Puchaz Spinning thread that might be of interest in light of the recent accident.

Ian Johnston wrote:


: There is a perfectly defensible position that says repeated full spin
: demonstrations are unnecessary.

Personally, I think the tail ends of single seaters sticking out of
fields and hill sides makes a pretty good attack on that position.

Do these accidents show an inability to: 1) recover from full spins, 2)
from incipient spins, 3) detect the signs of an impending (but not yet
incipient) spin, 4) avoid spin precursors entirely? If the answer is 1),
doesn't that mean three opportunities have been missed to avoid the need
for #1? And perhaps suggests it is better to spend training time on 4,
3, and 2 instead? Since low level spins don't leave much room for
recovering anyway, being skilled at 4, 3, and 2 seems more useful.

--
-----
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Eric Greenwell
Washington State
USA

Ian,

I couldn't agree more.
Blaming the Puchacz or the practice of spin training is very short sighted
indeed.

What bothers me is that some of the people who express oppinions here really
talk like those trial lawyers.
Man, they can talk the talk.
But in most cases they don't have much experience (if any), are still
students or are just enthusiasts.
You wouldn't know that by the way they express their oppinions.

What you "think" as a student is obviously very important, but sometimes you
have to learn to listen and practice, as opposed to trying to lecture your
instructor as to why you think this way or that (is that lawyer thing
again).
Just sit down, follow along, listen, open your eyes and mind to the
experience, let it sink in, think about it in the comfort of the house, then
come back for more.

Many of the concepts involved in flying are not intuitive. You should always
read many sources, practice, until you understand.
When I see this many people creating all sorts of excuses for not doing
spins, all I can think is that all of them are at the very early stages of
their flying careers, when stalls are this big monster ready to bite and
scare the living daylights out of you.
This will eventually pass and the pilot will become more mature and more
secure as he understands.

I once had a student, a Heart Surgeon, who after the first lesson with
Stalls started to give me this lecture about the health (or heart) risks
related to practicing this maneuver. He thought the fear could cause the
heart to spasm or whatever that was...
He basically was so affraid to die that it took him many months (and the
love of flying) to actually complete those very few first hours of
instruction. Always with that lecture, always feeling tense before
practicing stalls and spins.
He follow the advise to read more and more sources, understand the
importance of it, and he is today one of the safest pilots I know, even
instructing spins these days.

Anyway, I remember not that long ago many people hastily condemning the
Piper Malibu, as a result of several high-altitude accidents.
All kinds of crazy posibilities were hastily suggested, bad design, bad
tail, bad structure, this, that and the other.
Public pressure was so big that the FAA did an unprecedented
"re-certification" process with the airplane, as if they were not 100%
certain that all the bases were covered in the original certification.

The aircraft (Piper Malibu) came out of it as clean as before, with flying
colors.
It was then discovered that traning was the biggest issue. The airplane was
being flown at high-altitudes and speeds by pilots who were not used to
those conditions.
The Malibu is in fact a safer, more honest airplane than many older designs.


: The instructors all have their GFA ratings. The system does
: nothing to weed out the incompetent even when they demonstrate their
: incompetence.

Then it would seem that blaming the aircraft might be a wee bit over
hasty?

: The "blithe confidence" is based on thousands of hours where this
: hasn't happened. Unlike the blithe confidence displayed by some that
: they will always manage to recover from spinning Puchaczs despite the
: growing evidence to the contrary.

Most of the Puchacz accidents I've seen described involve low level
spins, like the one you discussed in your post. Recovery ain't an
option in those cases, generally speaking. Rapid conversion to an
effective religion is the only hope.

: There is a perfectly defensible position that says repeated full spin
: demonstrations are unnecessary.

Personally, I think the tail ends of single seaters sticking out of
fields and hill sides makes a pretty good attack on that position.


Ian

Eric Greenwell wrote:
Ian Johnston wrote:


: There is a perfectly defensible position that says repeated full spin
: demonstrations are unnecessary.

Personally, I think the tail ends of single seaters sticking out of
fields and hill sides makes a pretty good attack on that position.


Do these accidents show an inability to: 1) recover from full spins, 2)
from incipient spins, 3) detect the signs of an impending (but not yet
incipient) spin, 4) avoid spin precursors entirely? If the answer is 1),
doesn't that mean three opportunities have been missed to avoid the need
for #1? And perhaps suggests it is better to spend training time on 4,
3, and 2 instead? Since low level spins don't leave much room for
recovering anyway, being skilled at 4, 3, and 2 seems more useful.

Very true - It is far better to have the skills and training in numbers
4,3 and 2 so that you never get there inadvertently - but 1 is what
sometimes happens while planning or practising other things...
A pilot can manage his or her own performance and what the aircraft is
doing with skills and best practice - the air we fly in can be
unpredictable and difficult to judge. Sometimes other aircraft do things
that force a choice between collision and flying outside the parameters
that 4,3,and 2 have taught you. Sometimes people get so focussed on the
task at hand they don't notice the risks they are taking. Thats how "1"
happens.

Personally I like to cover all the bases.

Even if the spin experience just reminds you of what you can't get away
with the next time you even think about taking that thermal to prevent a
landing. I know of one fatal accident that might have been prevented if
the pilot had ever intentionally spun his Ventus 2cx with full water.
The expeience would possibly have changed his decision making in taking
a thermal at less than spin recovery height. Point is - he did not know
what his recovey height was.

I understand that most modern European single seaters exhibit a violent
spin entry, progressing to an approximately vertical attitude with
airspeed approaching VNE on recovery in this configuration. Even if you
have the height there is very little margin for error, in these
conditions I can't help thinking that experience in recovery might save
the fractions of a second that can make the difference between a topic
for discussion after the flight and an unrecoverable situation.
JAR 22 certification does not mean docility, only that it will recover
with conventional control inputs, under specific conditions.

Whether intentionally spinning a Puchacz (or anything else for that
matter) at low altitude is advisable is a seperate matter. Our club as a
2000" base for recovery - seems reasonable, at least you have a chance
if things go wrong.

At 17:24 28 January 2004, Ian Johnston wrote:
On Wed, 28 Jan 2004 15:01:49 UTC, Tony Verhulst
wrote:

: Arnold Pieper wrote:
: Repeating someone who wrote this earlier in the
week :
: 'Sure, we should stop training landings as well
because that's where the
: majority of the accidents happen.'
:
: Bad analogy. The difference is that you HAVE to land.

Should simulated cable breaks be taught, or should
pupils just be
taught to recognize the symptoms of a cable break
and be taken up in
a special glider a couple of times as they near first
solo to
practice. I've never had a real cable break, myself,
so I know it's
not going to happen to me ...

Ian

To reinforce what Ian just said. Perhaps we ought to
consider the consequences of not training full spin
recovery. When someone who has not been so trained
has the ground do the spin recovery for them, their
estate will sue the training organisation for negligence
in not training to recover from a mode of flight which
is well known to be fatal if not correctly recovered
from. You can't just teach people to recite the spin
recovery, it has to be practiced at altitude in a glider
or it won't get properly applied when needed.

Also, you might consider that the reason large numbers
of pilots of high performance sailplanes are not hitting
the ground spinning is precisely because they have
had spin avoidance and recovery training.

I'll take your word for it... stalling from a tight turn is difficult
unless the elevator is powerful or the cg well back. However, the next
time you do this, keep the stick back, ailerons and rudder neutral. If
it spins you should be able to let it go through 3 or 4 full rotations
without building up speed. Count them, and let me know if that's the
case. I'll want to find one an fly it.

I suspect there are sailplanes out there without adequate vertical
stabilizers, or, conversely, appropriate washout in the wing. But I
hope not many, and it would serve us all to know which ones they are.

"Ian Johnston" wrote in message news:cCUlhtvFIYkV-pn2-FWmHH7udlJdT@localhost...
On Tue, 27 Jan 2004 12:35:43 UTC, (Chris
OCallaghan) wrote:

: the point of my link was to show that you will not spin from
: coordinated flight.

Tight turn. Slow speed. String in the middle. Pull up sharply as if
another glider has just cut into the thermal. Whoops. Well, it works
in a Bocian, anyway.

Ian
--

This is an interesting case. I haven't really thought this through
since stalling is difficult in most properly balanced sailplanes at
high angles of bank. A long wingspan adds yet another aggrevator. But
your speed is higher in a steep turn, thus the vertical stabilizer is
more efficient. And right off hand I can think of several outcomes
that would look like spins, but are, in fact, something else. Think of
a wing over, for example. If you shot the initial 90 degrees of turn
after apex, it would look very much like a spin entry.

Nonetheless, I haven't tried a stall from a coordinated steep turn,
with controls crossed and the yaw string straight. And I won't have a
chance for another month or so...

Perhaps, for the time being, I need to ammend my position to say that
a spin is unlikely in most sailplanes if the ailerons and rudder are
neutralized.

In the meantime, if you have a chance to repeat, see if the instructor
will let the "spin" develop. I'm interested to see if it is really a
spin (I think the chances are good, though, if the controls stay
crossed). Try it again, but at entry, center the ailerons and rudder,
but leave the stick back. That is, add no further aggrevation after
the stall break and see what it does. By the way, how rapid was the
autorotation at stall break? How much change in direction did you
experience before rolling back to level? How much altitude did you
lose, if you took notice? And was there anything unusual about this
particular 25?

Robert Ehrlich wrote in message ...
Ian Johnston wrote:

On Tue, 27 Jan 2004 12:35:43 UTC, (Chris
OCallaghan) wrote:

: the point of my link was to show that you will not spin from
: coordinated flight.

Tight turn. Slow speed. String in the middle. Pull up sharply as if
another glider has just cut into the thermal. Whoops. Well, it works
in a Bocian, anyway.

Ian
--

Another way I experienced it during my 1st flight in an ASH25 (with
an instructor in the back seat of course). Circling in a thermal, with
just to much aft stick than approriate. Speed slowly decayed (slowly
beacause the hight weight and inertia of the glider), induced roll
and yaw slowly increased, needing more and more inside rudder and
outside stick, up to the point where a incipent spin started, immediateley
stopped by releasing back pressure and centralizing ailerons and rudder.
At the time of departure, stick and rudder were strongly crossed,
but the flight was coordinated and the yaw string in the middle.

To reinforce what Ian just said. Perhaps we ought to
consider the consequences of not training full spin
recovery. When someone who has not been so trained
has the ground do the spin recovery for them, their
estate will sue the training organisation for negligence
in not training to recover from a mode of flight which
is well known to be fatal if not correctly recovered
from.

Also, you might consider that the reason large numbers
of pilots of high performance sailplanes are not hitting
the ground spinning is precisely because they have
had spin avoidance and recovery training.

There is no doubt that more instructiors have been killed
in spins in the Puchacz than any other glider. One of the
reasons for these fatalities may be based on some as yet
unproven spin anomaly with the Puch. However there should
be little doubt that a good portion of these fatalities are
a result of the instructors having overconfidence in their
and the glider's ability to safely do low level spins. For
those who feel spins are a necessary part of flight training,
at least have the common sense to do it with plenty of altitude
and use a hard deck altitude of at least 2000 feet so that
you and your student have the ability to bail out.

For those who insist that spins at altitude fail to put the
proper fear of God into the student, and for those who think
it is just much more convenient to do spins off of winch launches,
aren't you being negligent if you fail to at least inform the
student of the spin accident history of the Puch, as well as
letting them know that the parachute you are requiring them
to wear will be of no use, if the spin recovery is not successful?

M. Eiler

"Sure, we should stop training landings as well because that's where the
majority of the accidents happen."

The ignorance in this particular discussion has reached a level where it's
beyond help.


Well, presumably total accidents would increase if you stopped teaching
landings. The point of this thread is that perhaps spin accidents will
decrease if we stop teaching spinning. Whether that is true, I don't
know, but the landing analogy is irrelevant.

Here's an analogy. Why don't we teach people how to drive when their
drunk, we know it will happen. How about we teach pilots to land on a
mountain side, in water, into trees, make a good turn at 50 ft. agl!
They've all happened. How about we practice these maneuvers regularly.
Sound stupid?
Hey, here's a novel idea! How about we spend a great many hours in
training on how to AVOID flying into a mountainous, unlandable region
or lake without enough height to get out, AVOID being low with no
escape over a forest.Teach us how to AVOID the mistakes MADE EARLIER
in our flight that got us to low for a proper circuit or RECOVERY from
a spin. Teach us how to keep a constant attitude / airspeed while
manuvering our aircraft. It,s not the spin that kills alot of pilots
it's the poor decisions and flying habits made before the spin, that
got them into trouble. If a pilot is flying below 300 ft. agl, going
slow then turns to final and spins in it was not the spin that killed
him.In my opinion. If flying low and slow is a common occurence,which
is how many spin deaths occure, should'nt we be starting there? In my
club I've seen a 1-23 make an abbreviated circuit, turn final at what
apeared to be 200ft.agl. So I asked him what happend. He said he was
low and had to change his circuit. Had no choice. So I suggested to
him that maybe flying DOWN WIND away from the club at 1500 agl. trying
to join a gaggle and add another 15 min. to his local flight was the
actual reason he had to make an abreviated circuit and dangerous low
turn. Sadly he disagreed. Now someone's going to comment that we need
spin training.I AGREE! We also need to know the safest way to land in
water or trees, avoiding telephone lines ,fence posts etc. if we had
to, but we should triple or quadruple that time in SPIN AVOIDENCE and
the PILOT DECISION PROCESS. Just my two cents.
Don
C-GLUV

Chris OCallaghan wrote:

This is an interesting case. I haven't really thought this through
since stalling is difficult in most properly balanced sailplanes at
high angles of bank. A long wingspan adds yet another aggrevator. But
your speed is higher in a steep turn, thus the vertical stabilizer is
more efficient. And right off hand I can think of several outcomes
that would look like spins, but are, in fact, something else. Think of
a wing over, for example. If you shot the initial 90 degrees of turn
after apex, it would look very much like a spin entry.

Nonetheless, I haven't tried a stall from a coordinated steep turn,
with controls crossed and the yaw string straight. And I won't have a
chance for another month or so...

Perhaps, for the time being, I need to ammend my position to say that
a spin is unlikely in most sailplanes if the ailerons and rudder are
neutralized.

In the meantime, if you have a chance to repeat, see if the instructor
will let the "spin" develop. I'm interested to see if it is really a
spin (I think the chances are good, though, if the controls stay
crossed). Try it again, but at entry, center the ailerons and rudder,
but leave the stick back. That is, add no further aggrevation after
the stall break and see what it does. By the way, how rapid was the
autorotation at stall break? How much change in direction did you
experience before rolling back to level? How much altitude did you
lose, if you took notice? And was there anything unusual about this
particular 25?


There was nothing unusual about this 25, only about myself. It was my
first flight in the ship, I had a very low experience at this time ( 100
hours) and had only flown ASK21 and ASK23. This happened twice in the day
at a low bank angle. There was almost no autorotation or change in
direction. It was rather the feeling that increasing outside stick could
no more counter the overbanking tendancy, but rather increased it,
that made me realize that the inner wing was stalled and the I had to
quickly release back pressure to avoid some mess, so nothing wrong
happened before immediate recovery. My propension to low speed flight
came from my familiarity with the ASK23 whose wing loading is much lower,
and from the fact that it was a weak day where low speed rather than
high bank angles helps to remain close to the core of thermals, at least
in the ASK23 I was usually flying. It was my first attempt to make a flight
longer than 5 hours, I felt it was better to try it first with an instructor
behind me and in a glider in which this may be achieved even in unfavorable
weather. This last point turned out to be true, all other gliders were
in the hangars when we landed at the end of the day and the duration was
effectively over 5 hours. However I had to wait another season before
getting my silver duration, but this is another story.

BTW I cannot try what you suggest since this 25 is no more in my club,
nor any other club 25 (but 2 private ones) and the instructor in such
a repeat attempt would probably be myself as I got this rating during
last September.

I've noted that many 25s have wing extended wing tips, some factory,
some home built. The vertical stab was designed to some theoritical
maximum... This would be yet another aggrevating factor.

What fascinates me about these reports is the effect in the real world
of the designer's tradeoff between stability and controlability.
Bigger vertical stabs would reduce the likelihood of a spin, but at
the cost of much drag. Less drag is better, but you don't want a
sailplane so unstable that moderate turbulence can flick it into a
spin from a low speed turn. So if you want to give it a good low speed
roll rate, you have to depend on the pilot's proper use of the
powerful rudder he'll need to counteract adverse yaw. But pilots are
people, and we all make mistakes. So the conscientious designer must
needs put enough surface area back there to prevent autorotation so
long as the pilot neutralizes the controls at the first indication of
an insipient stall. Even if the stall progesses, so long as the
controls aren't crossed, it shouldn't lead to a spin.

Little modern gliders seem to reflect this philosophy. As bigger
gliders become more popular among lower time pilots, shouldn't we be
examining their characteristics more carefully? While manuals give
very precise instructions on how to recover from a fully developed
spin, they recommend coordinated use of ailerons and rudder
(accompanied by a forward motion of the stick) to pick up a dropping
wing during the initial phase of a stall, straight ahead or turning.
In other words, the designer is recommending picking up the low wing
so long as it is accompanied by a "firm easing of the control stick
forward." This procedure is recommended because it results in the
minimum loss of height. We were all taught, thouigh, that if the wing
begins drop during a stall, we neutralize the ailerons, ease the stick
forward, and kick opposite rudder. Given the number (I counted 4) of
over the top spin entries noted in another thread, I wonder if we
haven't been to aggressive in preventing the "insipient spin" with
spin recovery control motions.

And as a result, misinterpret any yawing of the nose during a stall to
be the preamble to a spin. I'm splitting hairs. And it's certainly not
the stuff for students to be pondering. They need a one size fits all
recovery. But I'm genuinely interested in just what is going on at the
stall and immediately after, and if our perceptions haven't been
altered by the necessity of the shortcuts we take during training to
get us quickly to the point where we can go teach urselves.
Robert Ehrlich wrote in message ...
Chris OCallaghan wrote:

This is an interesting case. I haven't really thought this through
since stalling is difficult in most properly balanced sailplanes at
high angles of bank. A long wingspan adds yet another aggrevator. But
your speed is higher in a steep turn, thus the vertical stabilizer is
more efficient. And right off hand I can think of several outcomes
that would look like spins, but are, in fact, something else. Think of
a wing over, for example. If you shot the initial 90 degrees of turn
after apex, it would look very much like a spin entry.

Nonetheless, I haven't tried a stall from a coordinated steep turn,
with controls crossed and the yaw string straight. And I won't have a
chance for another month or so...

Perhaps, for the time being, I need to ammend my position to say that
a spin is unlikely in most sailplanes if the ailerons and rudder are
neutralized.

In the meantime, if you have a chance to repeat, see if the instructor
will let the "spin" develop. I'm interested to see if it is really a
spin (I think the chances are good, though, if the controls stay
crossed). Try it again, but at entry, center the ailerons and rudder,
but leave the stick back. That is, add no further aggrevation after
the stall break and see what it does. By the way, how rapid was the
autorotation at stall break? How much change in direction did you
experience before rolling back to level? How much altitude did you
lose, if you took notice? And was there anything unusual about this
particular 25?


There was nothing unusual about this 25, only about myself. It was my
first flight in the ship, I had a very low experience at this time ( 100
hours) and had only flown ASK21 and ASK23. This happened twice in the day
at a low bank angle. There was almost no autorotation or change in
direction. It was rather the feeling that increasing outside stick could
no more counter the overbanking tendancy, but rather increased it,
that made me realize that the inner wing was stalled and the I had to
quickly release back pressure to avoid some mess, so nothing wrong
happened before immediate recovery. My propension to low speed flight
came from my familiarity with the ASK23 whose wing loading is much lower,
and from the fact that it was a weak day where low speed rather than
high bank angles helps to remain close to the core of thermals, at least
in the ASK23 I was usually flying. It was my first attempt to make a flight
longer than 5 hours, I felt it was better to try it first with an instructor
behind me and in a glider in which this may be achieved even in unfavorable
weather. This last point turned out to be true, all other gliders were
in the hangars when we landed at the end of the day and the duration was
effectively over 5 hours. However I had to wait another season before
getting my silver duration, but this is another story.

BTW I cannot try what you suggest since this 25 is no more in my club,
nor any other club 25 (but 2 private ones) and the instructor in such
a repeat attempt would probably be myself as I got this rating during
last September.