BobsV35B(at)aol.com
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 Posted: Thu Jun 22, 2006 6:05 am Post subject: Disorientation. Was: More on the TC vs T&B (unusual attitude |
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Good Morning Rodney,
Since you are not an experienced IFR pilot, may I suggest that you wait a
while before you make a firm decision on what will and what will not work for
you?
As to flight without an attitude gyro, it was done all of the time before
the WWII boys came home from the wars. Up until about 1956 , the CAA would not
allow the use of an attitude gyro or a directional gyro during the conduct of
an instrument check ride.
My first two Bonanzas did not have attitude gyros. They did have directional
gyros and that was a much bigger aid than was the attitude gyro. I was a
chicken even back in those days and I did add an electric T&B to the factory
installed vacuum powered unit.
There is no doubt that it IS easier to fly IFR with an attitude gyro. Such
gyros had been available almost as long as had the rate of turn gyros. However,
they were very expensive and quite unreliable. Even from the very beginning
of IFR flight, the T&B had proven to be extremely reliable.
During WWII, it was decided that the military services would equip all of
their airplanes with a "Full Panel" It was much easier to teach "attitude"
instrument flying that it was to teach "rate" instrument flying. Rate instrument
flying continued to be taught, but only as a back up emergency technique to
be used when attitude instruments failed. It was then titled "Partial Panel".
Many such simplifications of training were used during WWII. It was
necessary to get the pilots over the target in the shortest amount of time possible.
It was also hoped that they would be capable of getting themselves, their
crew and the aircraft home if something went wrong, but the major effort was
directed at getting the pilots adequately trained in the shortest amount of time
possible. Many fine points of aviation were skipped over at the time.
It was called War time Expediency Flight Training.
It worked very well. We did win the war! (Not me, I was only fifteen when it
was over.)
Our industry is still suffering from some of the Old Wives Tales that
developed due to that shortened training period, but I am digressing from the IFR
discussion.
When those folks who did win the war came home, the ones that had found a
proficiency at, and a love for, aviation became the teachers and the regulators
of the rest of us. It was realized that it had taken much less time to train
IFR pilots using the attitude method. It was also noted that attitude gyro
instruments were becoming more reliable.
By 1956, it was decided that attitude instruments would be required for all
IFR flight. That meant that the training time could be reduced and more pilots
would fly IFR.
I HAD to add an attitude gyro to my Bonanza so that I could continue to fly
it IFR in the manner that I, and many others, had been doing for several
years using rate instruments.
I am not a particularly competent pilot nor have I ever been the Ace of the
Base. I did start as a flight instructor in 1949 and taught many people how to
fly IFR in the manner then required by the regulations. Some found it very
easy, other had to work at it a bit, but I never had a student that did not
eventually pass the test. When the FAA was formed and the full panel became a
requirement, we did manage to bring the applicants up to the new standards
faster than we had been able to do it using the older methods.
To shift gears here a moment. You mention that it is not rocket science to
determine which instrument has failed.
It may be simple for you and others who are blessed with rapid minds and
superior intuition, but many of the rest of us have found it difficult to do.
When our minds are telling us that we are sideways and our instruments are
telling us something else, we find it very difficult to reconcile the
situation.
I have found that many of us who have that problem find it easier to rely on
an instrument that tells us whether or not we are turning as against an
instrument that tells us whether or not our wings are level.
If I center the needle of a T&B, the turn will have been stopped.
If the turn is stopped, I will survive.
There are other instruments that can serve the same purpose, but most of
them will cause a conflict with my mind.
IF I have the needle centered, and, IF I have the ball in the middle, the
wings will be level, but IF my mind still says I am flying sideways and that I
am turning, I can just leave that feeling alone. I do not have to fight it or
try to make it feel that I am level. As long as the needle is in the center
and the ball is in the center, my mind can be telling me anything it wants to
and I do not care. After a few moments of flight in that manner, most of us
will find that our mind accepts the truth.
I do feel that we should be able to build an instrument that will do the job
better and easier with modern technology, but I have not yet found one that
is as cheap and reliable as is the T&B.
There are very few attitude gyros that are completely non tumbling. Most,
even the most modern ones, still tumble during an upset. The ones used by the
airlines as a backup instrument are priced between twenty-five and fifty -five
thousand dollars. Well out of my reach. And I do not know if they can be
tumbled or not! Probably not.
Even then, I am not sure they would help me to recover from a spin if I
should inadvertently get in one. The T&B works great for that purpose. The TC may
or may not help in spin recovery, it is dependent on the degree of flatness
involved in the spin.
I have very little experience in spin recovery using a TC, but experts have
told me that it does not work as consistently as does the T&B. Fortunately
or unfortunately, we don't do much spin training while IFR anymore!
I recognize that this disjointed discourse has become far too long. I wish
I had the time to get it better organized, but that time is not available
just now.
The main point I hope to get across to you is if you should ever find
yourself in a situation where you may have some confusion as to which way is up,
the choice of instrumentation to trust may be difficult.
JFK Jr and Carnahan both had working attitude gyros and they both died. Both
also had a considerable amount of training using the instrumentation which
they did have available.
One final point.
A failure of an altitude gyro is often very insidious, it just starts to get
the leans. If you make a correction for that "lean", it looks perfectly
normal. However, you will find that your rate instruments start to disagree with
the attitude instruments. That is the point at which confusion has it's chance
to take hold.
Happy Skies,
Old Bob
AKA
Bob Siegfried
Ancient Aviator
Stearman N3977A
Brookeridge Air Park LL22
Downers Grove, IL 60516
630 985-8503
In a message dated 6/22/2006 6:39:33 A.M. Central Standard Time,
rdunhamtn(at)hotmail.com writes:
As for tie breaker... Well, it's the same ole same ole. ASI, ALT and VSI for
pitch info. TC (or T&B) and DG for bank info. If the lights are out, don't
trust the electric stuff. If the suction gauge says kaplooey, don't trust
the vacuum Stuff. If you've got an electric AND a vacuum AI, you go with the
one that agrees with whichever system is operational and cover up the other
one. This isn't rocket surgery!
I think the tie breakers for this discussion are the NTSB reports. How many
times have we read that the pilot and passengers were killed when the plane
broke up in flight soon after the AI went tits up? That pilot was surely
trained in partial panel ops but when the chips were down, he couldn't
handle the situation and his victims paid the price for his penny pinching
in IMC. If you can afford to fly IFR, you can afford a back-up AI.
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