 on Lawrence.  Both have Yoshi pipes.  Deep into three digits. 
Must have sounded orgasmic.

I used to be the throttle guy for Bobby's Poker Run boat.  A 46 foot
catamaran with two enormous engines.  Here we are, carefully
observing the 10 kph speed limit sign under the bridge:

[img width=500 height=375][/img]

Talk about orgasmic sounds. It went fast enough that people
complained they couldn't breathe.  The dirt guy, Tomlinson, had
the same boat with lighter turbines.

https://speedonthewater.com/in-the-news ... 24-mph-run

224 MPH on the water might not be very fast for most guys here,
but I can assure you, it's extremely dangerous.