Cockpit Organization & Kneeboards

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Rich
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Re: Cockpit Organization & Kneeboards

Post by Rich »

Boatguy wrote: Tue May 18, 2021 9:39 pm
CFIDave wrote: Mon May 17, 2021 8:12 pm
N157DA wrote: Mon May 17, 2021 7:26 pm Ahh 91.171(d) requires you to sign the record of the VOR check... Still, I think you're probably fine.

I usually take a picture of the two bearings on my g1000 and shout the words "voice signature" into the live photo.
With WAAS, you no longer have to do VOR checks if using GPS as your primary means of navigation:
https://pilot-protection-services.aopa. ... ifr-flight

In fact, Garmin now sells IFR navigators that rely exclusively on WAAS GPS with no VOR functionality.
https://buy.garmin.com/en-US/US/p/577174
I think this is still pretty murky. First as @midlifelfyer points out, then also in the case of GPS outage and the MON network. The reg says IFR, not IMC and in the case of a GPS outage (I get weekly notices of planned outages in the west) navigating primarily by VOR is quite likely. I routinely get VORs in my clearances, but of course I use the GPS for nav to the VOR. On a few flights I've switched to the VOR for navigation and was amazed to see the CDI centered and the GPS cross track error up to 1nm. Unless you end up in the wrong airspace, CFIT, or get a ramp check that is really focused on the VORs, nobody is going to know.

Does the VOR check implicitly also check the accuracy of the ILS? If so, there is a good reason to keep checking.
If WAAS-equipped, it is permitted as the sole source of navigation. There are now aircraft flying (presumably including IFR) with ONLY GPS NAV capability. This is, of course, silly, given the Air Force insisting on intentionally running tests that compromise GPS signals.

Remember that a localizer provides a signal that needs a different signal interpretation that is independent of course setting on the CDI and there is no way to check your glideslope receiver accuracy. Also note that VOR checks allow pretty significant error.

I notice that when flying GPS along airways it's almost always true that it will turn me on a course slightly different than that published for the airway, yet it takes me perfectly from waypoint to waypoint.

Here's another wrinkle: The magnetic poles are constantly moving. (There have been a flurry of recent runway renaming in the last couple of years here in the Northwest.) This typically happens after a drift of 10 degrees or so. But the airways specify magnetic courses down to a single degree and they are not being updated with great frequency. So it would not surprise me that a lat/long designated waypoint (or the route to it) would be at a different real azimuth from a particular VOR than that defined by a published airway course that hasn't been updated in 5-10 years.
2002 DA40-180: MT, PowerFlow, 530W/430W, KAP140, ext. baggage, 1090 ES out, 2646 MTOW, 40gal., Surefly, Flightstream 210, Orion 600 LED, XeVision, Aspen E5
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Boatguy
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Re: Cockpit Organization & Kneeboards

Post by Boatguy »

Rich wrote: Tue May 18, 2021 10:32 pm Here's another wrinkle: The magnetic poles are constantly moving. (There have been a flurry of recent runway renaming in the last couple of years here in the Northwest.) This typically happens after a drift of 10 degrees or so. But the airways specify magnetic courses down to a single degree and they are not being updated with great frequency. So it would not surprise me that a lat/long designated waypoint (or the route to it) would be at a different real azimuth from a particular VOR than that defined by a published airway course that hasn't been updated in 5-10 years.
I explored that problem a couple of years ago. The VORs are never recalibrated for changes in variation. You can look in airnav.com and see the variation setting of a VOR and the year it was set. Since the VOR's are never recalibrated, the radials never change and are with respect to the VOR, not magnetic north. I suspect that is intentional to minimize the need to service VORs and republish charts.

I haven't looked for it, but it probably makes for some strange airways where the radial changes at the cross over by <> 180˚.

But we are seriously drifted from cockpit organization!
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Rich
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Re: Cockpit Organization & Kneeboards

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I've taken the next step for my time log entries, which have heretofore been into a spreadsheet. This is very practical for me as I'm the only user of my plane and conversely it's the only plane I fly.

What I've discovered is I can accomplish this by using the logbook feature of Foreflight. I've long ignored this feature altogether but in doing some cleanup I discovered that it has entries for Hobbs and Tach in and out. Exactly what I've been entering manually. And you can use the Hobbs differences to drive flight time, which is usually right anyway, but can be used to override the FF deduced time.

Today I also discovered that the start times for Hobbs and Tach values for "this" flight default to the end values for each of those respective times I entered for the previous flight. Super-convenient.

In reality FF is not my "official" logbook. I use the FF entries to enter into LogTen when back at my Mac and periodically copy into my paper logbook.
2002 DA40-180: MT, PowerFlow, 530W/430W, KAP140, ext. baggage, 1090 ES out, 2646 MTOW, 40gal., Surefly, Flightstream 210, Orion 600 LED, XeVision, Aspen E5
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Rich
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Re: Cockpit Organization & Kneeboards

Post by Rich »

I’ve started using ForeFlight logbook for recording my flights and the airplane Hobbs and tach time, since it has provision for this and pre-populates the start values for both based on the last flight. I also dedicate a scratchpad to record the most recent annual, oil change, etc. for ready reference. This approach has the added advantage that these items automatically propagate to FF on my iPhone and my other iPad so I have ready access to this information all the time.
2002 DA40-180: MT, PowerFlow, 530W/430W, KAP140, ext. baggage, 1090 ES out, 2646 MTOW, 40gal., Surefly, Flightstream 210, Orion 600 LED, XeVision, Aspen E5
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