Thomas Borchert wrote in message ...
Michael,
It's silly to give
that experience away to a gadget.

And it's less silly to die while not doing it???

(tieing threads together or branches of threads together)
Here IMO we go back to the difference between something
which is useful in a tight spot vs. a matter of life and
death

A pilot whose skills are such that not using the autopilot
is a matter of life and death is in trouble, with or without
'George'.

But if 'George' is there, in order for 'George' to be useful
in a tight spot, the pilot has to be proficient with George.
He has to know 'George's quirks, how to set George up boomboomboom
without extra brain cycles, and to what extent he can trust
George (or not). Anything less IMHO leave George out of the
picture.

Frankly, IMHO Michael contradicts another of his posts to
speak of "silly to give that experience away to a gadget".

An autopilot is just like a fancy MFD or a moving map GPS or
any other piece of cockpit equipment which can make life
easier *or* cause dependence, and the point he himself makes
in a different post applies. More equipment means more flying
to maintain proficiency with and without ALL the equipment in
the cockpit.

Personally, I look to people I respect totally from what I
know of them, and if people like my instructor and Stan Gosnell
speak of the benefits of SP autopilot use in being able to
develop and maintain a better grasp of the "big picture"
single-pilot, I'm listening. I've never seen the Richard
Collins tape and I don't know anything about him personally,
not meaning to 'dis' him, he's just not on my personal 'scope
and the sort of plane he flies (Cessna Truck) doesn't speak
to me.

BTW I speak of "tight spot" rather than "emergency" quite
deliberately because IMHO many (most?) abnormal situations
never become emergencies because of the quality of the choices
the pilot(s) make. We've been in 4-5 what I consider "tight
spots" which could easily have become emergencies and 0
emergencies so far, partly through luck partly through our
choices. And the quality of choices directly depends on the
quality of the "big picture" the pilot is able to maintain.

Anyone who thinks they can maintain the same quality of "big
picture" single-pilot while hand flying 100% of the time
as they could if they let 'George' take it judiciously,
I think is kidding themselves (or maybe handling a Flying Truck).
Just like anyone who thinks a cell phone ought to be a higher
priority than a GPS for in-flight emergency use (*g*) but
again that's their issue.

Cheers,
Sydney