Help me clear up my brain fart

Steve,

Thank you for taking time to write such a long and excellent post. I'm used
to all sorts wacky opinions and divergent viewpoints in these newsgroups but
the near unanimous position that I'm a dangerous nut because I look at my
gauges while flying was startling. I asked the question in the Pilot
Techniques Forum at Cessna Pilots Association where I spend a lot of time
and the unanimous position there backed up my view point. Interesting
cultural difference. A fellow who teaches seminars for advanced pilots
said, "Relying on the sight picture ONLY and not glancing at the airspeed
has resulted in many a flatlander stalling on final at a high altitude
airport. Airspeed, airspeed, airspeed."

I would hate to thing that a student pilot, perhaps not getting the best of
instruction, would look at the consensus of lot of high time pilots here and
decide that he should stop looking at his gauges as opposed to properly
integrating no panel flying into his training.

Let's see if we can get anyone to take you up on your bet

--
Roger Long

"Roger Long" om wrote in
message ...
[...] I asked the question in the Pilot
Techniques Forum at Cessna Pilots Association where I spend a lot of time
and the unanimous position there backed up my view point. Interesting
cultural difference. A fellow who teaches seminars for advanced pilots
said, "Relying on the sight picture ONLY and not glancing at the airspeed
has resulted in many a flatlander stalling on final at a high altitude
airport. Airspeed, airspeed, airspeed."

No one here is proposing one rely ONLY on the sight picture. I made it very
clear that one needs to pay attention to the other sensory input. In
particular, engine and airstream noise along with control feel are very
important and clear indications of airspeed. If all else fails, you have a
stall warning indicator (on any reasonably "modern" airplane), but it really
shouldn't get that far.

The sight picture is useful only for airplane attitude information and for
that, is only completely accurate in unaccelerated flight (though it's still
useful in accelerated flight).

I am always amused when someone takes a debate from one forum, claims to
have posed it in another forum and then comes back and says "well, at least
*those* guys agree 100% with me". It is almost never the case that a) the
nature of the debate was actually conveyed accurately, and b) that the
support in the other forum is as unanimous as claimed (unless the
information posed in the other forum was SO skewed as to be absurdly and
obviously wrong).

Steve's post also demonstrates a sad misinterpretation of the debate at
hand. He's obviously a bit touchy about the subject and is taking things
personally. No one is claiming that he isn't a good pilot just because he
wants to use "new-fangled" inventions, nor is this debate anything like the
"tricycle vs conventional" stuffed-shirt crap. He's getting his ego bent
out of shape for no reason at all.

No one is suggesting that aircraft instruments should be ignored. But to
claim that during VFR flight, the aircraft's instruments deserve anywhere
close to 50% of your attention is just plain absurd. Yes, pilots need to
"divide their time properly to looking at the panel and out the window".
But "divide their time properly" means the vast majority of time is spent
looking OUTSIDE. And those instruments are NOT the primary reference for
maneuvering, not even close.

Pete

Well, now you're doing it. I never said 50%. Dividing time properly could
be 5% / 95% or even 1% / 99%

Anyway, we've had fun. I think we all know where we stand.

Excuse me, gotta go check my airspeed

--
Roger Long

Peter Duniho wrote in message
...
"Roger Long" om wrote
in
message ...
[...] I asked the question in the Pilot
Techniques Forum at Cessna Pilots Association where I spend a lot of
time
and the unanimous position there backed up my view point. Interesting
cultural difference. A fellow who teaches seminars for advanced pilots
said, "Relying on the sight picture ONLY and not glancing at the
airspeed
has resulted in many a flatlander stalling on final at a high altitude
airport. Airspeed, airspeed, airspeed."

No one here is proposing one rely ONLY on the sight picture. I made it
very
clear that one needs to pay attention to the other sensory input. In
particular, engine and airstream noise along with control feel are very
important and clear indications of airspeed. If all else fails, you have
a
stall warning indicator (on any reasonably "modern" airplane), but it
really
shouldn't get that far.

The sight picture is useful only for airplane attitude information and for
that, is only completely accurate in unaccelerated flight (though it's
still
useful in accelerated flight).

I am always amused when someone takes a debate from one forum, claims to
have posed it in another forum and then comes back and says "well, at
least
*those* guys agree 100% with me". It is almost never the case that a) the
nature of the debate was actually conveyed accurately, and b) that the
support in the other forum is as unanimous as claimed (unless the
information posed in the other forum was SO skewed as to be absurdly and
obviously wrong).

Steve's post also demonstrates a sad misinterpretation of the debate at
hand. He's obviously a bit touchy about the subject and is taking things
personally. No one is claiming that he isn't a good pilot just because he
wants to use "new-fangled" inventions, nor is this debate anything like
the
"tricycle vs conventional" stuffed-shirt crap. He's getting his ego bent
out of shape for no reason at all.

No one is suggesting that aircraft instruments should be ignored. But to
claim that during VFR flight, the aircraft's instruments deserve anywhere
close to 50% of your attention is just plain absurd. Yes, pilots need to
"divide their time properly to looking at the panel and out the window".
But "divide their time properly" means the vast majority of time is spent
looking OUTSIDE. And those instruments are NOT the primary reference for
maneuvering, not even close.

Pete

"Roger Long" om wrote in
message .. .
Well, now you're doing it. I never said 50%. Dividing time properly
could
be 5% / 95% or even 1% / 99%

You're right. That figure was simply an example, my interpretation of more
general and vague comments.

But the actual figure doesn't matter that much. IMHO, any non-zero amount
of time spent watching the instruments while making a downwind-to-base or
base-to-final turn while in the pattern is too much time. That's for any
kind of turn, but becomes especially true in the overshoot case.
Transitioning to instrument flight (as your original post suggested) while
attempting to reintercept final approach in a VFR pattern is just plain
wrong.

Pete

The instruments may well be a VFR crutch. This all started by my suggesting
that pilots who are still at the stage where they need a crutch sometimes,
make use of it when they've gotten in a situation where many pilots have
screwed up. Since we are clarifying, I was didn't mean to say (although it
wasn't my best and clearest piece of newsgroup banter) that they should
transition to the instruments and use them to fly through the turn, just
that it would be a good time to check that were still comfortably within the
envelope.

While the underlying cause may well have been lack of proper training or
proficiency, there are certainly a lot of pilots who wish they had checked
their airspeed during their last base to final turn. I wish we could hear
from them but their computer access is kinda blocked right now....

--
Roger Long

Peter Duniho wrote in message
...
"Roger Long" om wrote
in
message .. .
Well, now you're doing it. I never said 50%. Dividing time properly
could
be 5% / 95% or even 1% / 99%

You're right. That figure was simply an example, my interpretation of
more
general and vague comments.

But the actual figure doesn't matter that much. IMHO, any non-zero amount
of time spent watching the instruments while making a downwind-to-base or
base-to-final turn while in the pattern is too much time. That's for any
kind of turn, but becomes especially true in the overshoot case.
Transitioning to instrument flight (as your original post suggested) while
attempting to reintercept final approach in a VFR pattern is just plain
wrong.

Pete