"G. Sylvester" wrote in message
...
A month or two ago there was a thread about CDI indicating north/south
vs. left/right in particular on front course and back course LOC.
I'm studying for the IFR written and not in a single place
does the FAA use north/south. Again I'm banging my head
wondering does a lowly IFR student like me have to scream
learn the wrong way. Further they have questions about MLS approaches?
Has anyone ever flown one or even seen one? I don't
even know what equipment is required for one. A historical
note about this, the founders of the company I work for
were (partial?) inventers of the MLS back in I think the 1940's
or early 50's. One of the brothers (Sig Varian, I think) was a
pilot for a major but ended up biting it while
landing in Mexico at night. He intended to land on
the beach but ended up putting it in the drink.


Give the FAA the FAA answer to the FAA question. If given the FAA question
of "where is the sunrise first seen?" you should answer whatever the FAA
wants to hear, "east, west, left, or magenta." The written test isn't about
testing the thoroughness of your preparation, it's about following
directions. The checkride is the test of your preparations.

Don't confuse real life and FAA written tests. It matters not if you are
right or if telling the FAA the wrong answer they want to hear will corrupt
Western Civilization, it's a fool's errand to argue with them about the
question during or just after test prep. If your score is signicantly
affected by the few bogus questions on the test, you have bigger problems.

Cheer up, at least as much of my FAA mechanic tests concerned WWII radial
engines as turbines or modern recips. Hell, they may have even been a
question about Doppler or Omega on some test I took.

Here's my sure fire method for passing any FAA test. Buy the book with only
the Q&A. Read each Q, highlight each FAA desired answer. After you have
read each question and read only the highlighted answer, go take the test.
Depending on your reading speed, attention span, and the endurance of your
butt, you should be ready for the test in a day or two. You won't know a
damn thing about flying airplanes from doing this but you will get a good
score and not waste anymore time on their silly test. Spend the time you
saved actually learning the subjects and practicing the skills.

The single worst way to pass any FAA test, is to prepare for real-life
flying and then walk in and see the questions for the first time when it
counts. We taxpayers have spent much money collecting all the legally
allowable questions, and many hard-working publishers have spent much time
printing the answers to those out of date questions. Why ignore their
effort?

If you go to one of those expensive ground school courses like my previous
employer produces you will learn a couple of tricks to let you breeze
through the long and tedious questions and the rest of the time will be
essentially "here's the question and this is the answer." The vast majority
of customers promptly pass the test and hardly any of them ever confuse the
written test for real life.

--

Scott