"Casey Wilson" wrote:
Well, Ron(s), on at least two occasions while acting as safety pilot I
have assumed control of the aircraft. First, when the hooded pilot blew an
approach and started wandering diagonally across the airport and second when
I had to take evasive action to avoid another aircraft.

My standard safety pilot briefing lays out my groundrules. The safety
pilot never touches the controls. First step in traffic avoidance is to
give me a heading to fly. If that's not working, he's to tell me to
take the hood off and point the traffic out to me.

I'm relying on his judgement as a pilot to decide what constitutes safe
separation and to come up with reasonable vectors, but that's it. My
job is to fly the plane. His job is to be my eyes.

In the two situations you cite above, would it have worked to have told
the pilot to take the hood off and go visual?

If you want your safety pilot to take the controls, that's fine. But
make sure you go over expectations, responsibilities, and procedures for
transfer of control before starting up. Close to the ground or close to
traffic is the last place you want there to be any confusion about who's
flying the airplane.