Flying Slow

"Jim Burns" wrote in message
...
.... and have you ever done it in an airplane without a stall warning
indicator or an airspeed indicator that drops to 0 before your wing quits
flying?

Jim

Not a big deal if you know your airplane. My butt and finger tips work
better than a stall warning or the pointer on the airspeed indicator down at
mca.


wrote in message
oups.com...
Have you ever really taken your aircraft to the bottom edges of its
flight ability and airspeed, and flown it with any degree of precision
and of more than just a few moments/minutes? Are you comfortable doing
it on the edge or nibble of a stall? Can you do it while holding
altitude and desired headings within reasonable limits - depending on
your experience?

Yep. My Tripacer.

mike regish

"Jim Burns" wrote in message
...

.... and have you ever done it in an airplane without a stall warning
indicator or an airspeed indicator that drops to 0 before your wing quits
flying?

Jim

wrote in message
oups.com...
Have you ever really taken your aircraft to the bottom edges of its
flight ability and airspeed, and flown it with any degree of precision
and of more than just a few moments/minutes? Are you comfortable doing
it on the edge or nibble of a stall? Can you do it while holding
altitude and desired headings within reasonable limits - depending on
your experience?
When is the last time you did it just to sharpen your skills without
prompting by a CFI in the next seat? When is the last time you spent
some diligent time doing stalls and the full range of them with your
aircraft? Are you honestly comfortable with your abilities? I know I
have to think about it every time I go fly and always find some fault
with my performance.
In a previous post it appeared I aggravated some pilots or CFI's with
saying I felt many pilots didn't know how to fly slowly these days. I
have seen a slow errosion of what used to be basic pilot skills and
level of performance with too many pilots compared with acceptable
standards not that many years ago. Now if that won't open a bucket of
worms I'll be surprised.
Fact is, just making the FAA minimums doesn't necessarily make you
safe
or even a good pilot.
Care to weigh in on the issues?
I'll be polite in my responses in accordance to the way they are
presented to me. No axe to grind, no ego to inflate (its big enough
already thank you) just a sincere desire to make pilots think a little
more about what they are doing when they go flying. You need to make
your own mistakes to hopefully learn from them and avoid repetition.
Ol Shy & Bashful

I would not have posted in this thread had you not referenced the other
thread peripherally in your comments.

Your points are well taken, and have validity. It's true that there are
many pilots out here who don't spend nearly enough time in the left
corner of the envelope, and doing so would make them much safer pilots.
I see only one difference between my approach to flying and what you
have stated here.
I have a problem with your sentence as follows;
"You need to make your own mistakes to hopefully learn from them and
avoid repetition."
In my end of the business thinking like this will kill you.
It's for this reason that I never taught my students, both primary and
aerobatic, to think this way.
Although it's fine to learn from a mistake, and by all means, pilots
should learn from mistakes if they live through that mistake, but my
thinking on this leans heavily toward the prevention of mistakes, rather
than learning from them.
Most good pilots I know have no problem understanding that time spent in
the left corner is time well spent, and most CFI's doing the job
properly spend plenty of time exploring slow flight and flight at and
near CLmax with their students. This is especially true of aerobatic
instructors.
Plainly put, if instructors are not doing this, they are not doing the
job properly.
It behooves all pilots to stay current by practicing flight in the left
corner, and what you have said about that is highly relevant to flight
safety.
Dudley Henriques
International Fighter Pilots Fellowship
Commercial Pilot/CFI Retired
for private email; make necessary changes between ( )
dhenriques(at)(delete all this)earthlink(dot)net

Dudley
Thank you for your reply. On the issue of making mistakes....if a pilot
never makes one, what have they learned that will take care of them
when the inevitable mistake occurs?
Certainly our goal is to show pilots how to avoid mistakes but I can't
divorce myself from the knowledge I learned from all those I have made.
How to get out again safely is the goal isn't it?
Cheers
Rocky

wrote in message
oups.com...
Dudley
Thank you for your reply. On the issue of making mistakes....if a
pilot
never makes one, what have they learned that will take care of them
when the inevitable mistake occurs?
Certainly our goal is to show pilots how to avoid mistakes but I can't
divorce myself from the knowledge I learned from all those I have
made.
How to get out again safely is the goal isn't it?
Cheers
Rocky

I think it has to do with the way you approach both teaching one to fly
and learning to fly, which by the way, I've always considered one in the
same :-)
You are absolutely correct that learning from mistakes is critical. This
is something you ingrain into every new pilot from the gitgo. But
there's another level you can strive to attain, and I believe the sooner
you make the transition from the obvious, (learning from mistakes) into
the development of the mental attitude that defines for you a doctrine
of prevention as your PRIMARY approach to flying, the safer you will be
in the long run.
Just because a pilot is thinking prevention doesn't take him out of the
learning from your mistakes level. That also exists, it just doesn't
exist in the pilot's mental attitude as job one. Job one remains
prevention.
Many pilots never actually manage to make the transition into the
prevention mode, and remain virtually static in the approach they bring
to the flying table. Many fly entire careers without ever REALLY
developing an action rather than reaction mental attitude toward flight
safety.
Your post on developing expertise in the envelope left corner is
actually typical of the prevention approach to flying. I commend you for
using it and attempting to spark a fire under others to do the same. In
my opinion, the prevention approach to flight safety is the only
approach. Never in one's flying career is this more relevant than when
transitioning out of simple airplanes into more high performance
airplanes. Never is this also more relevant than when a pilot begins
doing things with airplanes that require an ever increasing level of
performance.
I believe the mental attitude a pilot develops during his/her initial
phases of flight training will remain with that pilot all through their
career in flying. It's for this reason that the role of the primary
instructor is so important to a new pilot. If the CFI is lacking in
his/her desire to instill in a new pilot the importance of a prevention
approach to flight safety, that omission can have disastrous results
down the road.
In my world of demonstration flying, I have seen 32 of my fellow friends
and professional associates die in accidents. Many of these could have
been prevented.
No...there are many professions in this life where one can afford the
luxury of leaning on axioms like "If I make a mistake, I'll be sure to
learn from it" I just believe that flying airplanes just might not be
the best venue for this type of thinking. I much prefer to turn out a
pilot who's attitude has been drilled into him by my constant reminder
to him that, "You will never reach perfection in your flying, but every
second you spend in the air should be spent TRYING to reach it. Learn
from a mistake by all means, but put your entire effort....your entire
concentration, toward PREVENTING that mistake from happening in the
first place".
Every pilot who has ever been trained by me, ESPECIALLY the instructors,
have left with this drummed into their heads if I've taught them nothing
else.
All the best
Dudley

On 14 Jan 2005 08:21:11 -0800, wrote in
.com::

When is the last time you did it just to sharpen your skills without
prompting by a CFI in the next seat?

Here's a little confession/story.

After departing in a hurry on evening in a rush to make it back to the
home field before the sun sank below the Pacific, I discovered that
I'd failed to latch the door on the trusty old PA28. I was busy
following departure vectors, altitude restrictions and handoffs during
which I tried several times to get the door latched without success.
Part of the problem was the cabin vents were open, and the air was
exiting through the trailing door's 2" gap. It was the inside
pressure that prevented me from successfully latching the door in
flight, but I was too busy to realize that.

The noise of the slipstream rushing by at 100 mph was so loud, that I
had difficulty hearing ATC instructions, and it was very distracting.
When ATC finally assigned a higher altitude, I pulled up into slow
flight, and lowered the flaps, then trimmed for 50 knots. At the
reduced speed it was easy to get the door latches fastened.

So slow flight is useful for things beside landing and photographic
missions.

I also fly a PA28 (180C). During pre-departure checklist at night my
wife (sitting in the right seat, and not a pilot) reached up to set the
upper door latch as I got to that part of the checklist. I thought she
had latched it for me. OAT was -5C on the ground.

We were cleared to depart IFR and as I got to 800 AGL and switched
freqs, the upper door seals gave way and wind in the plane became so
bad that I couldn't hold a chart unless I had on gloves (which I
didn't). So I made the mistake of opening the side latch in an attempt
to re-shut the door and get both latches to latch.

Neither latch could be operated at that point, and ATC could hardly
hear me over the wind noise -- and I certainly couldn't hear them.
Thankfully it was VMC (because my approach plates were flying around
the cabit) and I could do an immediate 180.

I was at an IAS of 35MPH with the wheels on the runway before I was
able to get the door shut and the latches done.

I think I want to try this slow flight, at altitude, and see if by
slipping I can get that door shut and latched bottom and top. And would
you suggest using full flaps at that point?

Also, I have several speed mods on this plane, so its actual stall
speed is about 10 MPH less than the stall light is set to come on.
Later,
Steve.T
PP ASEL/Instrument

steve.t wrote:

I think I want to try this slow flight, at altitude, and see if by
slipping I can get that door shut and latched bottom and top. And
would
you suggest using full flaps at that point?


I've done this several times in a Cherokee 180 and it works just
fine. Just slow down, extend full flaps and bring the airspeed go just
above the stall (pretend you're doing minimum controllable airspeed on
the private pilot PTS). At that speed, you won't even need to slip.
Just push the door into the (now light) slipstream and give it a firm
pull. It should close without a problem. At that speed, low pressure
will not be exerting much pull on the door and you should be able to
secure the top latch easily.

Caveat : If the door pops with a passenger, I highly recommend that
you have the passenger lean back while you close it yourself. I had a
passenger last year that got over-excited about getting the top latch
closed and he twisted it right off (while latching it in the process).
When we got back to the airport, I had to crawl out the baggage
compartment door and let him out using the exterior latch. The fix
cost about $150 with parts and labor.

In article .com,
" wrote:

steve.t wrote:

I think I want to try this slow flight, at altitude, and see if by
slipping I can get that door shut and latched bottom and top. And
would
you suggest using full flaps at that point?


I've done this several times in a Cherokee 180 and it works just
fine. Just slow down, extend full flaps and bring the airspeed go just
above the stall (pretend you're doing minimum controllable airspeed on
the private pilot PTS). At that speed, you won't even need to slip.
Just push the door into the (now light) slipstream and give it a firm
pull. It should close without a problem. At that speed, low pressure
will not be exerting much pull on the door and you should be able to
secure the top latch easily.

Has anyone here ever successfully performed (or even attempted) this
maneuver in a Cirrus?

rg

On 14 Jan 2005 13:27:11 -0800, "steve.t"
wrote in .com::

I also fly a PA28 (180C). During pre-departure checklist at night my
wife (sitting in the right seat, and not a pilot) reached up to set the
upper door latch as I got to that part of the checklist. I thought she
had latched it for me.

I usually give the door a firm shove when that checklist item comes
up. But this time it was warm, and I wanted to wait until cleared to
take the runway before latching the door.

[...]

I think I want to try this slow flight, at altitude, and see if by
slipping I can get that door shut and latched bottom and top.

My experience revealed that kicking in a bunch of rudder had no effect
on getting the door to latch. Of course, that may have been due to
the cabin vents being open. It would be interesting to know the
results of your tests.

And would you suggest using full flaps at that point?

Well, you can fly slower with flaps deployed, and they may add a bit
of stability while mushing along.

Also, I have several speed mods on this plane, so its actual stall
speed is about 10 MPH less than the stall light is set to come on.

The reduced stall speed with the indicator still set for the pre-mod
stall speed probably causes you to ignore it most times. I wonder
what the FAA and speed-mod manufacturers recommend?