Have you ever...

Jay Honeck wrote:
I was referring specifically to the pages and pages (ad nauseum) of study
questions that show you a VOR instrument, totally out of context with
anything else, and ask you to determine where you are in relation to the
transmitter.


So what? Is that difficult for you? Consider that an "easy" question that
counts against the finite number they can ask. It could be replaced with a
bunch of PITA airspace questions.



--
Mortimer Schnerd, RN

VE

"George Patterson" wrote:
Consider slow flight. Why do we teach it?

According to several of my instructors, we teach it because if you get
trapped by deteriorating weather, it's a lot safer to be looking for a
good place to land at slow speed than at cruise.

Wow, that's a scary pictu a newbie PP stuck in bad weather, flying
around with the stall horn blowing.
--
Dan

"How can an idiot be a policeman? Answer me that!"
- Chief Inspector Dreyfus

Dan Luke wrote:
Wow, that's a scary pictu a newbie PP stuck in bad weather, flying
around with the stall horn blowing.


Way back in the 30s, some pilots would spin through an overcast and then recover
underneath in the clear. Unless the ceiling was 200', that is. Can you
imagine? Open cockpit, rain spraying you and there you go into an intentional
spin into the merk. Must have had huge balls and tiny brains....



--
Mortimer Schnerd, RN

VE

Jay Honeck wrote:

After I got tired of that and removed the hood, I asked "so, where are
we".
He laughed and told me that I was supposed to figure it out. So I did.

This seems rather useful to me. Why eliminate it?

You figured out your position using VORs? What decade was this? ;-)

A few years (3? 4?) ago. Did I just use the two VORs or did I use a VOR and
DME? I don't recall which, to be honest. The airplace I used for the
checkride was, I recall, /A.

Who in the world uses VORs
for daily flight anymore?

Out of the "neighborhood", I do.

I know, a lot of you guys do. Despite the fact that you've probably got a
Garmin/Lowrance/AvMap on your yoke that is 500 - 1000 times more accurate
and intuitive than your old 1953 Narco 12, you feel compelled to "follow
the
needle" cuz that's what you're used to doing.

Actually, GPS was a part of my IR training. It was just annoyingly bad luck
that I took the checkride in a /A instead of /G. Fortunately, I'd a good
CFII. The /A had an ADF; the /G didn't. Naturally, though, the DE
required an NDB approach of me. No problem.

If I'd two GPSs, perhaps it would be different. But since I've but one, I
track my location with VORs too.

I'd like to think I'd do that even with two GPSs. I've the tools in the
airplane; it's silly to waste them. It's more to do, but this also means
I've some "slack" if I ever grow overloaded (and I'm "exercising" to help
avoid that).

[...]
Which isn't to say that tracking a VOR isn't kind of fun, and (for those
of us at the bottom of the aviation food chain) still necessary for IFR
flight. But for regular, VFR navigation, VORs have pretty much outlived
their usefulness.

The planes that are often rented to VFR-only pilots are often as historic as
radio ranges, no laugh?

[...]

In five more years everything will be GPS based, and
interpreting a VOR will be like knowing how to gauge your position by
listening to two tones in your headset.

That's a separate issue. I'm not entirely comfortable with GPS-only, given
the ease with which it can be jammed or otherwise impacted. Why not have
the new "GPS" units dual capable, perhaps LORAN and GPS? From a user
perspective, we'd never see a difference, but it would offer greater
resilience.

These new units could even use VORs. It's not the navaid so much as the UI,
I think, that makes it a big deal.

- Andrew

Jay Honeck wrote:

[...]
I was referring specifically to the pages and pages (ad nauseum) of study
questions that show you a VOR instrument, totally out of context with
anything else, and ask you to determine where you are in relation to the
transmitter.

I've always thought of that as akin to unusual attitude work. It's practice
for something having already gone wrong.

First of all, if I'm flying along and the "black box" goes dead, I've been
following my position on my sectional -- so I have a pretty good idea
where
I am from the get-go.

Except that the GPS signal has been warped by some weird error in either the
signal or your box. You're not where you think you are.

Except you weren't flying. You were sleeping in the right seat. The pilot
was so shocked that the GPS screen went blank that he fainted, but not
before waking you up.

Except you're not sure whether you're approaching or past that nearby VOR.

- Andrew

Hilton wrote:

Jay, so what percentage of people fail their knowledge tests?Â*Â*ThenÂ*what
percentage of those people failed because of questions you believe
shouldn't be there.Â*Â*IÂ*thinkÂ*we'dÂ*beÂ*approachingÂ*0-1%Â*-Â*atÂ*theÂ*most.

In defense of this thread, I think you're asking the wrong question (or at
least you're missing one of the two questions). While your question is
reasonable, the other is "what is the cost of including these questions?"

It's not just an increased failure rate. It may also serve to keep people
from taking the test in the first place, either because it is "too hard" or
because it adds to the time required for the PPL and this passes beyond
certain individuals' personal thresholds' for the time they're willing to
spend.

While VORs are still the main electronic nav in many planes (including
rentals), I think that they need to stay on the test. But I would like to
see the test simplified *if* it would translate to more pilots.

- Andrew

Who in the world uses VORs
for daily flight anymore?


Those of us who refuse to pay $400/yr "Garmin tax" for data collected
and produced at taxpayer expense.

Garmin charges $400 per year to keep their databases current?

Glad I own an AvMap.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Jay, so what percentage of people fail their knowledge tests? Then what
percentage of those people failed because of questions you believe
shouldn't
be there. I think we'd be approaching 0-1% - at the most.

Irrelevant.

The "failed pilots" we should be concerned about are the ones who fail
because they are so intimidated by the process that they never even take the
test.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Way back in the 30s, some pilots would spin through an overcast and then
recover underneath in the clear. Unless the ceiling was 200', that is.
Can you imagine? Open cockpit, rain spraying you and there you go into an
intentional spin into the merk. Must have had huge balls and tiny
brains....

And appalling short life-spans.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

On Fri, 15 Apr 2005 04:37:47 GMT, "Jay Honeck"
wrote in vyH7e.15254$xL4.5745@attbi_s72::

... to put those kind of questions on the Private written exam is just
another way to weed out potential pilots.

That's true. The potential pilots it weeds out are those who are
incapable of understanding VOR operations. Would you prefer to share
the skies with them?

Dumbing down the airman training curricula in blind fear of future
dwindling numbers in our ranks is a policy about as astute as
squandering tens of billions of dollars of tax payers' money waging
your daddy's war during a time when our nation's future citizens are
being so poorly educated that it's embarrassing if not freighting.
Fortunately, it is you, not me, who will have to live in that future
America.