I was able to read the chart well enough to answer the load factor question on the written test. My math is not good enough, however, to figure how much to bank in every turn with horizontal obstructions. So I ask, "Should we load or unload the wing in turns"? The book says there is no limitation that would cover all bank conditions with limited airspeed. Videos of military jet fighters doing aileron rolls during 90 degree pitch up are no help to me in my rented 172. So I just release any back pressure in any turn of any bank to unload the wing. That always works. Is there a way to first safely manage the energy of any zoom reserve in airspeed with the wing level, however?

What makes flight by reference to instruments safer than contact flying? Where is that kind of flight practicable? What pitch and bank limitations make instrument flying safe and doable without self induced upset? What is the danger of trying to plug similar bank limitations into contact flying? Does that work out well in all vertical and horizontal space available situations during maneuvering flight? What is the most common horizontal space available situation for airplanes in the pattern limited to left only turns even with significant downwind on base leg.? Does limiting bank angle in the base to final turn work well in this condition? Should speed, altitude, and procedural track be factors in the integration of instruments with contact flying? Does contact or instrument orientation work better in maneuvering flight. Should we be teaching pilots to fly exactly the same during maneuvering flight or at altitude? Should the need for zoom reserve airspeed be maneuvering flight orientation rather than the need for altitude? Can maneuvering flight be avoided or is it a part of every VFR flight?

Is loading the wing with the wing level safer than loading the wing in a turn? What else is necessary to make loading the wing safe? Is zoom reserve airspeed stabilized in pitch up or is it time limited? Sould pitch up cause the zoomey maneuvering flight pilot to set a mental timer? Why is maneuvering in both the vertical and horizontal plane safer than maneuvering limited to the horizontal plane? How does the law of the roller coaster make the energy management turn safer? How is kinetic energy, zoom reserve in airspeed, managed in the energy management turn? How is the potential energy of altitude managed in the energy management turn? How does wind management decrease the radius of turn given the same airspeed and bank angle as wind ignorance?

Was the emphasis of Wayne Handley's "Turn Smart" video spin recovery or was it unloading the wing in turns to prevent stall and therefore prevent spin either over the top (slip) or down wing dropping out (skid.) In maneuvering flight, is stall or spin recovery technique relevant? In maneuvering flight is energy management, including release of back pressure on the elevator, what Wayne and all crop dusters emphasize in turns? Would you rather be extremely proficient in recovery from stalls and spins or in using energy management in turns to prevent them? Would proficiency using energy management in turns reduce the fatality rate in maneuvering flight around the airport?

Huh?

That is exactly the question I have been asking for years about flight training that demands that I keep my nose up on the horizon and maintain altitude in a turn regardless of all other considerations.

Aerobatic training should be become part of all pilots proficiency. Reacting naturally, without hesitation, to situations that may kill us is priceless.

contactflying wrote:That is exactly the question I have been asking for years about flight training that demands that I keep my nose up on the horizon and maintain altitude in a turn regardless of all other considerations.

Jim,

I totally agree that there are situations where allowing the aircraft to descend in a turn is totally appropriate. But, to argue that you should ALWAYS do so can be suicidal in the mountains.

A pilot should be able to turn an airplane SAFELY in constant altitude level flight, AND in descending turns, as appropriate.

But, please stop insisting that to conduct a level turn is some form of suicide mission. It's a basic skill that needs to be conducted SAFELY and mastered.

MTV

Yes, Mike. Of course. It's default, however, is exactly what kills in a startle reaction or engine failure at Vy. It is necessary, of course, for safe IMC flight. I am fussing about the orientation that leads pilots down the path of destruction. I am fussing about the total lack of orientation and training in safe maneuvering flight. I am fussing about the failure of aviation leadership to accept that there is a true difference in practical technique for maneuvering flight. I am fussing that we accept a great number of fatalities rather than train for the difference in safe techniques when too low to recover from inadvertent, not practice, stall. Why, Mike, do crop dusters working in a much less forgiving environment have fewer fatalities than general aviation charter, skydive, freight, and recreational flying pilots?

I believe we can learn form airline AQP type training even without simulators. I believe we can learn from bush pilots. I believe we can learn from crop dusters. I believe we can learn from pipeline patrol, banner tow, backcountry off airport, bush, and glider pilots. I believe we all have something to contribute. The school solution, one size fits all, I believe is limiting our progress toward reduction of the 300 or so fatalities every year. I believe that teaching energy management turns, rather than wing loading level and climbing and descending turns are a possible solution to the inadvertent stall fatalities. The pilots who make by far the most turns in general aviation, crop dusters and pipeline patrol pilots, do not make default level altitude maintenance turns. When low enough to be potentially killed by turning steeply enough to miss stuff, a technique that does not load the wing becomes extremely beneficial.

Bigrenna wrote:Huh?

Haha - I’m glad I’m not the only one.

The Ag pilot in Wayne Handley's Turn Smart video was using his knowledge of energy management to perform too near acrobatic maneuvers in low altitude Ag work. Normal Ag back to back turns look enough like acrobatic maneuvers to bring crop dusters enough flack. One of the instructors I taught the energy management turn to modifies it enough to get away with while actually making pattern turns safer. A work around you might call it. Who cares if it saves lives. Yes, Mike, a student who can turn smart can pull back on the yoke enough in all turns (think ALWAYS) to pass a test.

A big problem with altitude maintenance attempting level or even climbing turns in the mountains is that by reducing airspeed they cause the very opposite of their objective. Just because we are at Vy just to hold altitude at high DA, doesn't mean we are not at maneuvering flight altitude over the ridge. A descending turn down drainage might be wiser than attempting a level turn. Of course not paying attention to ridge valley ridge drainage systems can get us into the dangerous position where level flight is necessary. Sure, minimum controllable airspeed skill is needed here. It is similar to getting off with more load than can safely be carried. Time to look for a hole to descend into. It is really nice to have sorted that out before getting here.

It's not that the FAA deviously decided to start teaching pilots to strictly maintain altitude in turns regardless of airspeed degradation during contact flying. It was that instrument flying had become the safe and well respected form of flying and most pilots, save WWII veterans, were still VFR rated only. The idea was to bring instruments safety into contact flying with instrument integration. A major emphasis of the new then Practical Test Standards was to make the transition smooth and safe. It had its ups and downs. The ups were much better situation awareness at high altitude. The downs were much worse stick and rudder skills at low altitude. Safe maneuvering flight techniques simply try to buy back into good stick and rudder skills for contact flying. Excellent instrument integration skills with high altitude only orientation have not improved situational awareness in the pattern and especially during low altitude work. The FAA did not, nor do they now, require more than a CPL to do Ag work. While somewhat logical back then when lots of us operated single pilot single Pawnee, Chief Pilots like Rob have a lot of transition to low altitude orientation and skills work to do to make any regular flight school trained commercial pilot safe in Ag.

Mike is correct that we should have slow flight skills for when we are down low. While helpful, these skills practiced at high altitude do not adequately prepare pilots to safely fly a pattern where inadvertent stall is fatal. There are many many untaught techniques that would make getting up to high altitude and getting back down from high altitude and all low altitude work safer.

corefile wrote:

Bigrenna wrote:Huh?

Haha - I’m glad I’m not the only one.

x 3

hotrod180 wrote:

corefile wrote:

Bigrenna wrote:Huh?

Haha - I’m glad I’m not the only one.

x 3

x4

Ok. I can see that not all want to learn to make Ag quality turns and even I don't see any point to flying in a true vertical walled canyon. Only twice, other than during many forced landings, did the muscle memory to let go of the elevator while going full stop with rudder and aileron save me. That would be once with student to be just missed by a twin on final that did not see me and student in a L-2 Taylorcraft and once in a Pawnee to be missed by an airliner at an uncontrolled field that did not care. Startle response was full rudder and full aileron to turn away while allowing the nose to go down significantly. Muscle memory was no pull on the stick. Startle response from thousands of level turns, I think, would have been same as many other very experienced pilots : Full aileron (a little delay for the nose to go the wrong way) and full rudder with a significant loading pull on the elevator. I am not a better pilot than you. I just have developed different muscle memory and the bit of pitch up wings level followed by nose going down a bit as designed as soon as bank was brought in didn't bother anyone, even DMEs. Nobody got sick in 1g turns even though those that needed to be steep to miss things were steep and therefore the nose went down significantly.

I know the energy management or crop duster turn will not become standard enough to create muscle memory in most pilots. Most pilots will also survive by never having a startle response that stalls them near the ground. One did a couple weeks ago. I just would feel bad knowing how to prevent stalls in normal flying activities that happen unexpectedly and too low for recovery no mater how experienced the pilot yet not caring to try to prevent that.

And it's what I do. You may have to just shoot me to put me out of my misery. I can't believe this is so unpopular.

Another advantage of being a bit lower that other airplanes coming into the pattern because you actually allowed the nose to go down rather than pull and get slower is that you might actually see that other guy that had no radio or you heard but didn't see. Against a bit of sky without ground clutter, they are easier to see and avoid.

And if you spray or patrol pipelines down low, it is amazing how much you see and overhear that they hear but don't see going on up there. Sort of makes you not want to go up there.

Devils advocate here.

I’m not and never have been an ag pilot, but I’ve watched a lot of ag turns, and ridden along with a couple ag pilots as they demo them. So, Jim, you are leaving out perhaps one of the most important components of an ag turn. Initiation of an ag turn begins with a pull UP, as in applied back pressure on elevator, first, then the turn is initiated, and THEN let the nose come through.

I realize that is a bit of an oversimplification, since this turn is a fluid evolution. But the point is, in the ag environment, that pitch up is essential to initiate the turn, and that works because the ag plane is being operated essentially at cruise speed, or at least nowhere near the stall. And turn radius is really up to the pilot, on how he works a field, but is generally initiated by a turn AWAY from the intended turn direction for spacing.

On the other hand, flying in a canyon, to minimize turn radius, and maximize operational space, we need to slow down, and initiate the turn from very close to one canyon wall. So, the turn away and the pitch up aren’t really available in this environment.

A nicely performed ag turn is truly lovely evolution to watch. And, you’re right, many pilots lose control of their aircraft because they didn’t FLY the airplane. The key is understanding the basics of aerodynamics, and learning to FLY the airplane, using proper energy management techniques in a VARIETY of environments.

For twenty years, I did Dall Sheep surveys in central Alaska. Working canyons, cracks and crevices teaches one a lot about WORKING the airplane in three dimensional space.

Our wold is NOT a flat field, with well demarcated boundaries.

MTV

mtv wrote:Devils advocate here.

I’m not and never have been an ag pilot, but I’ve watched a lot of ag turns, and ridden along with a couple ag pilots as they demo them. So, Jim, you are leaving out perhaps one of the most important components of an ag turn. Initiation of an ag turn begins with a pull UP, as in applied back pressure on elevator, first, then the turn is initiated, and THEN let the nose come through.

I realize that is a bit of an oversimplification, since this turn is a fluid evolution. But the point is, in the ag environment, that pitch up is essential to initiate the turn, and that works because the ag plane is being operated essentially at cruise speed, or at least nowhere near the stall. And turn radius is really up to the pilot, on how he works a field, but is generally initiated by a turn AWAY from the intended turn direction for spacing.

On the other hand, flying in a canyon, to minimize turn radius, and maximize operational space, we need to slow down, and initiate the turn from very close to one canyon wall. So, the turn away and the pitch up aren’t really available in this environment.

A nicely performed ag turn is truly lovely evolution to watch. And, you’re right, many pilots lose control of their aircraft because they didn’t FLY the airplane. The key is understanding the basics of aerodynamics, and learning to FLY the airplane, using proper energy management techniques in a VARIETY of environments.

For twenty years, I did Dall Sheep surveys in central Alaska. Working canyons, cracks and crevices teaches one a lot about WORKING the airplane in three dimensional space.

Our wold is NOT a flat field, with well demarcated boundaries.

MTV

You are correct Mike, at least partially. The pull up isn't available, but you most likely already have the available altitude required to allow the nose to drop in the turn. The pull up is to trade airspeed for altitude. In the canyon/mountain environment we are usually already slowed up and have the available altitude so no pull up is needed. Up here in Canada 99% of our spraying is done racetrack, so with the turbines we don't need to turn away from our turn, just straight out and then turn towards our line. Makes a 180 degree turn in 1200 feet horizontally very comfortable. That's with about 2-300' of available altitude, lower then a lot of people are comfortable with.

Thanks Mike and David. Mike, you explained the energy management turn well, but like David said no P or teardrop downwind turn with zoom reserve airspeed from being in ground effect with full power in the field. Also from just above telephone pole height with the dry spreader, we only have sorta cruise (pulling a lot of wind) airspeed. However, we can spread in the wind. In a twenty knot crosswind, an energy management and wind management 180 degree turn back doing back to back to the next row 50' distant can safely be done. This is the turn (at 600') I have students do instead of the useless level S turn across a road to show them the wind can be our friend. Parallel a road downwind of the road and turn into a headwind component to the target which is the road going the other way. The energy management wind management turn would find sheep, I think, better and safer than a level turn around the herd. If more time than one run is needed, fall off the target downwind and energy management and wind management turn back for another gun run. Also, on the top of the roller coaster, we are slower giving us more gun target time. No, I never counted sheep except to go to sleep. I did hunt Charlie this way.

In the pattern I teach energy management turns, but accept pilots just allowing the nose to go down as designed if they prefer. Yes, the initial pull up take a bit more skill and iterations to be safe. We have to develop the timed pull habit the same as most pilots develop the pull and keep pulling no matter what habit. I accept that climb is necessary to get to the recommended, not FAR ruled, 1,000'. It is not necessary to make climbing turns to do this. Why not just climb with the wing level and release that back pressure when we bank? We can then safely return to climb. All that Vy stuff could be practiced up high where it is still safe in an inadvertent stall. In the summer heat of day at Monte Vista we did a work around whatever pattern altitude for safety.

Whether rule or advisory, some really unsafe practices can get ingrained. Altitude over airspeed orientation at low altitude is unsafe orientation. Is it a rule or are we advised to get up there and stay up there no matter what?

Thanks for continually trying to keep guys like me from accidentally killing ourselves , Contact .
I really appreciate it Brother .

Have you ever considered putting all your sage advice in one thread instead of creating separate ones?

This is especially impactful given most of them are basically the same topic.

It's something to consider...I know it would really improve the experience here at BCP if as a community we refrain from blasting new thread after new thread and instead do our best to consolidate topics.

umwminer +1