Busted IFR Checkride

In article ne.com,
Andrew Gideon wrote:

Roy Smith wrote:

My club has the CNX-80 in four of our planes now. It's a cool radio,
but there is certainly a learning curve. I've got about 25 hours behind
box now, and havn't learned everything there is to know about it yet.

Nice club. Where's this, again?

- Andrew

White Plains. www.wfc-hpn.org.

On Sat, 24 Apr 2004 18:05:19 -0400, Roy Smith wrote:

Outbound course or outbound heading?

Course. The wind was from the west.


Ron (EPM) (N5843Q, Mooney M20E) (CP, ASEL, ASES, IA)

Jon Kraus wrote in message ...
Thanks Bob... I figured the same thing... I hear that most people have
never been asked to hold anywhere... how about you? JK

On my first flight as PIC under IFR, I was #3 for the approach into
a non-towered airport in Center airspace. No radio comms with Center
once you start to descend inbound from the FAF, have to cancel on the
ground through FSS. Layer from about 1000 AGL to 4000 AGL.

Think I had to hold? Oh, yes, and let's not get sloppy either,
planes over and under me.

I think it all depends upon where you fly. If you're flying all the
time into airports where radar conditions permit vectors to final,
seems a lot of controllers just send you all over the sky instead
of issuing holds (though I think you'll still get 'em if the weather
is truly bad).

OTOH, if you're flying a lot where vectors to final aren't an option
but the airport sees a fair bit of traffic, holding shouldn't come
as a shock any time the wx makes an IAP necessary. I'll be surprised
if I go through the year without another hold.

And frankly, I'd rather just hold than get vectored all over creation,
told to circle a couple times, that kind of thing. If I hold with an
EFC time and I lose comm, I know where I am, what I'm supposed to
do, and when I'm supposed to do it.

Cheers,
Sydney

(Martin Kosina) wrote
IFR
departure procedures often prescribe identical orbiting procedures
(even if they are not called "holds")

And sometimes they are. I've seen DP's with instructions to 'climb in
the hold' and should have mentioned that one as well.

that really do keep you out of
the weeds, sometimes with not very big margins. If you get messed up
there, I'd say head straight back to the navaid while climbing and try
to sort it out.

At normal climb speeds for certified singles, if you just head for the
holding fix and fly standard rate turns around it with some effort
made to keep the navaid in the center, you're not going to leave the
protected airspace.

I only became really aware of published IDP's and the various TERPS
issues after reading Wally Robert's site, my own instrument training
did not emphasise this too much, which is a bit scary in retrospect...

Unfortunately, your situation is far from rare.

Michael

Andrew Sarangan wrote:
Jon Kraus wrote in
:


Funny Mark.... my DE busted his IFR ride on the hold too... He said
hold wasn't even close to being racetrack shaped or anywhere near the
racetrack :-) Like others have said this doesn't mean anything in
the big picture.... Thanks again. JK



When you have a crosswind, the hold will not be a race track pattern. The
outbound should not be parallel to the inbound if there is a crosswind.

Bless you, Andrew. I was about to jump in and say the same thing. The idea that
holding patterns are supposed to be racetrack-shaped is commonly held and is a
source of difficulty in doing holds well.

I'm not an instructor of any kind, but I've been instrument rated for a few
years and have flown as safety-pilot with a lot of different instrument pilots
doing holds for currency.

I often see pilots trying to make the outbound leg parallel to the inbound leg,
and it just doesn't work that way when there's a wind blowing across the inbound
course. Pilots with GPS seem to be particularly prone to this error.

Think about the turn radius on the downwind turn versus the turn radius on the
upwind turn, and you'll see why the outbound and inbound legs can't be parallel.

Dave
Remove SHIRT to reply directly.

Dave Butler wrote:
Andrew Sarangan wrote:

Jon Kraus wrote in
:

Funny Mark.... my DE busted his IFR ride on the hold too... He said
hold wasn't even close to being racetrack shaped or anywhere near the
racetrack :-) Like others have said this doesn't mean anything in
the big picture.... Thanks again. JK



When you have a crosswind, the hold will not be a race track pattern.
The outbound should not be parallel to the inbound if there is a
crosswind.


Bless you, Andrew. I was about to jump in and say the same thing. The
idea that holding patterns are supposed to be racetrack-shaped is
commonly held and is a source of difficulty in doing holds well.

I'm not an instructor of any kind, but I've been instrument rated for a
few years and have flown as safety-pilot with a lot of different
instrument pilots doing holds for currency.

I often see pilots trying to make the outbound leg parallel to the
inbound leg, and it just doesn't work that way when there's a wind
blowing across the inbound course. Pilots with GPS seem to be
particularly prone to this error.

Think about the turn radius on the downwind turn versus the turn radius
on the upwind turn, and you'll see why the outbound and inbound legs
can't be parallel.

Well, they COULD be, but it would be a lot of work and you couldn't use
standard rate turns. You'd have to turn at a very slow rate upwind and
very fast downwind!


Matt

In article , Dave Jacobowitz wrote:

I did make some mistakes on the checkride. One of
which was flying on a vector right through the FAC
on a partial-panel VOR-A approach to TCY. I was
behind the plane, had not dialed in the OBS as
quickly as I should have, when I did, the needle was
already on the wrong side.

I caught the problem right away, correcting right
away, and said so out loud. The rest of the approach
was sloppy by my standards, but within PTS limits.
Still, the DE could have failed me right then and
there. He elected not to. Luck.

Not luck. In my experience, most examiners give you one mulligan,
unless they think you're otherwise marginal.

Despite this, IME, most people crash and burn (not literally, I hope!)
on at least one checkride in their lives. I failed the IFR checkride
first time around despite getting my mulligan. Went back, did a bit
more practice, then passed. It builds character.


There's just something about checkrides.

There sure is.


Morris (oh, no, not another character-building experience)

John R Weiss wrote:

While holding may be infrequent, it usually comes up at an inopportune time when
it does come up. So, it's worth keeping up your skills. I've recently had to
do a "360 for spacing" on approach into HKG, and have had to hold a couple times
at Point Reyes on arrival into SFO (B747). Also, holding is a good technique
when you're not quite ready to start an approach IMC; just ask for a turn or 2,
and get yourself prepared after established.

Here's another nice holding trick that my IFR instructor taught me. If you
are concerned about (unforecast) ice in a cloud layer that you have to climb
through, or if you have to fly over water directly after takeoff, ask for a
climbing hold at a navaid close to the airport (it's called a "shuttle
climb" in Canada, but I don't think the U.S. has a term for it) until you
either get above the clouds or get to a safe gliding altitude for flying
over the water.

If you do start picking up ice during the climb, you'll be either lined up
for an approach (if you're holding over the IAF) or right over the airport.

I think that this is a normal IFR departure procedure for some airports in
mountain country, but I have no mountain flying experience.

To the original poster, I am very sorry to hear that you busted the first
part of the checkride, but you should be proud of yourself for going on and
finishing (and passing everything else). You've proven to yourself that if
something goes wrong in a real-life flight some day, you won't get
distracted and fall to pieces, but will keep focussed and finish your flight
safely: that might be a lifesaver.


All the best,


David