Minimum fuel

Just a comment... Last weekend I had to move a full load, five seats
and baggage, across three states with multiple stops... This required
a light fuel load to make the W&B work out...

For those who have not seen my postings on fuel before, I am a fanatic
about not ever going into the last hour of fuel, for any reason... I
have even, in the distant past, landed 20 minutes from home for gas to
avoid busting my own one hour minimum rule... Given that the current
bird holds six hours of fuel and my bladder range is four hours, it has
been many years since I had less than two hours in the tanks...

Anyway, this time the significant other was breathing down my neck
about completing the flights on a fixed schedule... After beating up
on my whiz wheel for 20 minutes it became clear I would have to suspend
the fuel rule for the first time in decades, and go 15 minutes into the
fuel reserve because there 'aint no' gas station in the middle of Lake
Erie... I measure fuel by the clock and use the fuel gauges only as a
'how goes it' indicator, though I know from experience the gauge on the
main tank is on the money... So, there we are going across Lake Erie
on a gorgeous sunny day as the needle just touches the 1/4 mark which
means exactly 60 minutes of fuel left.. The count down timer I normally
use for approaches agrees with the gauge...

What didn't agree was my pucker factor... Amazing what your nervous
system can do when it wants your attention... In spite of my
intellectual knowledge that I had 15 minutes until landing with 60
minutes of fuel on board, my parasympathetic nervous system threw a
tantrum... I got a hollow in the pit of my stomach.. My palms got
sweaty... I had that, 'something bad is going to happen' sensation...
OTOH, the engines continued to do the Lycoming four banger, shake,
rattle, and roll... They weren't nervous... And the flight ended with
the usual squeak of tires on the concrete at Port Clinton...

So what is the point of this post? Well not much, except rules can be
broken ( NASA just did) if done carefully, but it still feels bad...
It will be a long time before I break the 1 hour rule again,
significant other not withstanding...

denny

Denny wrote:
For those who have not seen my postings on fuel before, I am a fanatic
about not ever going into the last hour of fuel, for any reason...

Not a bad rule. You won't get every bit of utility out of your
airplane, but you're also not likely to ever run out of fuel. I think
that's a perfectly reasonable way to fly.

Anyway, this time the significant other was breathing down my neck
about completing the flights on a fixed schedule...

Don't let your SO talk you into breaking rules. Lie if you have to.
Fudge your calculations to make it look like going non-stop will mean
landing with 15 minutes reserve instead of 45. Or zero. Or halfway
through the flight tell her you must be hitting unexpected headwinds
because you keep hitting checkpoints further and further behind your
flight planned estimates. Or that you've *really* got to take a leak
NOW and you're not going to make it to your destination without
wetting your pants. Once you're on the ground, you might as well take
on another 10 gallons.

If you really are committed to breaking a rule, I'd rather take on an
extra 30 minutes of fuel and take off overgross. You didn't say what
you're flying, but a "4-banger" is probably burning no more than 10
gph in cruise; 30 minutes is 30 pounds of fuel. Nobody ever died
taking off 30 pounds overweight, but people have died being 3 pounds
of fuel short of making the runway.

Did you try planning different power settings? Cruising at 55%
vs. 75% power can make a huge difference in range (especially with a
tailwind).

On Wed, 5 Jul 2006 15:54:35 +0000 (UTC), (Roy Smith)
wrote in ::

Don't let your SO talk you into breaking rules. Lie if you have to.

There's no need to lie. Just assume your authority as PIC, and do
what's right.

Than not withstanding, thanks for your insightful comments.

"Larry Dighera" wrote in message
...
Don't let your SO talk you into breaking rules. Lie if you have to.

There's no need to lie. Just assume your authority as PIC, and do
what's right.

That ignores the larger picture.

Personally, I'd be incredibly disappointed if I found that I had to lie to
my spouse in order to get her to be comfortable with my decisions with
respect to maintaining the safety of a flight. However, from many
discussions with other people, including many close friends, I recognize
that, unfortunately, my situation is uncommon. Many people are in
relationships, and quite happily so, where they rely on deception at times
in order to keep things going smoothly.

When you write "there's no need to lie", you are no longer talking about
aviation. You are making a statement about the person's relationship with
his SO, one that may or may not be true depending on the actual nature of
the relationship (an aspect of the issue that I doubt you have personal
knowledge of, unless you are their couple's counselor, or a very close
friend, or something like that).

I would say that your statement is more accurate when talking about
passengers generally. There is less risk in simply making an outright "no"
statement when not dealing with an intimate relationship. But when dealing
with a spouse or similar, things are more complicated and lying may be the
only way to ensure the safety of the flight *and* the integrity (such as it
may be in such situations) of the relationship.

All that said, I would also say that there is generally no need to educate
one's passengers, spouse or otherwise, on the finer details of the
regulations or of the flight planning details. If they don't know that 30
minutes during the daytime is the legal minimum, or if they don't know the
precise fuel load and fuel burn, it's easy enough to truthfully say, simply,
"we can't make this distance safely without stopping for fuel along the
way".

How often this will work obviously depends on the individual passenger, how
much interest they take in the flight planning and execution, and how
willing they are to accept the pilot's definition of "safely". I have also
found that, even if the passenger does wind up taking an interest and
looking into the details later, it still allows me to execute the flight as
I see fit, delaying arguments until such time when they are rendered moot.
After the fact, if there are still questions, I am more easily able to
address them without getting bogged down in "but I really want to make this
flight!" emotional issues.

Using this method, I have yet to have a single passenger get upset with me
regarding any decision I've made with respect to flying. Or at least, as
far as I know. And that includes flights that were simply cancelled, as
well as having to leave one person on the ground while I took two others
sightseeing, due to balance considerations (granted, in that case, the guy
was an unexpected tag-along, invited by my passengers and not me). All of
my passengers have recognized my authority as pilot in command and while
they may ask questions regarding why I make decisions the way I do, they
have never complained about my right to make those decisions, or about the
outcome of such decisions.

Perhaps most of my passengers would be just as cooperative if I filled them
in on all the little details, but some of them may not have been. I've
found it's simpler, and easier to stick to my standards, when the passengers
are volunteered information only on a "need to know" basis. I encourage
interest, and do answer questions truthfully when asked, but I don't go out
of my way to explain every little detail, and that includes not going out of
my way to differentiate between issues that are regulatory in nature and
issues that are my own personal safety requirements. (Of course, with the
responsibility to ensure the safety of the flight, the pilot's own personal
standards could be considered regulatory as well, I suppose ).

Pete

On Wed, 5 Jul 2006 10:57:02 -0700, "Peter Duniho"
wrote in
::

When you write "there's no need to lie", you are no longer talking about
aviation. You are making a statement about the person's relationship with
his SO, one that may or may not be true depending on the actual nature of
the relationship.

Well, perhaps it's just me, but if I have to lie to my SO to assert my
command authority as PIC, I would be looking for another SO pronto.

"Larry Dighera" wrote in message
...
Well, perhaps it's just me, but if I have to lie to my SO to assert my
command authority as PIC, I would be looking for another SO pronto.

Me too. But like I said, that's not an aviation issue, and since you don't
know the specifics of the relationship in question, you can't make a blanket
statement about what "works" for them.

Roy,

If you really are committed to breaking a rule, I'd rather take on an
extra 30 minutes of fuel and take off overgross.


Good advice, IMHO. However, don't make it much more than that.

--
Thomas Borchert (EDDH)

If you really are committed to breaking a rule, I'd rather take on an
extra 30 minutes of fuel and take off overgross.

Those are different kinds of rules. Breaking a personal minimum should
be treated differently from breaking an FAR.

Jose
--
The monkey turns the crank and thinks he's making the music.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

In article ,
Jose wrote:

If you really are committed to breaking a rule, I'd rather take on an
extra 30 minutes of fuel and take off overgross.

Those are different kinds of rules. Breaking a personal minimum should
be treated differently from breaking an FAR.

Jose

Would you rather be legal and dangerous or illegal and safe? Your choice.

Would you rather be legal and dangerous or illegal and safe? Your choice.

I see your point. However, the question is whether setting a
conservative (fuel) minimum and then deciding for this flight to exceed
it, remaining within FAA rules, does not make one unsafe. Becoming a
test pilot by exceeding aircraft (weight) limitations is more likely to,
IMHO. But each case is different. One can make personal minima as
stringent as one wants (two hour fuel reserve, for example), but the FAA
and the aircraft manufacturers probably do not (the manufacturers want
to market the aircraft's capability, after all)

Not all that is illegal is safe, and not all that is legal is unsafe.

Jose
--
The monkey turns the crank and thinks he's making the music.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.