Roger Roger
Bottom of the list
I guess if I’m driving a bus they’ll probably frown on calling the field in sight abeam on downwind and making the visual inside fire island.
Looks like turboprops are back on menu, boys!
- Thread starter alaskadrifter
- Start date
alaskadrifter
Landing gear operator
I’d love to fly a 2K again, for the right price and QOL.
Edit: Looks like fabric, wing warping, and biplanes (kinda) might be fashionable again someday too!
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SlumTodd_Millionaire
Most Hated Member
For some people, myself included, becoming adept at operating a complicated “appliance” is fun itself. It’s a nerd thing. Hand flying? Yeah, not so much. Just a waste of time and energy. To each his own, though.
Really good hand flying is a skill to be enjoyed/appreciated in the same way (personality dependent of course). I love the challenge of flying (or even driving) so smoothly that passengers never even notice changes of direction, attitude, power settings, etc. Smoooooth!!!
SlumTodd_Millionaire
Most Hated Member
See, I always found that far easier than smoothly operating the autopilot (which, as a passenger nowadays, I can say that very few pilots put any effort into). Autopilots tend to be pretty jerky when you don’t put any effort into learning how to manipulate them into operating smoothly.
I always found airline pilots bragging about hand flying so ridiculous. Who are you trying to impress? If you tell another pilot you hand flew, he’s like “so what.” If you tell a non-pilot you hand flew they think “yeah, I thought that’s what pilots did.”
I equate it to a trucker sitting down for a meal at a truck stop, and announcing to the waitress and all other truckers in ear shot “whew, I just put 500 miles on the odometer today, and didn’t use cruise the whole time!”
and yes, I understand that cruise control in a truck and autopilot aren’t exactly the same technology.
Boris Badenov
Fortis Leader
Can't speak to the bus but on the boings I've flown it's essentially a video game at that point. Try to keep the little white thing in the middle of the two magenta things. Not exactly my idea of "really flying"...
Stone Cold
Well-Known Member
So, am I understanding the OP? We’re going back to the 1980’s? Lol.
avgeekery.com
“Props” for McDonnell Douglas: Unducted Fans Never Took Off
1980s McDonnell Douglas unducted fan (UDF) technology was showed promise for reducing fuel consumption substantially.
avgeekery.com
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L-16B
Well-Known Member
I hear ya. I miss the hands on stuff though to be fair. When I fly GA and file (not fly) IFR I can tell my skills have eroded tremendously. I’m a way worse pilot than I was 10 years ago. I bet I couldn’t even do an NDB hold right now anymore.
Apophis
Resident Iconoclast
Yeah, our clapped out ATR's still require you to do pilot stuff, so my skills have stayed sharp. But I don't really have the same nostalgia for GA flying. Literally zero interest in it at all. Not one day has passed where I wish I could still fly some piece of GA junk around the pattern. THAT is my idea of boring.
SlumTodd_Millionaire
Most Hated Member
You’d be surprised. While my landings needed work when I came back to GA, the old school instrument skills were still solid. Yes, even NDBs.
Excellent point. Keeping your ”nose in the pink,” is nothing like the GA flying guys love to romantacize.
ahw01
Well-Known Member
It's a totally different kind of flying. Altogether
Click Click. Click Click <--- who remembers
Boris Badenov
Fortis Leader
But that's not important right now.
zmiller4
Well-Known Member
To some degree, flying ATR’s is like GA flying. I think I’ve flown approaches in them (empty) about the same speed as a Mooney. And it you’re flying out west for work, I could see how GA flying would feel pedestrian.
This. I didn’t fly GA for years when I was at the airlines, and then borrowed my brother in laws Cherokee. Took a few trips around the pattern to get comfortable with a reasonable approach speed, but I logged like 8 hrs of actual in 2 days with a 40yr old 6 pack and felt totally comfortable. “Riding a bike” is cliché but I think it applies to stuff you do for hundreds or thousands of hours.
Apophis
Resident Iconoclast
72-212 this morning at 37,000lbs our approach speed was 95 KIAS.
Hilariously slow for such a big airplane
///AMG
Well-Known Member
Those are French knots though right? So maybe 140 American knots? It's like when I switched the rental car speedo from MPH to KM/hr when my bud wasn't looking. He drove us around town at 25 km, and it was so amazing. Grandmothers were passing us and flipping the bird. He had no idea
ahw01
Well-Known Member
Technically they are noeuds.
Life is just one big comedy routine for you Navy bubbas isn't? (I gotta try this sometime)