Instrument Checkride

[eodfe]

I took my IR checkride last week. It took two flights because of the weather. The oral was pretty straight forward, know when and why you have to have an alternate, and it is not the 123 exception to the rule.
The first flight we did steep turns and slow flight under the hood. The second flight we did a VOR DME approach, an ILS approach, a NDB hold and the approach out of the hold. The flights were also straight forward although because of nerves or whatever I chased the needles on the ILS and NDB, ended up doing small s-turns to the DH and MDA.

I'm glad it's over, now I'm looking forward to comm and keeping practicing approaches.

 

[juskl]

I just took and passed my Instrument Ride last week. It went well, but due to the traffic south of the Phoenix area, it was a bit stressful to say the least. Realistic, but stressful none the less.

Try to find out who your examiner is going to be and what their testing style is. Though I was obviously responsible for all of the information, it isn't a bad idea to find out what approaches he/she likes to do for the ride and what areas they REALY like to talk about.

For instance, my examiner was huge on altitudes (density calculations and such). Realize that even if it is not in the PTS, you are still responsible for the info (Private Pilot Stuff can still come up). Know your systems, all of them to include brakes and various situations involved with them.

It is also helpful to talk (out loud) to yourself during the checkride and explain every thing that you are doing and things that you are looking for. This may help to answer something that the Examiner has not had the opportunity to ask and now won't because you just mentioned it. And talk about everything.

You are still pilot in command and the examiner is still going to try to do the normal distraction stuff. If you need to tell them to hold on a minute while you do something tell them so (but do it in a very polite way). That shows them that you are taking this seriously.

Here is a VOR situation that I was tested on, an fortunately my Instructor prepared me very well for this. VOR approach. At the IAF DME failure, VOR #2 failure, Vaccuum Failure. All I had was VOR #1, magnetic compass, and timer (Pitot-Statics were also ok). In the past, some students were not prepared for this one and pink slipped out.

In preparation for this. My instructor insisted that I realy KNOW my magnetic compass. We did three training flights just prior to the checkride, where the magnetic compass was all I used. It helped me huge. Especially when the DG on the aircraft I was using for the checkride went sour during the checkride. Old Murphy showed his ugly head that day. In the end all went well and my examiner just wanted to see if I knew my stuff. I did and it went well. If there was any minor errors on my part, I listened intently and was very greatful for the information and advice. Hope this helps....

 

[desertflyer]

I always dreaded the compass turns also! I decided one day to try them on microsoft flight simulator to see if it would even work. To my astonishment, they did. At 30 degrees of lattitude, turns to the north and south would undershoot and overshoot by 30 degrees. So, if you break it down, a turn to 360 will undershoot by 30 degrees, 030 heading undershoots 20 degrees, 060 heading undershoots 10 degrees, and of course a heading of west will read accuratley. A good way to become oriented before you begin any turn is to set the OBS so that your current heading is at the top. This makes it easy to see which way to turn and can aid in counting degrees between turns. Takes alot of the mental gymnastics out of the picture. As for shooting a partial panel approach, once your on your desired inbound heading, any correction can be made by rolling into a standard rate turn and emediatley rolling back out. This will give you about three degrees of heading change and help keep your eyes on the gauges and not the compass. It's always easier said than done though. Good luck!

 

[E_Dawg]

I never did get timed turns for more than 30 degrees of heading change.... there's no way I'm going to be able to do math like that on the checkride or worse... partial pannel in IMC. I needed one hell of a nap after my comm failure... can you immagine trying to subtract 200 from 150 and dividing by three on partial pannel in actual!? Anyways... I just turn to a compass heading which usually gets me within 10 degrees, then do a standard rate turn for the amount I'm off.

GREAT avatar desert!!!!!

 

[ready2fly]

Aaahhhhhh - you guys are talking about something right up my alley => partial panel/timed compass turns.

Here's a trick that my instructor taught me that works - every time:

Take the difference between your heading and the heading you are assigned my ATC - drop the zero - multiply by 3 - and that's the number of seconds you turn.

Example:

You're flying 360
ATC says "Cessna 123Z turn to heading of 020"

20
(drop the zero)
2 x 3 = 6

you turn right for 6 seconds.

Believe me - it works. We've been pounding that on the sim and in the plane for about three weeks now and now I find myself counting even when I have FULL panel.

It works... and it's easy.... and this is coming from a former Political Science major... so you KNOW I'm no math genius!!