As they say, you can't believe everything you think...

Jedi post removed

Waiting for someone to say they can fly by feel with their eyes closed, like a Jedi.

Jedi post removed

I fly with my eyes closed. Like a Jedi. But only when r2d2 is on board. Skalywag may do it. Use the force Luke.
I agree tho.. No gauge or gadget should be necessary if your in touch with your bird and using it like we're talking about using it.
Gotta go. Light saber practice in 5.

New word: brain energy. You guys are doing good.

Lesuther wrote:
As they say, you can't believe everything you think...

That's the purpose of the question, I am a greenhorn rookie and was serious. If these posts come across sounding like I know anything other than squat please excuse my poor communication skills, I know jack shit and my eyes are unclouded. If you have an anwser for me that'd be helpful, just trying to learn and wrap my brain around all this.

Zane, whats ur point, you think flyin by the seat of ur pants is BS or what??? I was taught to fly by an old school fighter pilot and got most of the basics from him. He's flown everything from 180s to F4's to 777 to T6 etc. and quite counting around 35,000 hours, according to him seat of the pants is the only way to go???...I'm here to learn, Please enlighten

contactflying wrote:New word: brain energy. You guys are doing good.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLDgQg6bq7o

NOW I get it.

CAVU

Skalywag wrote:That's the purpose of the question, I am a greenhorn rookie and was serious. If these posts come across sounding like I know anything other than squat please excuse my poor communication skills, I know jack shit and my eyes are unclouded. If you have an anwser for me that'd be helpful, just trying to learn and wrap my brain around all this.

Zane, whats ur point, you think flyin by the seat of ur pants is BS or what??? I was taught to fly by an old school fighter pilot and got most of the basics from him. He's flown everything from 180s to F4's to 777 to T6 etc. and quite counting around 35,000 hours, according to him seat of the pants is the only way to go???...I'm here to learn, Please enlighten

Well, since u asked.

I think some people are trying too hard to make a dichotomy out of this. I'm of the opinion that a pilot should use all the tools at his disposal, appropriately, and keep an open mind (the irony is not lost on me at this moment.) I would not recommend some of the techniques posted as of late to a student or low-time pilot(which I admittedly am too.) It would get them killed, and what can kill the student can kill the pontificating master.

I learned to fly in an airplane with no windscreen and no instruments other than some basic engine info like RPM and CHT. My airspeed indicator was my face and ears. My butt and my stomach provided the other instrumentation. I started with seat-of-the-pants flying, so I understand the appeal and its value. But get inside an enclosed cockpit with a little sound dampening insulation, put on a noise canceling headset, create a cave-like cockpit of aluminum, and you're insulating yourself from a lot of the natural sensory inputs of airspeed and movement through a fluid medium, which is what flight is. It is nothing else. Now add some visually misleading cues like strong winds, drift, etc. At that point I find a dial airspeed indicator on the panel a little more useful. I'm sorry, but airspeed is not just "academic." Hotrod150 made a great point above regarding groundspeed.

While I agree there is sometimes over-fixation on the panel, what should be taught is appropriate use and multi-faceted approaches to using all the tools available. It's not black and white, and changes to suit the scenario. Knowing your aircraft (or many different aircraft) by feel is extremely important, as is knowing when "feel" is misleading.

I've been caught with my pants down around 12-18 inches AGL with the tail up out of ground effect but fully grounded to the 6,000 volt residential power-line because I'm running old steel belted radial Firestones on the old Sears Roebuck™ crop duster--I would find myself huffin' ether just to keep going thru the night on the 12 minutes of sleep I caught while doing an epic hammerhead--the alarm clock being the sound of the engine ceasing at the apex of the maneuver--she always backfired. Wokeme up most of the time.
Once my hearing went, I would throw my old jimmy-leg into the slip-stream and wait for it to go to zero-G and swing it out--gave me a charlie horse every time and I'd wake up quicker than you can recover from a snap-stall hydroplaning off the hog-manure pit. Old brain turned to jelly after that summer.

But all i'm saying is you totally can do all this stuff. The part I left out in the last telegraph i sent is that I was cross-controlled, full stall-wing-down and couldn't go any more, so I hachet-downed the right leading spar half way and jammed a logging wedge to kill the dihedral allowing more downwind powersnatch zoom-down pelvic thrust.

That's what I teach all my disciples and they pick it up immediately as long as they didn't first take lessons in anything that doesn't have a skid plate.

I would take them out for butterscotch and then we'd laugh and take the wedge out of the spar, J-B Weld it back together, sell it on Barnstormers at fair prices and buy more DDT to slap the hammer-down ethanol, corn-rows in my nappy bush.

It's easy.

Holy shit this past week has been interesting.

Honestly, my comment was light hearted.

I happen to think airspeed indicators are a good way to help 95% of us knuckle draggers to fly safely.

For the remaining 5% among us who stall all their approaches, ignore airspeed, and frequently invoke mysterious kinetic zoom potential of ram pressure airspeed inflatulations, many of their legends are conveniently chronicled for posterity at http://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/reports_aviation.html.

wyomingiswindy wrote:.... so I hachet-downed the right leading spar half way and jammed a logging wedge to kill the dihedral allowing more downwind powersnatch zoom-down pelvic thrust.

I'm updating my flight bag. I don't have any of those in there yet.

Crzyivan13 wrote:Holy shit this past week has been interesting.

No kidding. As someone said to me one time, "I definitely picked the wrong week to stop drinking!"

lesuther wrote:

wyomingiswindy wrote:.... so I hachet-downed the right leading spar half way and jammed a logging wedge to kill the dihedral allowing more downwind powersnatch zoom-down pelvic thrust.

I'm updating my flight bag. I don't have any of those in there yet.

pm me. I have a bunch of them left over from my previous career as a timber pimp. Very handy to keep around

Fuck this, I'm going out for butterscotch!

Honestly, I am laughing so hard I'm in tears.

downwind powersnatch zoom-down pelvic thrust.

Now THAT deserves a graphic!

This thread is epic!