Navigation flight planning during training

This question is directed at student pilots and flight instructors.

How many of you learn/teach cross country navigation using the
traditional methods using paper charts, protractors, E6B and
navigation logs?

During my training more than 10 years ago, xc planning was a fairly
elaborate process that involved filling lots of numbers in small
boxes. The flight was broken down into approximately 25 mile legs, and
each row had distance, true course, winds, temperature, variation,
wind correction angle, magnetic heading, time, fuel. Then we add up
the columns to get total time and fuel. We also compute the time
required to climb and descent. If we want to be more precise, we also
compute the fuel needed for taxi and run-up. Once airborne, we
religiously write down more numbers at each checkpoint and recompute
ground speed.

All fine, but I don't do any of these on a typical flight. I use an
online source such as skyvector.com to view the charts. Then I use an
online software to compute heading and time. That plus a paper chart
is pretty much all I need for a VFR flight.

I've been toying with the idea of taking a different approach to
teaching flight planning by skipping a lot of these things. I don't
see the purpose of doing things by hand when it is done much easier on
a computer. It feels like using a typewriter instead of a computer. In
addition, the less stuff you have in the cockpit, the simpler the
organization becomes. All these papers and pens flying around the
cockpit becomes an organizational nightmare.

So what are your thoughts on this? Is the ability to compute a flight
by hand really important? Are there important aspects I am
overlooking?

"Andrew Sarangan" wrote in message
ups.com...
This question is directed at student pilots and flight instructors.

How many of you learn/teach cross country navigation using the
traditional methods using paper charts, protractors, E6B and
navigation logs?


Snip

I'm probably unqualified to offer solid suggestions regarding flight
training. But in my limited experience as a pilot, I'll say this:

I don't think "analog" flight planning should be overlooked or discounted
but any and all tools are, IMO, fair game.

The mechanics of doing a flight plan with paper sectional, plotter, flight
computer and A/FD make a pilot think about routes, checkpoints, etc...

However, use of electronic flight planning tools (and any associated pros
and/or cons) should be included in today's flight training environment. In
my own personal flying today, I really like the Golden Eagle Flight Prep
product as it allows me to play with routes ad infitum (with an eye to
terrain avoidance/clearance...the route profile view is really handy) while
not turning my sectionals into a spider's web of pencil lines. Once I get
the route, I still draw it on my sectional while noting major checkpoints
but I also print the "strip maps" of sectional images from Flight Prep and
go nuts with pen and highlighter adding freqs, altitudes and circling
anything and everything of interest along the way.

As for the actual flight plan itself, I find that filing and printing via
duats has yielded plans which (so far) I've flown and have yet to be more
than +/- two minutes off E.T.E.

Letting the "1s" and "0s" do the work should be discussed, used and
post-flight scrutinized.

Just my $0.02 ...

Jay Beckman
PP-ASEL
Chandler, AZ
www.pbase.com/flyingphotog

Andrew Sarangan wrote:
How many of you learn/teach cross country navigation using the
traditional methods using paper charts, protractors, E6B and
navigation logs?

Yes, yes, yes (analog AND digital), and yes.

While I did learn to use the DUATS system for getting briefings, I never
file plans with it. I still make the phone call to the local FSS, and I
still talk to a real person for a briefing and filing (some of the guys
are pretty cool).

I still write up the plans by hand, mark them out by hand, compute their
relevant stats and highlight POI's, navaids, etc. etc. by hand. I was
never taught to use electronic systems (other than the aforementioned
information), and I think I'm a better pilot for it.

If we want to be more precise, we also
compute the fuel needed for taxi and run-up. Once airborne, we
religiously write down more numbers at each checkpoint and recompute
ground speed.

One of the schools that I've flown with before taught us interpolation
of EVERY chart and EVERY figure, and how to work in applicable variables
(no guesstimating your climb performance if it was +13C above standard,
you found the RIGHT number)

All wonderful parts of the flying experience (gives you something to do
besides watch the GPS, which I've also never been fully versed on; you
whippersnappers with your newfangled glass cockpits, it's a Cessna fer
Pete's sake!)

Checking over your plan keeps your mind focused on the task of
navigation, and helps verify and reinforce your capabilities as a pilot
and a navigator (which do wonders for confidence), plus it helps you
visualize your current situation, and adjust to any new developments by
giving you lots of sample points (and keeping your apprised of your
current locations with those unburnout-able, unperturbable, invaluable
paper charts.

I've been toying with the idea of taking a different approach to
teaching flight planning by skipping a lot of these things. I don't
see the purpose of doing things by hand when it is done much easier on
a computer.
So what are your thoughts on this? Is the ability to compute a flight
by hand really important? Are there important aspects I am
overlooking?

It is very important to do it by hand; what if things go pear-shaped,
and you need to plot a new course NOW, in the air, with only your paper
charts, E6B, ruler and a friendly voice at the other end of a NAV/COM?

What if your fancy-dancy multi-thousand dollar GPS system goes tits-up?
You have an electrical short (or an alternator failure, and need to
conserve power)?

While the merits of filing through DUATS can't really be argued
(especially if your typing skills are up to snuff), flying was, is, and
should always be a social experience; there's nothing to replace human
contact, even if it's with an FSS jockey, there's an inexorable feeling
of knowing that somewhere, at least one real person knows where you're
going, to say nothing of the often-times helpful suggestions of places
to see or diversions worth making that I've received before.

Doing things by hand keeps a pilot intimately acquainted with his craft,
with the process and necessity of each step (and how to actually read
those prog charts!), with muscle memory and skills that can always be
fallen back on in emergency, and helps keep the social traditions of
flying alive.

TheSmokingGnu

I believe the basic methods should still be taught to student pilots
and I do teach them. IMHO pilots should be able to flight plan without
computers, satellites or high speed internet. Once these skills have
been learned and the underlying principles understood then I'm all for
using a computer to do it.

Andrew Sarangan wrote:
This question is directed at student pilots and flight instructors.

How many of you learn/teach cross country navigation using the
traditional methods using paper charts, protractors, E6B and
navigation logs?


Well, I'm neither but I am traditional. Certainly the newer and more convenient
ways of flight planning need to be taught. At the same time, I think you're
doing your student a disservice if he doesn't learn how to do it the old
fashioned way. You don't always have access to a computer.

It would be analogous to expecting to fly by GPS only to have it take a crap on
you. Certainly being able to find your way via VORs and NDBs would be an
advantage.

When I was learning, even though we had a perfectly reliable VOR system, we
still were expected to be able to find our way by pilotage. I can, too...
though it's hardly the way I'd choose to go. But the skill set wasn't a total
waste of time.



--
Mortimer Schnerd, RN
mschnerdatcarolina.rr.com

Andrew Sarangan wrote:
This question is directed at student pilots and flight instructors.

How many of you learn/teach cross country navigation using the
traditional methods using paper charts, protractors, E6B and
navigation logs?

Neither student nor teacher, but I was a student not so long ago (4yrs)
and that is how I was taught. With my trusty E6B and just what all those
numbers mean.

The cool thing about learning how to flight plan that way is that it
teaches you all the underlying principles behind navigation. Plus it
builds a foundation for going on to advanced ratings. Take something
like WCA. How could you do a 1 minute hold if you didn't understand how
to calculate wind correction? Likewise for emergency planning, how much
fuel do I have, can I make that field? You have to know all the numbers
from the POH to do that. So it is good stuff. Lastly it satisfies the
FAR 91.103 PIC, BEFORE beginning a flight shall become familiar with all
available information concerning the flight. Grabbing a printout from
some flight planning service doesn't qualify in my mind. Of course,
"familiar" is vague. I'm sure the lawyers on this list will parse that
ad nauseum.

KC

Well, that is the question - as we move into the age of instantaneous
position display on the panel...
Like you, I learned to plan a flight by practically wearing out an E6B
and laying waste to a small forest... Then the flight was made by
sweating my way from one check point to another at a flaming 96 mph at
1500 feet agl, in my nordo T-Craft...

Does that particular skill mean anything today? - Well, I guess if
every electronic navigation aid was shut down I could, push comes to
shove, pull out the old E6B and plan a flight from the Canadian border
down to Florida, the old way... Actually I'm not looking forward to
it, though...
The planning for the most recent flight over that route was done
mostly by watching the Weather Channel for a couple of days prior to
leaving... Getting a current weather briefing and TFR notices over
the route about 5 minutes before launching... On the way out the door
glancing at the wall map of the USA and deciding that Chattanoga
looked like a good spot to refuel... Climbed in the plane, dialed up
the GPS moving map and told it, "take me to KCHA", cruise climbed to
10,500 and away we went...
Yes, I did keep a Howie Keefe nav chart open on my lap and a VOR
somewhere up ahead tuned in on the radio in case the GPS started
leaking magic smoke... And some visual navigation was done, mostly of
the , "see there, that's the runways at Dayton" variety, for the
passengers amusement...

It's a new world and while learning how to plot a track on a nav chart
and visually navigate there will be part of early cross country
training, immediately after the student demonstrates he can do it one
time, the CFI will turn his remaining teaching to the vastly more
important issues of managing the glass cockpit...

Chatting with a group of newer pilots at an airport in Indiana the
topic of NDB approaches came up... Turns out, of 4 IFR pilots in the
group, none had ever done an NDB approach... So, on the flight back
home I used the NDB receiver as I always do, tuned in the ball game
and followed the expressway home - staying to the right, of course...

denny

fancy-dancy multi-thousand dollar GPS system

nope - mine's a $125 hiker's model.

But seriously folks...I find that planning is much more fun than
most flying. Let's face it - as a VFR pilot, a cross-country is
pretty boring (at least out here in the west, if you avoid the
mountains). Not too many people to talk to, we don't have an airport
every 5 miles, we're usually too low to talk to Center, etc.

I admit, I use software for flight planning - but then, I'm a
Professional Geek. As one of the other posters noted, it's so
much easier to look at alternates, deal with terrain, etc than
marking up the maps. Once I settle on a route, then I may or may
not copy it to the physical map. Depends on the route and length
of the flight. DEN-PUB? Nope. Got that one pretty well memorized.

I left my GPS (I really do have an aviation GPS portable, too) in the
trunk of the car this past week (thought I'd lost it!) and was
"forced, I mean sir, FORCED" to use maps and VORs. Which I do all
the time anyway. Around here, the GPS is invaluable for monitoring
where Class B and MOAs are located (and out west, they are growing!)

But I don't circle stuff on the maps - I use yellow stickies that
I've written pertinent info (wx, freqs, etc) in LARGER letters so
I can more rapidly & easily find it. Even wearing the bifocals, that
type on sectionals and IFR maps is just too tiny in the cockpit.

Of course the freqs & info for the VORs and airports I need are on
a half-sheet on the yoke (in 14 pt type)

Andrew Sarangan wrote:
This question is directed at student pilots and flight instructors.

How many of you learn/teach cross country navigation using the
traditional methods using paper charts, protractors, E6B and
navigation logs?

During my training more than 10 years ago, xc planning was a fairly
elaborate process that involved filling lots of numbers in small
boxes. The flight was broken down into approximately 25 mile legs, and
each row had distance, true course, winds, temperature, variation,
wind correction angle, magnetic heading, time, fuel. Then we add up
the columns to get total time and fuel. We also compute the time
required to climb and descent. If we want to be more precise, we also
compute the fuel needed for taxi and run-up. Once airborne, we
religiously write down more numbers at each checkpoint and recompute
ground speed.

All fine, but I don't do any of these on a typical flight. I use an
online source such as skyvector.com to view the charts. Then I use an
online software to compute heading and time. That plus a paper chart
is pretty much all I need for a VFR flight.

I've been toying with the idea of taking a different approach to
teaching flight planning by skipping a lot of these things. I don't
see the purpose of doing things by hand when it is done much easier on
a computer. It feels like using a typewriter instead of a computer. In
addition, the less stuff you have in the cockpit, the simpler the
organization becomes. All these papers and pens flying around the
cockpit becomes an organizational nightmare.

So what are your thoughts on this? Is the ability to compute a flight
by hand really important? Are there important aspects I am
overlooking?

Yes, yes and yes.

It's just like mathmatics in school. In the real world you are 99 times out
of 100 going to use a calculator but unless you understand the operation you
don't really know that what comes out of the calculator is correct.

Add to that the the future pilot you are training might end up starting a
flight from somewhere that has no computer terminal and all they have is a
sectional and E6B.

On 2007-03-12 22:28:59 -0700, "Andrew Sarangan" said:

This question is directed at student pilots and flight instructors.

How many of you learn/teach cross country navigation using the
traditional methods using paper charts, protractors, E6B and
navigation logs?

I still teach them for several reasons. After all, we still teach
arithmetic to grade-school children despite the widespread use of
calculators.

The vast majority of aircraft are not yet equipped with GPS. Many do
not even have an electrical system. Yet, when we certify a pilot as
being able to fly, we certify that he is able to fly these kinds of
aircraft. We don't put a restriction in his logbook, "Working GPS only!"

Secondly, teaching the manual method can be an enormous help to the
student in gaining an understanding of automated methods. It is a lot
easier to work with a paper chart on the ground than it is with a GPS
in the air. I have some concern, too, that simply punching in the
destination into a machine and letting it do the flight plan breeds a
little too much complacency. Putting a little thought into your routing
can yield great rewards.

--
Waddling Eagle
World Famous Flight Instructor