Stability augmentation promises to give you even less control

Mxsmanic wrote:
This article is strongly slanted in favor of new
stability-augmentation gadgets for light aircraft:

http://www.flyingmag.com/blogs/going...-your-airplane

Not surprisingly, Cirrus is installing the gadget first, and Garmin
is writing the poorly-tested software for it.

Apparently the author does not understand the distinction between
flying for fun and flying for transportation. The pilot who flies for
fun is unlikely to want a computer to fly for him, no matter how well
the computer does it or how safe the computer can make things. A
pilot who flies for transportation might welcome more computer
control. But putting gadgets like this on every light aircraft makes
no sense. Sure, it might improve safety, but so would automating the
entire flight, giving the pilot no control at all--and yet complete
automation of flights would defeat the purpose of flying for many
hobby pilots.

This is sort of like saying that electronic stabilisation systems common in
todays cars take all the fun out of driving. Sure they do, if you're trying
to skid sideways on a frozen lake or push the envelope on a racetrack. But
flying for fun, just like driving for recreational reasons, rather seldomly
involves going to the edge like that. I guess that 99% of drivers never even
notice any override from the electronics unless they are about to loose
control of their car. In which case they will be very thankful for having
them aboard. The fun neither in driving nor in flying is in loosing control.
ESP undenieably saved thousands of lifes, and the conceived systems for
airplanes could possibly do the same.

Just like in cars electronic systems can also outperform humans in airplanes
when it comes to tasks involving very rapid an precise reactions. No need to
feel embarrassed about that. There is really not much point in arguing about
stability systems taking away authority from the pilot. Remember how pilots
first detested the stall prevention systems implemented by airbus? Not one
case has been proven, where a system override over the pilots stick input
has been to the worse and caused an undesireable result.

And just like ESP on a car I would imagine that the stability augmentation
systems in airplanes could be disabled if you intendedly want to push the
envelope of your plane and know what you are doing.

regards,
Friedrich

Friedrich Ostertag writes:

ESP undenieably saved thousands of lifes, and the conceived systems for
airplanes could possibly do the same.

ESP is nonexistent in most cars (maybe BMW or someone like that is
implementing it), so how can it be saving thousands of lives?

Just like in cars electronic systems can also outperform humans in airplanes
when it comes to tasks involving very rapid an precise reactions.

And just as in cars, digital systems have catastrophic modes of failure when
confronted with situations that were not foreseen and programmed for during
the design of the systems.

There is really not much point in arguing about stability systems
taking away authority from the pilot.

Why not? It has been hotly debated for decades, and there is still no
consensus on it.

Remember how pilots first detested the stall prevention systems
implemented by airbus?

Some pilots still detest the systems on Airbus. In any case, small aircraft
don't have stall prevention systems, as a general rule.

Not one case has been proven, where a system override over the pilots
stick input has been to the worse and caused an undesireable result.

Not one case has been proven where a system override prevented a crash.

And just like ESP on a car I would imagine that the stability augmentation
systems in airplanes could be disabled if you intendedly want to push the
envelope of your plane and know what you are doing.

I prefer a system that needs to enabled explicitly to a system that needs to
be disabled explicitly (and I don't even want to think about a system that
cannot be disabled).

Mxsmanic wrote:
Friedrich Ostertag writes:

ESP undenieably saved thousands of lifes, and the conceived systems for
airplanes could possibly do the same.

ESP is nonexistent in most cars (maybe BMW or someone like that is
implementing it), so how can it be saving thousands of lives?

Nonsense.

It has been around since at least '87 and has been implemented by about every
car maker out there world wide.


--
Jim Pennino

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writes:

It has been around since at least '87 and has been implemented by about every
car maker out there world wide.

I did some research and it turns out to be more prevalent than I thought;
however, it is far from universal (but apparently some governments have
required or will require it). I don't pay much attention to cars and I haven't
driven a car in ages. I'm disappointed that gadgets like this are becoming
prevalent.

Mxsmanic wrote:
writes:

It has been around since at least '87 and has been implemented by about every
car maker out there world wide.

I did some research and it turns out to be more prevalent than I thought;
however, it is far from universal (but apparently some governments have
required or will require it). I don't pay much attention to cars and I haven't
driven a car in ages. I'm disappointed that gadgets like this are becoming
prevalent.

Once again, since 1987, so it isn't "are becoming prevalent", they have
been prevalent for over 20 years.

The only downside to such systems that I have seen is when a very old
driver first encounters them, as in very old drivers were taught not to
press the brakes as hard as you can in a panic stop yet the anti-skid
systems "want" you to do exactly that.

Even then it takes only once to adjust to the new reality (for me that was
more than 15 years ago) and since pilots train for other than normal
circumstances while drivers do not, I see no problem with such a system
in aircraft.


--
Jim Pennino

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writes:

The only downside to such systems that I have seen is when a very old
driver first encounters them, as in very old drivers were taught not to
press the brakes as hard as you can in a panic stop yet the anti-skid
systems "want" you to do exactly that.

There is a downside for newer drivers, too, in that those who have driven
mostly cars with ABS tend to constantly ram the brakes at the last minute,
confident that the ABS will bring them to a safe stop without a skid. The
problems here are that they don't know what to do if the ABS fails, and they
often don't understand that ABS does not reduce minimum stopping distance, so
they can still crash into the car in front of them even with the system
running if they are too careless about braking.

I drive all cars as if they don't have ABS. In other words, I make sure that I
can stop with completely normal braking (not impending-skid braking, although
I learned to do that, too).

Which reminds me (incidentally) that supposedly Southwest has ABS disabled on
all its aircraft, because some of their older models don't have it, and they
want a consistent experience for all pilots on all 737 models. I've heard the
same about autothrottle. It makes me wonder how much automation Southwest
aircraft actually use.

Even then it takes only once to adjust to the new reality (for me that was
more than 15 years ago) and since pilots train for other than normal
circumstances while drivers do not, I see no problem with such a system
in aircraft.

Hmm ... does this rapid adjustment to reality apply generally?

Mxsmanic wrote:
writes:

The only downside to such systems that I have seen is when a very old
driver first encounters them, as in very old drivers were taught not to
press the brakes as hard as you can in a panic stop yet the anti-skid
systems "want" you to do exactly that.

There is a downside for newer drivers, too, in that those who have driven
mostly cars with ABS

It is rather difficult to drive anything else these days unless you are
a collector of "classic" cars.

Even then it takes only once to adjust to the new reality (for me that was
more than 15 years ago) and since pilots train for other than normal
circumstances while drivers do not, I see no problem with such a system
in aircraft.

Hmm ... does this rapid adjustment to reality apply generally?

Well, I've had this discussion with two other people from the same basic
age group, so for a sample size of three, it applies 100%.


--
Jim Pennino

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"Mxsmanic" wrote

they
often don't understand that ABS does not reduce minimum stopping distance,

THAT shows how you speak about thing you don't fully understand. ABS DOES
shorten stopping distances, as the system can more precisely modulate the
brakes than any human is able.