Testing your glide. Are people doing this?

When I was a student, if we were practicing engine outs in the pattern,
we simply called it a "short approach." There was no details about
whether or not it was for engine out simulation or otherwise. And I had
one instructor that actually liked to do them quite a bit - after all,
unlike on a runway, if you practice an engine out over fields, you can't
REALLY be sure whether you would have made it...

And admittedly, while I have practiced a few engine outs (in fact I did
one in cruise this past Wed. - but not at an airport), reading this
thread makes me realize that I probably don't practice my manuevers
nearly enough... And not just engine outs, but stalls, steep turns,
etc...

I second the motion to thank Montblack!


BTW: I'm sorry I didn't reply to your last message on our Newspaper
Memories thread... I was out of town (installing stacker controls,
actually) and when I came back, it got archived off by my news server,
which definitely doesn't keep messages long enough!

"Jay Honeck" wrote in
news:4Wtmb.25865$HS4.93467@attbi_s01:

Folks should go out and practice this a bunch. Early in the morning
high above the airport, they should simulate a glide onto the runway,
to get a feel for the descent rate, speed, angle, etc. etc.

Now that we monitor Unicom at all hours, I can tell you that it is VERY
rare to hear someone practicing any "engine out" procedures over our
airport. Even though we have a very active bunch of flight instructors,
we almost never hear anyone announce this extremely important routine.

Now, perhaps they are taking students to a smaller, less busy airport
nearby -- but I doubt it. I think it's just one of those things that
new pilots do with their instructors over rural areas, and then rarely
practice again. And they almost never do it over an airport.

I know I haven't done the "engine out" routine for a looong time -- but
I plan to at our next opportunity. Thanks for the reminder, Montblack!

"'Vejita' S. Cousin" wrote:

That's good to know. On balance, do you see any difference between
owners and renters? Does the owner's extra familiarity with the plane
make any practical difference?

LOL, so you think owners make better pilots than renters just because
they own a plane.

He asks a question and YOU jump to HIS conclusion?

George Patterson
You can dress a hog in a tuxedo, but he still wants to roll in the mud.

Teacherjh wrote:

I didn't take "their" to be that restrictive, and also maintain that flying a
variety of aircraft makes one more able to jump between them.

But as an owner, I don't have to be able to jump between them.

George Patterson
You can dress a hog in a tuxedo, but he still wants to roll in the mud.

Judah wrote:

And in fact, the focus of his post seems
to be on the fact that he practices stalls and touch and goes and other
manuevers and enjoys learning the limits of the plane he flies (which,
based on other language later in the post, he seems to own).

And, in fact, I enjoyed learning the limits of the aircraft I own back in 1995
shortly after I bought it. Every BFR, we check them out again. They're still
the same.

George Patterson
You can dress a hog in a tuxedo, but he still wants to roll in the mud.

Jay Honeck wrote:

I don't know about anyone else, but I know that as an owner, spending
several hundred hours in the same aircraft, I become MUCH more proficient
with an airplane than I could when I rented a wide variety of aircraft.

There you go!

George Patterson
You can dress a hog in a tuxedo, but he still wants to roll in the mud.

Jay Honeck wrote:

Now that we monitor Unicom at all hours, I can tell you that it is VERY rare
to hear someone practicing any "engine out" procedures over our airport.

Nearly every "engine out" practice I've been handed was off-airport.

George Patterson
You can dress a hog in a tuxedo, but he still wants to roll in the mud.

Right. "Short Approach" is one of the 5 landing requests. Full stop, stop
and go, touch and go, go-around, short approach let the tower and other
planes know what's going on. It's generally bad to use "emergency" in any
non-emergency situation -- if the newspapers pick it up, you know what the
result will be.



"C J Campbell" wrote in message
...

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:QHumb.24708$Tr4.49542@attbi_s03...
| During my training (at controlled airport), a simulated engine failure
| on base or final wouldn't generate any radio activity at all; a
| simulated engine failure in the downwind would be preceeded by a call
| to tower "request direct to threshold."
|
| Standard practice at an uncontrolled airport here in the U.S. is to
announce
| "Iowa City Traffic, Warrior 33431 is left downwind for RWY 25, Iowa
City,
| simulated emergency landing" -- or something to that effect.
|

I usually just announce that I am making a 'short approach.' There are
several reasons for making a short approach; engine out practice is just
one
of them. I usually take students over to Shelton for engine out practice
because I often have the whole airport to myself.

Happy Dog wrote:

What if someone, trying this (and it
doesn't sound completely crazy), couldn't restart the engine? (And had a
less than perfect landing...) Is it just the same as a glider making an off
field landing accident?

No. It gets you a suspension for reckless operation of an aircraft. If you
survive.

Oh. By the way. To me, this does sound completely crazy. IMO, someone trying
this should get a revocation, not a suspension.

George Patterson
You can dress a hog in a tuxedo, but he still wants to roll in the mud.

If you really like stick-and-rudder flying, look into gliders. I'll bet you
really like it.


"ShawnD2112" wrote in message
...
My experience is that most people don't actually know how to fly their
airplanes. They know how to get them off the ground, from Point A to
Point
B, but they never do touch and gos, they never go out and do stalls, and
they really don't know how their airplane performs in anything other than
the cruise. Personally, I enjoy simply controlling the machine. Kind of
like racing drivers - they enjoy being in control of the machine, not
using
it go to anywhere. Therefore, I get a hell of a kick out of touch and
goes,
I stall the airplane all the time simply because it's fun, I do all kinds
of
turns and maneuvers just for the hell of it. What this all means is that
I
know how my airplane performs at all edges of it's envelope and with the
engine off more than I do in the cruise. Possibly all for fun, but
really,
in the back of my mind, it's so I know how to get out of trouble faster
than
I got into it.

Shawn
"Montblack" wrote in message
...
("MLenoch" wrote)
Folks should go out and practice this a bunch. Early in the morning
high
above
the airport, they should simulate a glide onto the runway, to get a
feel
for
the descent rate, speed, angle, etc. etc.


Talking to folks at airports, do you get the sense that people are, in
fact,
doing what you suggested? Or is it just a good idea ...."I should do
that,
one-of-these-days"...kind of thing?

Just curious.

--
Montblack

"Styled by the laws of nature.............Concorde"

"Judah" wrote in message
...
There is absolutely nothing in CJs comments that in any way, shape, or
form
even IMPLIES owners. Even renters get BFRs.

Sorry, you're right. Between Shawn's and David's posts I got a little
confused about who was specifically talking about aircraft owners.

Still, no one was saying that renters are sucky pilots. And I don't think
that a person who is always flying something different is going to do as
well in any given airplane as a person who nearly always flies the same
plane will do *in that same plane* (yes, their flying in other planes
probably will suffer).

Pete