Some good news

Not sure why you think having SOME sort of backup is a "bad" idea. The number of bailouts, crashes and general fear-inducing crashes is unbelievable. I'll tell you what's a bad idea - the flights that started this thread. THAT was a bad idea. I'm glad he survived, but there it is.

FWIW, I went up with an instructor recently doing some instrument training and we brought the aircraft down to 200 ft agl for a perfect landing. Stratus plus an ipad mini or iphone properly attached gives you weather, terrain and an AHRS. Seems way better than just heading up hoping no clouds come along.

On Wednesday, 4 November 2015 11:28:41 UTC+2, Bruce Hoult wrote:

10 m/s vario? Really?

I thought euros used pretty much the same 10 knot varios the rest of us use, but labelled ±5 m/s.

Got to admit that I've no idea what EASA says of minumum equipment for cloud flying, if anything, but yes, that is at least what our (still valid) national regulation says. Nowhere is said that it has to be mechanical, though, so variable scale electric vario is ok. (I would not depart my beloved 10 m/s mechanical Bohli at any price.)

How is it that you Euro Guys are so advanced in certain areas and and so
retarded in others? Aren't we all? ;-)

I would happily fly IFR with the Dynon D2 but, alas, I live in the "New
World", and, in reality, our weather is so terrific out west that we
need an occasional break from flying when the stray cloud passes by.

On 11/4/2015 12:44 AM, krasw wrote:
On Tuesday, 3 November 2015 18:05:40 UTC+2, Dan Marotta wrote:
The Dynon D2 looks like a fine piece of equipment but it does not
have the TSO to be used in IFR flying.
Glider cloud flying is not considered real IFR flying in Europe (for example), and gliders or equipment do not have to be TSO/IFR, only cloud flying equipment is required (compass, turn&bank, 10 m/s vario, clock). Difference between cloud flying glider and real IFR flight is that with latter you are supposed to know where you are and where you are going. Glider cloud flying regulations kind of suppose that you are flying well above ground (which is always VMC) and stay locally inside one cloud at a time. I would have no problem using non-TSO'd equipment, don't you have thousands of experimental planes flying IFR every day using these?

--
Dan, 5J

Report back when you've done it alone... In really crappy weather. I'd
be interested what Apple and whomever wrote Fore Flight have to say
about using their products as you're suggesting. I'm not talking about
advertisements, I'm talking about the small print and disclaimers.

I never said having a backup was a bad idea. What I said, or intended
to at least, was it's a bad idea to be untrained and to venture where
you shouldn't be without /_proper_/ instrumentation. A cell phone or an
iPad is /_not_/ proper equipment. It could be considered as a backup
for proper instrumentation, but that's another argument.

Dan

On 11/4/2015 5:49 AM, Andrew Ainslie wrote:
Not sure why you think having SOME sort of backup is a "bad" idea. The number of bailouts, crashes and general fear-inducing crashes is unbelievable. I'll tell you what's a bad idea - the flights that started this thread. THAT was a bad idea. I'm glad he survived, but there it is.

FWIW, I went up with an instructor recently doing some instrument training and we brought the aircraft down to 200 ft agl for a perfect landing. Stratus plus an ipad mini or iphone properly attached gives you weather, terrain and an AHRS. Seems way better than just heading up hoping no clouds come along.

--
Dan, 5J

On Wednesday, 4 November 2015 16:54:07 UTC+2, Dan Marotta wrote:
How is it that you Euro Guys are so advanced in certain areas and
and so retarded in others?* Aren't we all? ;-)*

That is valid question. One would think that nothing can be more retarded than EASA regulating general aviation and gliding in particular. But then you insert national authorities who interpret these EASA regulations and all bets are off in general retardiness.

At 15:17 04 November 2015, krasw wrote:
That is valid question. One would think that nothing can be more retarded
t=
han EASA regulating general aviation and gliding in particular. But then
yo=
u insert national authorities who interpret these EASA regulations and
all
=
bets are off in general retardiness.


One of the few sensible things that EASA licencing did prompt was the
introduction of a formal "cloud flying rating / certificate" in the UK.
This is relatively simple to get & covers the basics you need for flying a
glider in a fair weather cumulus or descending through a wave gap and
teaches you a standard set of recovery actions if things get out of hand.

Mind you our terrain is a lot more forgiving than the continental US - and
gliding out to lower ground (or even the coast!) is normally an option from
most wave climbs.

Several people at our club use the Kanardia A/H, which seems to work very
well in a glider environment. Power consumption is low enough I have mine
on from launch.

Of course we no doubt persevere with other retarded stuff :-)

As I mentioned before, I have one of THESE
http://code7700.com/images/t37_attitude_indicator_j8.png in a box at
the airport. It runs on 400 Hz AC and mine has a dual transistor
flip-flop which converts 12 Vdc to the required voltage for the attitude
indicator. It buzzes like a mad hornet when hooked up and I have no
idea of how much power it dissipates. It fits into an 80 mm hole and,
if installed, I'd have to complete a new weight and balance. But just
look at all the gizmos that whirl around and note that the sky and
ground are both black. Fun to use...

Here's the link for the non-HTML crowd:
http://code7700.com/images/t37_attit...dicator_j8.png

On 11/4/2015 9:43 AM, Julian Rees wrote:
At 15:17 04 November 2015, krasw wrote:
That is valid question. One would think that nothing can be more retarded
t=
han EASA regulating general aviation and gliding in particular. But then
yo=
u insert national authorities who interpret these EASA regulations and
all
=
bets are off in general retardiness.

One of the few sensible things that EASA licencing did prompt was the
introduction of a formal "cloud flying rating / certificate" in the UK.
This is relatively simple to get & covers the basics you need for flying a
glider in a fair weather cumulus or descending through a wave gap and
teaches you a standard set of recovery actions if things get out of hand.

Mind you our terrain is a lot more forgiving than the continental US - and
gliding out to lower ground (or even the coast!) is normally an option from
most wave climbs.

Several people at our club use the Kanardia A/H, which seems to work very
well in a glider environment. Power consumption is low enough I have mine
on from launch.

Of course we no doubt persevere with other retarded stuff :-)


--
Dan, 5J

At the risk of sounding defensive and getting Andrew all fired up again (the reason so many avoid RAS to start with), I think it is pretty obvious that I made several mistakes throughout the course of this flight that caused the end result. I would say, given the conditions and clearing trend at takeoff and climb, that to say the entire flight was just an indicator of a dumb mistake of a careless pilot is a bit of an over-generalization and Monday morning quarterbacking at its worst.

While I have zero time under the hood, i have no doubt that an ARHS would have significantly changed my plan for the flight, but given the conditions under the clouds (the LS-4 that was forced to land in the valley just after me due to incredibly low ceilings) i don't know that it would have resulted in any better of an outcome, and probably would have given me a false sense of security and forced a more dangerous decision when the best option was to indeed bail out. How many pilots would intentionally go into IFR when there is a VFR hole still available? The greatest mistake in this flight was the hurry up mentality and decision to try and dive through the VFR hole.

I have no doubt in my mind that the outcome of my flight was pilot error at 18,000 feet, and little confidence that I would have used an artificial horizon to my benefit and not to my demise if i had had one on board.

On 11/4/2015 6:16 PM, Christopher Giacomo wrote:
...I think it is pretty obvious
that I made several mistakes throughout the course of this flight that
caused the end result. I would say, given the conditions and clearing trend
at takeoff and climb, that to say the entire flight was just an indicator
of a dumb mistake of a careless pilot is a bit of an over-generalization
and Monday morning quarterbacking at its worst.

+1 on that 2nd sentence above!
- - - - - -

While I have zero time under the hood, i have no doubt that an ARHS would
have significantly changed my plan for the flight, but given the conditions
under the clouds (the LS-4 that was forced to land in the valley just after
me due to incredibly low ceilings) i don't know that it would have resulted
in any better of an outcome, and probably would have given me a false sense
of security and forced a more dangerous decision when the best option was
to indeed bail out.

+1 regarding anything tending to delay the bailout decision, once in IMC below
peak tops, regardless of having (or not) a moving map...no software out there
claiming to show "your personal cloud's base" that I know of. Delaying the
bailout decision once in peak-enveloping-IMC would simply have added another
link to the chain of decisions that so often lead to a fatal accident.
- - - - - -

...The greatest mistake in this flight
was the hurry up mentality and decision to try and dive through the VFR
hole.

So it seems from my seat in the peanut gallery... Sitting aloft may (would!)
have been genuinely worrisome as it clouded up beneath you, but clearance agl
is clearance agl; it's difficult to have too much of it when the ground
beneath you is vanishing, especially in something as "IMC benign" as a
large-deflection-landing-flap-equipped glider...
- - - - - -

I have no doubt in my mind that the outcome of my flight was pilot error at
18,000 feet, and little confidence that I would have used an artificial
horizon to my benefit and not to my demise if i had had one on board.

Well-said, IMO. Your "second guessing" seems spot-on from where I sit.

Some of the peanut gallery's thoughts expressed previously in this thread
remind me of the old saw about the difference between being *interested* in
something vs. being *committed* to something, you know, the one about the hen
having an interest in a ham and eggs breakfast, and the pig being committed.
The peanut gallery is interested; Joe PIC is committed.

Bob W.

On 11/4/2015 6:16 PM, Christopher Giacomo wrote:
While I have zero time under the hood, i have no doubt that an ARHS would have significantly changed my plan for the flight

How would an AHRS change your plan? I'm not trying to add fuel to the
fire, but please consider that nothing you can practice on a computer
can prepare you for actual IMC flight. Take a look at this and
understand that the sensations generated by your vestibular system will
likely be too powerful to resist without proper training and experience.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sensor...ns_in_aviation

And here's a youtube video showing two trained and experienced military
pilots who suffer spatial disorientation. One of them doesn't survive...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HAaeBE7uSzY

There seems to be too many people who think that simply having an
instrument will save their bacon when the chips are down. You might get
lucky if you make a controlled entry into IMC, but don't bet your life
on it. Being suddenly enveloped when a hole closes around you is
another story. Once you were in the soup you made the right choice to
jump. My only critique of your decision to jump was that I thought you
waited too long.
--
Dan, 5J