"Peter Duniho" wrote in message
...
"Michael 182" wrote in message
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I'm kind of curious - does anyone with more than 100 hours do a flight
plan, with winds and all, before they fly cross country? [...]

I'm well past 100 hours. For me, it just depends, but it appears I always
plan with more detail than you do.

I always plan at least a basic route for total mileage, adjust my cruise
speed for the winds to get total time and thus fuel burn. snip I always
carry at least an hour of fuel in reserve, and on shorter flights (two or
three hours or so) it can be more than that.

I agree, I just don't actively plan for this. I usually take off with a full
tank. I have a Shadin to measure fuel flow, which I know from experience is
very accurate. Since I also have a Garmin 430 I know, pretty accutaely, my
time to destination. I have a backup Pilot III in the glove box if I need
it. If all of this fails (a very low probability - never happened in over
1200 hours in this plane), I can tune in VORs, figure out where I am, and
find an airport.

It's MUCH more important to then cross-check your expected fuel burn and
ETA with what transpires during the flight, since the winds can change at
any time anyway.

I never go below 1.5 hours in reserve. All of this can easily be handled in
flight, with very minimal ground planning.

For routes that I'm not familiar with, I do more detailed planning. This
includes, of course, noting airspaces, landmarks for waypoints and general
navigation purposes, terrain for inclusion in cruise altitude
decision-making, possible emergency landing sites, etc.

Come on, you plan for emergency landing spots on a long cross country? No
way - you might generally say "I'm not flying across the Rockies in IMC, but
beyond that, how can you plan for emergency landing spots? In any case, I'm
generally just buying IFR charts - I have no idea of the terrain beyond some
general altitude information.

The "this is what will happen" goal is to find an efficient route from
Point A to Point B, while either avoiding or anticipating any impediments
along the way. The "this is what might happen" goal is to identify
various things that shouldn't happen, but which might anyway, and develop
strategies for dealing with them. Knowing where one might land if the
headwind is greater than expected, adjusting the route for friendlier
emergency landing sites (if possible), identifying alternate airports in
case of things like the original destination being closed, equipment
trouble, emergency bathroom break, etc. (yes, there's overlap in those
various criteria...but it's not always the same overlap).

Once again, all of this is easily done in the air. ... Hmmm, I'm hungry.
What airports are within 50 miles? Oh yeah - there's one. Do they have a
restaurant? (Open the Flight Guide... ) "Albuquerque Center, Skylane 123 is
changing my destination and landing at Santa Fe..."

I have a reasonably reliable Loran in my airplane, and so I admit I do
slack a bit on the groundspeed calculations while enroute. However, I
need to have the waypoints for backup in case the Loran goes south, and
even with the Loran, on longer flights I am still double-checking my
groundspeed with waypoints every 30-60 minutes.

Why? If you are in the air for two hours, and you only have three hours
fuel, get on the ground and refuel. What difference does continually
checking waypoints make?


Note that having a Loran (or even IFR-certified GPS) doesn't obviate the
need for proper planning. Even if the equipment was 100% reliable, you
still need to actually inspect the route for the details along the way, to
avoid obstacles and so that you can double-check your navigation equipment
(even the GPS, which is supposed to tell you when it's lying, can
theoretically go wrong without you knowing...

I do double check it occasionally, out of boredom on some flights - but how
can it "theoretically go wrong without you knowing"? I know about RAIM
errors - they have totaled maybe 5 minutes in the past four years of flying,
and even during the errors the navigation was accurate. But, once again,
even if the GPS miraculously failed, and the hand held backup failed, and
the VOR's (both of them) failed, and the radio died (so I couldn't get
vectors) - I rarely fly more than 30 minutes anywhere in the US without
seeing an airport, or at least a private ranch strip.


Much of my enjoyment of flying comes from the somewhat anachronistic
aspects of it, and I actually like spreading the charts out on the floor
and measuring distances with my plotter. It does take longer, that's for
sure. But for me, it's all part of the whole experience.

Now this I fully appreciate - I rarely do it, but I can see why it is
appealing to some people.

I don't want to sound cavalier about flying. I am fanatical about
maintenance on my plane. I will do extensive planning for a go-no go
decision based on weather. I get an IPC at least once a year, even if I am
current. But it seems to me that for a reasonably high performance plane the
geography of planning has, for the most part, been displaced by technology.

Michael