Never again on PE - share your mistakes

Steven Winslow
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Re: Never again on PE - share your mistakes

Post by Steven Winslow »

Doh! Thanks for reminding me about "vectors to final." You're absolutely correct that I chose RNAV over ILS because I thought it was faster. Turns out I'm learning a LOT more than just don't go below minimums. Thanks again for your instruction!
Steven Winslow
CEO/Owner - Air Northwest Virtual Airlines • http://www.airnorthwest.org
People should get what they want when they want it once in a while. Keeps them optimisitic.
boevad
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Joined: Sun Oct 16, 2011 4:04 pm

Re: Never again on PE - share your mistakes

Post by boevad »

Wow, what a flight. It all started out when I lined up at 1L when I thought I was at 19R at KSNA. I had already flipped over to tower so I couldn't hear ground trying to reach me. Ugh. Tower thankfully was very helpful and directed me around to 19R. Take off was uneventful, was told to switch to departure. Contacted Socal departure by referring to them as "John Wayne Departure". Ugh again. At first I was maintaining my assigned heading of 175, but my HSI swung to the left showing I had just flown thru V23 which was part of my routing. I was confused by that and thought I should follow V23. ATC was kind enough to give a few moments before asking "dude, where the heck are you going?!", although the controller said it in a much more professional tone. Doh! Thankfully, the rest of the flight was completed successfully into Palomar.
Guys, thanks for your professionalism and patience in guiding me around the skies tonight. I knew when I signed up I would be knocking some rust off, but man, it was worse than I thought. I am truly enjoying PE and am learning more every flight.

Dave
arb65912
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Re: Never again on PE - share your mistakes

Post by arb65912 »

Dave, do not feel bad, I started just a few weeks ago and you should hear me while my first attempts to communicate, taking off from wrong runway, calling Center Approach etc. etc.
I have learned maybe 5% of what I would like to learn but on thing is sure, the more time you spend on PE , the better it will get. Cheers, AJ
Keith Smith
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Re: Never again on PE - share your mistakes

Post by Keith Smith »

Alright, here's mine. It's a doozy.

I've been doing a lot more FSE flying lately, particularly after steal....borrowing a Lear 25 from Chandler, AZ and eventually taking it to Santa Barbara.

From there, I loaded up with a bunch of cargo and just enough fuel to make it to MRY with what should have been the legal reserves (although I didn't really plan an alternate and didn't TECHNICALLY look at the weather at Monterey.) It's on the coast, but don't worry, it ONLY gets horrific fog early in the mornings.

So, off I set early the next morning....

The data sheet in FSEconomy called for fuel burns of 120gal/hr. I can only assume they meant during taxi, or perhaps after both engines were shutdown and the plane was tucked away for the night. Truth be told I should've KNOWN these burns were way off because, and this can be verified by just about every controller on PE that has seen my fly that Lear so far, I have declared "minimum fuel" on every flight involving that aircraft since I stol.....borrowed it from Arizona.

In any case, I launch out of SBA into horrific visibility...but that's ok, I'm sure the coastal town that I'm flying into further north will have weather that is COMPLETELY DIFFERENT than the coastal town that I'm departing. Not even worth checking, right?

Alrighty, we're passing San Luis Obispo and the panel is lighting up like a Christmas tree. A depressing combination of the phrases "FUEL", "QTY", and "MIN"

Ugh. Soooooo, dust off the 3d panel, and crane my neck down to the fancy gadget that shows my remaining fuel in fathoms, dubloons or some other relic of a unit. Wait....what? That's GOT to be missing a zero or two. Oh dear.

Well, there's no way we're diverting...that won't do at all. This is, after all "To Divert is To Fail" Airlines(tm). Let's see...how can we stretch our legs a little bit?

Plan #1) SHUT DOWN BOTH ENGINES.

Annnd that's really it in terms of your basic fuel planning strategies at this stage of the game.

Fantastic! Let's go with Plan #1. It's FOOLPROOF! So, off they go. Much quieter, too. I should've done this before takeoff, we'd still have plenty of gas.

Now, checking the weather at sunny Monterey, I'm thinking we may have a problem. We MAY not have brought enough sunscreen and umbrellas...oh...wait. We have precisely as much sunscreen and umbrellas as is required, despite not having any aboard. It is indeed 100 overcast with RVR 1400.

Moving the story along, I flew the ILS 10R full approach from PEBBS, and flew the course reversal with both engines out. Once I was inbound on the final approach course and about 2 miles outside of the marker, I fired up the left engine to get the hydraulics back so I could get the gear out.

I was high and fast, but it was a non-starter to scroll down on the panel to get the spoilers out (they were armed for touchdown, but weren't deployed). I knew MRY had a fairly long runway, and I would stop unusually quickly being so light (since we very close to 0 fuel left).

Got to minimums, no field, of course, swapped to full screen mode with HUD and held the same pitch attitude and did my best to stay on glideslope. With the RVR being just 1400ft, I didn't get much notice of the runway, but there it was....oh so close to those trees, btw... Crossed the threshold at about 180kts, got the wheels down with minimal flare, full brakes, spoilers deployed, slowly, SLOWLY engage the single thrust reverser. Thankfully the LJ25's engines aren't very far apart, so asymmetric thrust wasn't a big problem. I was able to keep it straight with plenty of rudder and a little differential braking. I got it stopped with a reasonable amount of room left. Stow the reverser (singular) clear the runway, check remaining fuels....40lbs, about 7 gallons.

Taxi to the ramp, ran out of gas not far from the intended parking spot. Had I not shutdown both engines for the initial descent, or had I fired up both engines at the outer marker....I think I would've been hosed.

I was actually sweating slightly as I got out of the chair. Never again!
Alex Stjepanovic
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Re: Never again on PE - share your mistakes

Post by Alex Stjepanovic »

KS you said you had a video too?
Steven Winslow
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Re: Never again on PE - share your mistakes

Post by Steven Winslow »

Hmmm.....Sluggish climb out of SBP last night. ATC calls and asks me to verify my rate of climb. I'm struggling to climb at 200-300 fpm in my Bonanza. That's not normal. Oh well, must be the wind.....or maybe it's that I was running on one magneto. DOH!

Finally reach cruise altitude and get a little airspeed. Still flying at less than normal cruise speed, but it must be the wind, I tell myself. Flying along my route, TEC route SBAN71. ATC asks if I am attempting to follow the V186 airway and I respond that I think so. That's when I realize I didn't bother to check the route on m Low En Route charts before I programmed my GPS and instead of following V186, which has a couple of slight turns, I have gone direct FIM to NIKKL. Ugh! And I thought I had this flight planning thing down.

As for the magneto thing, I didn't realize I was running on one until I had an X-Plane crash to desktop. I'm sure that's not what caused the crash, but it sure makes a difference in engine performance!

I'm learning something every flight. Just glad it's in the sim!

Thanks to ATC for all the patience and instruction!
Steven Winslow
CEO/Owner - Air Northwest Virtual Airlines • http://www.airnorthwest.org
People should get what they want when they want it once in a while. Keeps them optimisitic.
arb65912
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Re: Never again on PE - share your mistakes

Post by arb65912 »

Following Victor airways mistake, exactly like mine described in one of the replies above...you are not alone. :)

As far as magneto, I am sure you checked them before the take of but I would like to know if there would be any way to find out about flying on one without going to Aircraft Failures menu, just by instruments in the cockpit.
Steven Winslow
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Re: Never again on PE - share your mistakes

Post by Steven Winslow »

I have all the Saitek panels. The switch panel has an ignition switch with left, right, both and start positions. I must have inadvertently turned the switch past the "both" setting back to "right" and didn't realize it. Of course, it was late at night and I didn't even notice the mistake until after I shut down.
Steven Winslow
CEO/Owner - Air Northwest Virtual Airlines • http://www.airnorthwest.org
People should get what they want when they want it once in a while. Keeps them optimisitic.
arb65912
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Joined: Sun Jul 17, 2011 5:40 am
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Re: Never again on PE - share your mistakes

Post by arb65912 »

Steve, I am using the Before Take Off checklist from real plane I take lessons and one of the checks is to make sure that magneto switch is on both. In the future, I will get these panels, it seems that they contribute to the realism a lot. Thank you. Cheers, AJ
Steven Winslow
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Re: Never again on PE - share your mistakes

Post by Steven Winslow »

Andrzej, not only do they add to the realism, but they sure make it easier to change radio frequencies. You don't have to use the mouse and struggle to see the frequencies on the aircraft panel. Well worth the investment!
Steven Winslow
CEO/Owner - Air Northwest Virtual Airlines • http://www.airnorthwest.org
People should get what they want when they want it once in a while. Keeps them optimisitic.
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