Pre Takeoff Checklists

Seems to me that it's been a while since we had a good brouhaha over
pretakeoff checklists. Most of use use either ABBCCCDDE (or is it
AABBCCDDE? Or ABBBCCCCDDEEFG?) or CBSIFTCB or some other variant. I'm
curious what you use and WHY? What have you added or subtracted to
the "base" checklist to fit your specific glider or operation, or to
prevent problems you have encountered.

I personally use CBSIFTCB in all the gliders I fly. After that is
complete I'm OK hooking up the rope, then I review WET (Wind,
Emergency, Traffic) and give the signal to launch.

On Mar 23, 8:20*am, Tony wrote:
Seems to me that it's been a while since we had a good brouhaha over
pretakeoff checklists. *Most of use use either ABBCCCDDE (or is it
AABBCCDDE? Or ABBBCCCCDDEEFG?) or CBSIFTCB or some other variant. *I'm
curious what you use and WHY? *What have you added or subtracted to
the "base" checklist to fit your specific glider or operation, or to
prevent problems you have encountered.

I personally use CBSIFTCB in all the gliders I fly. After that is
complete I'm OK hooking up the rope, then I review WET (Wind,
Emergency, Traffic) and give the signal to launch.

Ditto the checklist you use, mostly due to law of primacy.

Frank Whiteley

On Mar 23, 7:24*am, Frank Whiteley wrote:
On Mar 23, 8:20*am, Tony wrote:

Seems to me that it's been a while since we had a good brouhaha over
pretakeoff checklists. *Most of use use either ABBCCCDDE (or is it
AABBCCDDE? Or ABBBCCCCDDEEFG?) or CBSIFTCB or some other variant. *I'm
curious what you use and WHY? *What have you added or subtracted to
the "base" checklist to fit your specific glider or operation, or to
prevent problems you have encountered.

I personally use CBSIFTCB in all the gliders I fly. After that is
complete I'm OK hooking up the rope, then I review WET (Wind,
Emergency, Traffic) and give the signal to launch.

Ditto the checklist you use, mostly due to law of primacy.

Frank Whiteley

I don't know CBSIFTCB. I use

A ltimiter
B elts
B allast
C ontrols
C anopy
C able
D ivebrakes
D irection (wind)
E mergency plan

... and for landing:

F laps
U ndercarriage
S peed
T rim
A irbrakes
L ook
L and

Good lists.

The only things I've forgotten multiple times a

Drinking water (sitting on the hose)
Oxygen (main valve closed)
Sunglasses (left in the car)

They won't cause an accident - but the first two require coming back
to land.

9B

Nine Bravo Ground wrote:
Good lists.

The only things I've forgotten multiple times a

Drinking water (sitting on the hose)
Oxygen (main valve closed)
Sunglasses (left in the car)

They won't cause an accident - but the first two require coming back
to land.

Just in case you haven't thought of this:

* water is a tough one. I've used a clip to hold it out of the way; the
current glider, it just goes in the side pocket.

* invent/devise/whatever a cable/lever/remote electric valve that lets
you open the bottle while flying. I used bicycle cable to a simple
bolt-on lever to the oxygen knob on the bottle in my Libelle. Easy - it
only has to be cracked less than a quarter turn. My other four gliders
had the bottle where a determined pilot could reach back to the baggage
area or beside himself and turn it on.

* buy a pair of sunglasses that _never_ leave the glider (easy for me
because I don't have prescription glasses, but cheez! at least put a
pair of clip-ons in the pocket!).

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (netto to net to email me)

- "Transponders in Sailplanes - Feb/2010" also ADS-B, PCAS, Flarm http://tinyurl.com/yb3xywl

- "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane Operation Mar/2004" Much of what you need to know tinyurl.com/yfs7tnz

On Mar 23, 8:03*pm, Eric Greenwell wrote:
Nine Bravo Ground wrote:

* * invent/devise/whatever a cable/lever/remote electric valve that lets
you open the bottle while flying. I used bicycle cable to a simple
bolt-on lever to the oxygen knob on the bottle in my Libelle. Easy - it
only has to be cracked less than a quarter turn. My other four gliders
had the bottle where a determined pilot could reach back to the baggage
area or beside himself and turn it on.

A couple of points

Mountain High has a clever remote valve operating device for their
cylinders.

Some older oxygen cylinder valves may leak past the stem if not fully
opened. I open O2 valves fully to seat the stem seal.

On Mar 23, 8:31*am, Grider Pirate wrote:
On Mar 23, 7:24*am, Frank Whiteley wrote:



On Mar 23, 8:20*am, Tony wrote:

Seems to me that it's been a while since we had a good brouhaha over
pretakeoff checklists. *Most of use use either ABBCCCDDE (or is it
AABBCCDDE? Or ABBBCCCCDDEEFG?) or CBSIFTCB or some other variant. *I'm
curious what you use and WHY? *What have you added or subtracted to
the "base" checklist to fit your specific glider or operation, or to
prevent problems you have encountered.

I personally use CBSIFTCB in all the gliders I fly. After that is
complete I'm OK hooking up the rope, then I review WET (Wind,
Emergency, Traffic) and give the signal to launch.

Ditto the checklist you use, mostly due to law of primacy.

Frank Whiteley

I don't know CBSIFTCB. *I use

A ltimiter
B elts
B allast
C ontrols
C anopy
C able
D ivebrakes
D irection (wind)
E mergency plan

.. and for landing:

F laps
U ndercarriage
S peed
T rim
A irbrakes
L ook
L and

C ontrols
B allast
S traps
I nstruments
F laps
T rim
C anopy
B rakes

W ater
U ndercarriage
L loose items
F laps
S peed
T rim
A irbrakes
L ook
L and

as the eventual migration from USTALL in the late '70's. Some of the
liturgy of soaring.

On Mar 23, 7:48*am, Frank Whiteley wrote:
On Mar 23, 8:31*am, Grider Pirate wrote:





On Mar 23, 7:24*am, Frank Whiteley wrote:

On Mar 23, 8:20*am, Tony wrote:

Seems to me that it's been a while since we had a good brouhaha over
pretakeoff checklists. *Most of use use either ABBCCCDDE (or is it
AABBCCDDE? Or ABBBCCCCDDEEFG?) or CBSIFTCB or some other variant. *I'm
curious what you use and WHY? *What have you added or subtracted to
the "base" checklist to fit your specific glider or operation, or to
prevent problems you have encountered.

I personally use CBSIFTCB in all the gliders I fly. After that is
complete I'm OK hooking up the rope, then I review WET (Wind,
Emergency, Traffic) and give the signal to launch.

Ditto the checklist you use, mostly due to law of primacy.

Frank Whiteley

I don't know CBSIFTCB. *I use

A ltimiter
B elts
B allast
C ontrols
C anopy
C able
D ivebrakes
D irection (wind)
E mergency plan

.. and for landing:

F laps
U ndercarriage
S peed
T rim
A irbrakes
L ook
L and

C ontrols
B allast
S traps
I nstruments
F laps
T rim
C anopy
B rakes

W ater
U ndercarriage
L loose items
F laps
S peed
T rim
A irbrakes
L ook
L and

as the eventual migration from USTALL in the late '70's. *Some of the
liturgy of soaring.

Does "Land" mean anything beyond the obvious?

9B

On Mar 23, 9:01*am, Nine Bravo Ground wrote:
On Mar 23, 7:48*am, Frank Whiteley wrote:



On Mar 23, 8:31*am, Grider Pirate wrote:

On Mar 23, 7:24*am, Frank Whiteley wrote:

On Mar 23, 8:20*am, Tony wrote:

Seems to me that it's been a while since we had a good brouhaha over
pretakeoff checklists. *Most of use use either ABBCCCDDE (or is it
AABBCCDDE? Or ABBBCCCCDDEEFG?) or CBSIFTCB or some other variant. *I'm
curious what you use and WHY? *What have you added or subtracted to
the "base" checklist to fit your specific glider or operation, or to
prevent problems you have encountered.

I personally use CBSIFTCB in all the gliders I fly. After that is
complete I'm OK hooking up the rope, then I review WET (Wind,
Emergency, Traffic) and give the signal to launch.

Ditto the checklist you use, mostly due to law of primacy.

Frank Whiteley

I don't know CBSIFTCB. *I use

A ltimiter
B elts
B allast
C ontrols
C anopy
C able
D ivebrakes
D irection (wind)
E mergency plan

.. and for landing:

F laps
U ndercarriage
S peed
T rim
A irbrakes
L ook
L and

C ontrols
B allast
S traps
I nstruments
F laps
T rim
C anopy
B rakes

W ater
U ndercarriage
L loose items
F laps
S peed
T rim
A irbrakes
L ook
L and

as the eventual migration from USTALL in the late '70's. *Some of the
liturgy of soaring.

Does "Land" mean anything beyond the obvious?

9B

IIRC, in the original USTALL I learned in 1977 the second L (modified
in later club checks) was 'Look again', which is good advice.

The ABC pre-takeoff checklist came from Schweizer gliders that had the
list posted on the instrument panel.

I remember a CFI revalidation course I presented some years ago, where
I asked the 80 CFIs to write the list on a piece of paper. Doris
checked the results. Not a single instructor got the list correct.

This indicates one of the primary problems: Pilots are not trained to
memorize the list so it can be used in gliders without a posted
checklist.

Our ASK-13 has a factory supplied pre-takeoff checklist with two
items: Close and lock canopy, close and lock dive brakes.

My recent ten-year accident summary indicates 50% of glider fatalities
occurred during the first few seconds of flight, so performing an
adequate pre-takeoff checklist is an important ingredient to flight
safety.

The most common pre-takeoff checklist (English language) is CB-SIFT-
CB.

Most of us have added some letters to this list, inserting a W for
“Wind,”
And an all-important E for “Emergency plan.” This results in the
recommended, CB-SWIFT-CBE. Arguably, this can be considered the basic
universal per-takeoff checklist.

The reality is this checklist is not universally adequate, because our
gliders may have some complexity needing to be checked before takeoff.
The factory-supplied checklist must be used, and takes precedence over
a memorized checklist in case of some important item unique to that
glider.

In addition, there may be items important to check such as the flight
computer, data logger, etc.

My written pre-takeoff checklist is rather extensive (Duo Discus) and
includes the factory items plus essential items like removing my
wallet from my back pocket and unzipping my fly.

For more information about this subject, you might consider a booklet
titled , “Preventing Glider Accidents” or a DVD titled, “Preventing
Launching Accidents” available on our web site: WWW.EGLIDER.ORG

The DVD is especially suited for club safety meetings using a laptop
and projector.

Tom Knauff