Radar gain usage

OH NO! YELLOW?! WHAT THE HELL DO I DO?!

Just messing with ya. I always check everything over 1-4 times if I swap planes, witch really isn't that often in my kind of work. You never know who flew that aircraft before you. It could have been Neil Armstrong or that student you had that tried to kill you 837 times.
 
This is why I always hated swapping airplanes. It starts with the seat adjustment being on the floor (I'm shortish and drive like a grandma) and continues throughout the flight with little "gotchas" the last guy left for me. There was one guy who would leave the inverters in the "off" position. Cue hilarious clip of me starting #1 and wondering why the heck the engine was running but the gauges say it's not. "Well, boss, I'm sorry the engine got barbecued, but the ITT gauge said '0'. Gimme a Mulligan?"

Back in the good ole days at FLX I flew the only "L" model that had TKS and thus was up north for just this reason. Yeah, I'm 5 knots slower than you, but no one will else will ever willingly touch this airplane. I could leave my crap in 29209 till the Apocalypse and all the switches would be right where I left them. Also prevented those embarrassing "oops it's 1/4 mile and VV001 and I forgot my charts" moments.
 
Crockrocket94 said:
Psh, gain settings...

Thats why we all need Nexrad or XMish stuff.

I cant recall, does that even have a gain control? I fly the encore+ so few and far between these days.
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Does Nexrad or XM give you the tops of what you're looking at? Last I heard, years ago by the way, is that you don't get the tops so you could be looking at something big red and nasty and realize you are gonna top it by 20,000 ft. Or worse ask to deviate around it when there is nothing at your altitude. I think this is why ATC sometimes tells you that you have heavy to moderate precip at 12 o'clock when all you see are some clouds down beneath you.
 
NEXRAD I believe is calibrated to the VIP, actually its in dbz, at the 25,000 ft level.

Something big and red (a true red) and nasty is going to have a top well over 20k.

ATC weather radar and nexrad aren't the same.
 
SoCalAprch said:
Does Nexrad or XM give you the tops of what you're looking at? Last I heard, years ago by the way, is that you don't get the tops so you could be looking at something big red and nasty and realize you are gonna top it by 20,000 ft. Or worse ask to deviate around it when there is nothing at your altitude. I think this is why ATC sometimes tells you that you have heavy to moderate precip at 12 o'clock when all you see are some clouds down beneath you.
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The echo tops reported on those products are suspect, anyway. The really big stuff often doesn't reflect very well in the higher flight levels due to the amount of ice present in the clouds. The thing could say that the top is FL300 when it's actually 50% higher than that. My completely non-expert method is to instead look at CAPE or Lifted Index to determine the amount of instability that might be associated with the weather.
 
Is the lesson to put it back in the CAL position after flight, or ensuring that equipment is in the right mode when you intend to use it? :)
 
fholbert said:
Once I rented a plane that was just out of annual. When I rotated the nose shot up and I had to push down really hard to prevent a stall. The mechanic had left the trim in the full aft position.

My error or the mechanics?
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Who returns the plane to service. Mx or pilot?
 
dasleben said:
Please...please...if you insist on taking the gain out of the preset setting, please make sure that you put it back before handing the aircraft off to someone else. Got a nasty little surprise today banging into a nice yellow cell that wasn't painting on the radar. Turns out the gain was turned all the way down. Partly my fault for not catching it, but there's no conceivable reason to take a radar out of the preset gain for more than a moment or two to get rid of a little clutter; it can be outright dangerous if you don't put it back.

This has been a PSA, brought to you by your friendly neighborhood piston pounder who's running around down low. :D
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No disrespect, but you just made a thread to rant about someone's fault for you not doing your job, of checking the proper setup of a piece of equipment prior to use?? Basically you are saying that due to your complacency you could have endangered the lives of your passengers but it's partly the fault of the previous crew? Let me know how that goes with the FAA!
I bet from now on you'll now make it a point to check the gain when using the radar.
 
dasleben said:
Seriously...gonna be that guy, huh...

I already said my mea culpas in my first post. Yep, I screwed up by not seeing it. Now, please raise your hand if you've never missed something or done something incorrectly. I need to pick your brain and learn from you! This also occurred on my 26th leg in the previous 4 days. Stuff happens when you fly that much.

This post is meant to be a reminder to 1) remember to return the gain to preset (low gain could be hazardous to you and the next crew), and 2) check to make sure it's in preset before you go.

Anyone else want to get their cracks in? We've sure got some amazing aviators here at JC.
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Dude seriously,

He was just making a point, yes, we all make mistakes, but that's what we always need to minimize as pilots, and I'm sorry although I agree with your second point of this thread I cannot agree with the first part. Hey everyone please ensure the landing gear handle is left in the down position when you leave the aircraft, I don't want the wheels to tuck away during my take-off roll :banghead:
 
phoenix 23684 said:
Dude seriously,

He was just making a point, yes, we all make mistakes, but that's what we always need to minimize as pilots, and I'm sorry although I agree with your second point of this thread I cannot agree with the first part. Hey everyone please ensure the landing gear handle is left in the down position when you leave the aircraft, I don't want the wheels to tuck away during my take-off roll :banghead:
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Come on now. Nothing wrong with what he's said, imo. Yes, we should verify everything is as it should be before we fly, I don't think anyone would argue that. But you've NEVER come into a plane that was all jacked up after someone else was in it??? You can take this post in 2 ways. 1) I had a problem and it's someone else's fault. or 2) Hey, try to put things back the way you found it, or better.

I don't know about you, but I'd lean more towards the latter explanation. Sometimes one person's venting might help others to remember to double check. We ALL get complacent from time to time, and I don't think a lot of people snap themselves out of that unless something smacks it out of them. I'd rather it be someone venting rather than bent metal.
 
phoenix 23684 said:
No disrespect, but you just made a thread to rant about someone's fault for you not doing your job, of checking the proper setup of a piece of equipment prior to use?? Basically you are saying that due to your complacency you could have endangered the lives of your passengers but it's partly the fault of the previous crew? Let me know how that goes with the FAA!
I bet from now on you'll now make it a point to check the gain when using the radar.
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Alright, listen, new rule: You can't say "no disrespect," then go disrespect someone by calling them complacent. :P

phoenix 23684 said:
Dude seriously,

He was just making a point, yes, we all make mistakes, but that's what we always need to minimize as pilots, and I'm sorry although I agree with your second point of this thread I cannot agree with the first part. Hey everyone please ensure the landing gear handle is left in the down position when you leave the aircraft, I don't want the wheels to tuck away during my take-off roll :banghead:
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Big difference between the landing gear handle (or trim setting) and a gain knob on a radar. The former two items are included in flows and checklists. The latter is often not. In fact (and this was a point I previously made), when the fleet of aircraft is comprised of aircraft with many different types of radar installations and setups, we don't have a standardized way of checking the setup of each type. In a previous life when I flew jets, each aircraft had the same type; it was part of the receiving flow to check the radar panel in a specific way.

We don't have that here. It's very easy to miss something. Yes, it's my fault (saying it again, even though I said it in the first post) that I didn't catch it. The point of this thread, however, is not to blame the last guy who flew the aircraft. If that's what you got out of it, re-read it. The point of this thread is to remind people that the preset setting is the safest position for the gain. If I could put the previous sentence in flashing font, I would. This should help clarify my point as well:

Turning down the gain and not returning it to the preset position can be a hazard to you, and a hazard to the next guy who flies the aircraft. You'd be very surprised at just how many people don't even know what gain is, much less what happens when you turn it all the way down.

Hopefully I've made my point crystal clear by dumbing down the thread into two bolded sentences.
 
SpiraMirabilis said:
On our radar the gain knob, it does NOTHINK!! Maintenance disabled it and set the gain to low manually. I'm not sure why.
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Probably so you don't run late by deviating around weather. Don't be late, penetrate! :D

goggles.jpg
 
Just leave it all the way down and if you paint some yellow or red, just know you wont make it to the other side.
 
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