Sport Pilot Talk

I have finally finished requirements for sport pilot and will spend the next few weeks preparing for my checkride.
I would appreciate any thoughts or input pertaining to the checkride, I know all dpe's are different but....

goinaround wrote:I have finally finished requirements for sport pilot and will spend the next few weeks preparing for my checkride.
I would appreciate any thoughts or input pertaining to the checkride, I know all dpe's are different but....

Safety first
Follow your checklist
Relax and have fun

If you can do your manuevers to PTS standards you have nothing to worry about as long as you follow the above 3 rules. The DPE's I have met DO NOT want to fail you, they want to make sure you will be a SAFE pilot who can navigate to a destination.

The flying part is easy. You've done it all 100 times.

The best advice I can give for the ground questioning is to review the parts of your knowledge test that you got WRONG. My DPE asked a few basic questions about currency and then went right after the codes for questions I missed on the knowledge test.

You need know your plane well, read POH carefully, including all the notes in it; you need do some weight and balance practice, give yourself some reasonable number, say your weight, fuel, etc; also, practice takeoff and landing distance calculation, density altitude; knowledge test is a good guideline, and FAA knowledge handbook for pilots and practice book are complete guides.

good luck

spooky981 wrote:review the parts of your knowledge test that you got WRONG.

You're required to do this with your flight instructor anyway, before he or she can sign you off for the practical test. In fact, if using IACRA, the instructor has to enter your written test record number, and score, and indicate that the deficiencies have been remediated. There is also a standard logbook endorsement for this.

One of my students just passed his checkride yesterday. When the DPE looked at his IACRA application, which listed his 98% on the written, he hassled my student by saying "I see you missed one question!" (The student aced the practical, I'm happy to report. So will you, I'm confident.)

One additional thought: remember, the DPE cannot really fail you. The worst he or she can do is not pass you this time.

Oh, and please remember that, when we say we hope you'll ace the checkride, that doesn't mean you're going to have to shoot down five planes!

drseti wrote:Oh, and please remember that, when we say we hope you'll ace the checkride, that doesn't mean you're going to have to shoot down five planes!

Thank goodness, I only shot down two during my checkride, LOL

Goinaround,

Congratulations on getting the hard part out of the way.

My contribution to your checkride is this:

THE PROPER LOCATION FOR YOUR EYES ON THIS CHECKRIDE... IS OUTISIDE THE COCKPIT.

Spotting other aircraft and flying mostly by visual cues is the purpose. Looking at the instruments momentarily is fine, just put at least 80% of your attention outside.

bryancobb wrote:Goinaround,

Congratulations on getting the hard part out of the way.

My contribution to your checkride is this:

THE PROPER LOCATION FOR YOUR EYES ON THIS CHECKRIDE... IS OUTISIDE THE COCKPIT.

Spotting other aircraft and flying mostly by visual cues is the purpose. Looking at the instruments momentarily is fine, just put at least 80% of your attention outside.

What! Heresy! What about the modern, high tech glass? Fixate on the glass I say. Otherwise, why beam with pride about your modern high tech cockpit in a VFR airplane?

And remember your clearing turns. If you are unsure if you need to make one ask. If your DPE ask "what is your primary form of collision avoidance", you are not looking outside enough.

zdc wrote:What about the modern, high tech glass? Fixate on the glass I say.

Even better: save money, stay home, and fly Microsoft Flight Simulator, with your eyes glued to the computer screen. We don't need no steenkin' airplanes!

zdc wrote:........ why beam with pride about your modern high tech cockpit in a VFR airplane?

The glass is not what LSA's need unless it's to save 5 pounds.

bryancobb wrote:The glass is not what LSA's need unless it's to save 5 pounds.

Bryan, I will admit to being somewhat ambivalent about glass. My previous airplane (a Beechcraft) was equipped for heavy IFR - it qualified as what the FAA calls a "technically advanced aircraft" -- and I used it to its fullest capacity. When I transitioned to LSA, I wanted to go in entirely the opposite direction. I shopped around for a six-pack of steam gauges, only to discover that, compared to the glass cockpit, they were both significantly heavier and quite a bit more costly. So, reluctantly, I ended up buying a plane with the Dynon EFIS and EMS combination.

At first I was quite uncomfortable with the glass. I found I ignored the EFIS entirely, and both flew and taught with just the conventional ASI, altimeter, compass, and ball. I couldn't understand why Dynon didn't have a six-pack mode in their software - I wanted things to look like an airplane, not a computer screen.

A couple of months ago, I upgraded the firmware in my EFIS (and also activated the databus between the EFIS and EMS, so I can cross-feed between screens). Still no six-pack mode, but the new OS gave me a much more tolerable layout option, complete with an HSI on screen. This is now usable for instrument training (always in VMC, of course) - though for primary training, I still have the students mostly ignore the glass and fly the sky.

I'm afraid glass is the wave of the future, and those of us who grew up on round gauges are going to have to be dragged, kicking and screaming, into the 21st century. The avionics manufacturers could ease the transition for us, if they would replicate a six-pack in software. This should be available at the push of a button, and would be an easy fix for them. (Garmin, Dynon, MGL, TruTrak, Grand Rapids, and Advanced Flight Systems, are you listening?)

Glad I'm not the only 'glass' flyer who cheated by using the backup round gauges

Actually, the mindset transition was relatively easy for me on everything except the airspeed. The Dynon tape just didn't work for me when on final. Probably as much a factor of learning my plane as it was the glass but I was determined to use my 'primary' instrument. So I eventually covered the analog gauge with a yellow sticky and forced myself to always use the D100. Took awhile but this old dog finally learned a new trick.....

Cost/weight definitely favor glass in an LSA these days not to mention the future value of your panel when you sell.

With the DSAB activated you can now reach up and dim both panels from your side to make the student look outside. Just remember how to turn them back up. Tom

drseti wrote:

bryancobb wrote:The glass is not what LSA's need unless it's to save 5 pounds.

Bryan, I will admit to being somewhat ambivalent about glass. My previous airplane (a Beechcraft) was equipped for heavy IFR - it qualified as what the FAA calls a "technically advanced aircraft" -- and I used it to its fullest capacity. When I transitioned to LSA, I wanted to go in entirely the opposite direction. I shopped around for a six-pack of steam gauges, only to discover that, compared to the glass cockpit, they were both significantly heavier and quite a bit more costly. So, reluctantly, I ended up buying a plane with the Dynon EFIS and EMS combination.

At first I was quite uncomfortable with the glass. I found I ignored the EFIS entirely, and both flew and taught with just the conventional ASI, altimeter, compass, and ball. I couldn't understand why Dynon didn't have a six-pack mode in their software - I wanted things to look like an airplane, not a computer screen.

A couple of months ago, I upgraded the firmware in my EFIS (and also activated the databus between the EFIS and EMS, so I can cross-feed between screens). Still no six-pack mode, but the new OS gave me a much more tolerable layout option, complete with an HSI on screen. This is now usable for instrument training (always in VMC, of course) - though for primary training, I still have the students mostly ignore the glass and fly the sky.

I'm afraid glass is the wave of the future, and those of us who grew up on round gauges are going to have to be dragged, kicking and screaming, into the 21st century. The avionics manufacturers could ease the transition for us, if they would replicate a six-pack in software. This should be available at the push of a button, and would be an easy fix for them. (Garmin, Dynon, MGL, TruTrak, Grand Rapids, and Advanced Flight Systems, are you listening?)