Ever screw up an approach?

[starchkr]

A flight not too long ago going into a NE airport with ceilings 100' VV and 1800 RVR (appraoch) and 1800-0 RVR (mid)...brought us down for the first approach with nothing in sight...no lights, no ground (this was all at night, so the lights usually will help)... missed to go around and try it again. Cleared for the approach with the warning that the ILS Crit area "is not protected." Yeah, that's right, an airport down to minimums and they are not protecting the Crit area. So this appraoch goes well and at DH we are a little right of course (1/2 dot) and we get the rabbits in sight, shortly after we see the runway end lights, AND the 737 sitting right in front of us holding for the runway. I quickly put it in a bank to line up with the runway and as we touch down my co-pilot says he could have reached out and touched the 73 if we had continued any longer without that correction. So two points to this story... 1. try your damndest to keep that course centered on an approach, and 2. always make sure that the Crit area is clear if you are shooting a super low appraoch like that.

"dangdest" huh..man the censor even got that?!

 

[A Squared]

Flying a bit, then one of us:

"Oh man, I set 200 above DH as our minimum..."

which one of you? 'fess up.

 

[JimG]

"How many marker beacons can you put in your panel before you're weight and balance is out of omni range?"

Oops.....I guess I shouldn't have been in such a hurry to post so I could go to bed last night....



"I came back around and used the autopilot to shoot the approach and handflew it uneventfully the last couple miles inbound."

Out of curiosity, why wouldn't you have done that the first time?

As a habit, all the approaches I have flown, or flights through clouds have been with an autopilot either tracking the course, or a heading bug on the approach and me on the edge of my seat watching it.

 

[Fury220]

As a habit, all the approaches I have flown, or flights through clouds have been with an autopilot either tracking the course, or a heading bug on the approach and me on the edge of my seat watching it.

Really? What's wrong with hand-flying in a little IMC?

 

[JimG]

Really? What's wrong with hand-flying in a little IMC?

Nothing I guess if it's "a little IMC" and there are no rocks in the clouds.

Problem is, IMC out west isn't usually "little" and the clouds all have rocks in them down low (when climbing/decending).

All of the approaches I have flown have been surrounded by rocks too, so there's not alot of room for error. Even the few along the California coast I've flown in/out of (SAN comes to mind first) are surrounded by hills.

Plus....I don't have alot of actual IMC time for the above reasons combined with ice that's usually found in clouds here from October through April.

It's a personal thing I guess. I hand fly most of the time when practicing approaches, or flying cross country (with a check pilot) under a hood, but when it's the real thing, I want all the help I can get.

 

[starchkr]

I would rather hand fly in IMC than have to rely on a piece of equipment that may be not working correctly. Just remember, that autopilot will only do what you tell it to do, if you program it wrong or ask it to do the wrong thing...you will find those "boulder filled clouds" just as fast as hand flying the thing. Actually, i will only use the autopilot during approaches in training so that i can keep the currency going for using the thing on my airman letter...other than that, it is for cruise and some of the descent only (i love hand flying in IMC, especially low approaches). I love hand flying in IMC, it gives me a better feel of what the a/c is doing versus letting the a/p fly it to say 500' agl and then taking over not knowing what the heck the plane is going to do when i take over. I have had autopilots give me the controls completely out of wack with a lot of force required to correct and retrim what it put in while flying...I was very glad i didn't take over that night while shooting an ILS to mins and finding out at 300' agl that the plane wants to go into a very steep bank and nose down attitutde.

Just my thoughts on it though.

 

[User546]

"I came back around and used the autopilot to shoot the approach and handflew it uneventfully the last couple miles inbound."

Out of curiosity, why wouldn't you have done that the first time?

Typically I do.

However, I'll typically make it a point to handfly atleast one out of every four or five approaches just to keep "the touch."

95% of my flying is done in a jet with an an all glass cockpit. So anytime I get into a turboprop or piston airplane with hard ball gauges, I like to handfly approaches so that my scan doesn't get too rusty.

 

[Moonfly201]

Back in the late 80's I was flying a lot of single pilot IFR with one VOR/ILS, a DME, a loran and a wing-leveler in an old Mooney that had the car-jack type hand-pump flap actuator handle sticking out of the bottom of the panel. Every now and then, instead of the usual 3 or 4 pumps to get full flaps down, it took 15 or 20 pumps. Maybe dirt in the valve or something, but it was intermittent and I was slow to get it fixed.

Back at home base the only ILS lands to the northeast, but when the weather is low the winds are generally strong out of the south or southwest until a few hundred feet above DH. So, late one night I'm returning home in some miserable weather, and was usual I'm fighting to stay on the localizer with multiple wind shifts on the way down, with a ripping tailwind and the DME showing 140kts.

About 500' above DH I reduce the power and start pumping the flaps, and of course I feel no resistance as the valve (Murphy's law) picks that instant not to work. About then I hit some turbulence as the tailwind switches to a gusting crosswind and the runway appears about 100' above DH. I'm positioned high, and still fast, but I'm back to idle power and trimming missing a third hand to get at least partial flaps down. My plate was full.

No way I want to go back up into the soup, so of course I figure just slip it in and land ... which I do. Unfortunately, the runway is sailing by, and I manage to touch down as the red runway end lights begin. As I brake the plane hydroplanes, so I pump them like a car on ice and come to a stop right at the end.

The guy in the Tower asks, "not counting the landing ... how was the rest of the flight?"

 

[JimG]

I would rather hand fly in IMC than have to rely on a piece of equipment that may be not working correctly. Just remember, that autopilot will only do what you tell it to do, if you program it wrong or ask it to do the wrong thing...you will find those "boulder filled clouds" just as fast as hand flying the thing. Actually, i will only use the autopilot during approaches in training so that i can keep the currency going for using the thing on my airman letter...other than that, it is for cruise and some of the descent only (i love hand flying in IMC, especially low approaches). I love hand flying in IMC, it gives me a better feel of what the a/c is doing versus letting the a/p fly it to say 500' agl and then taking over not knowing what the heck the plane is going to do when i take over. I have had autopilots give me the controls completely out of wack with a lot of force required to correct and retrim what it put in while flying...I was very glad i didn't take over that night while shooting an ILS to mins and finding out at 300' agl that the plane wants to go into a very steep bank and nose down attitutde.

Just my thoughts on it though.

Thanks for the input.

I've never felt comfortable letting the autopilot fly the whole approach for those reasons, which is why I wrote that I use the heading bug... to maintain course and wings level.

I'm manually adjusting pitch and power.

In essence, I'm still flying the approach, but it's like having another pilot help with the workload.

I've got one of the best autopilot's (came with it) you can buy, but I still look at it with a little bit of suspicion.