Small logbook mistakes - what would you do?

E_Dawg

E_Dawg

Moderator
My buddy's been going over his logbook a bit more lately and has been finding a few small mistakes - such as 0.1 too much or too little in some of the total columns that have been carried through to the end of the logbook.

Would you just disregard this completely... or would you write the correct totals on the last page and possibly raise future questions about it?

None of the errors add up to much more than a few hours. In come cases my friend flew more than logged and in some cases he flew less; i.e. the errors are not all in his 'favor'.
 
A few hours in error would be aggregious in my opinion. In a pilot interview, an individual's attention to detail can largely be assessed by his logbook record keeping. Is it neat and accurate? Is it detailed? Does it show required currency? Numerous errors in math can indicate a person who lacks attention to detail or a lack of discipline. Especially for a professional pilot or an aspiring professional...the logbook should be kept neatly and accurately. If it's bad enough, you may consider purchasing an electronic logbook software program and starting over. I've never used one before...but it may help clean up a disorderly logbook. Maybe someone else can comment.

I had a 1.2 hour discrepancy several years ago after about 4000 hours of flying. It was an addition error in adding up the column, that I traced back several pages. I took a plain white sticker and affixed it to the page with the error and then referred to the page where the total time was corrected. I believe my logbook was in this condition when I interviewed at DL and the interviewer made no mention of it.

I've heard of some pilot interviews where an evaluator will total columns at random to see if they add up. My logbook was examined in fair detail at each place I've interviewed.
 
I was told that you should make a slash through the error (don't scribble over it) and make the correction next to it. This way anyone checking your logbook can see what the number was and what change was made.
 
Putting a line through it does work but if you have to carry the correction foward a whole bunch of pages it can get ugly. My handwritting sucks so I switched over to an electronic logbook (excel spreadsheet at first, then logbookpro) right after I finished up my instrument rating. I double logged everything digitally and in my logbook until I hit about 400 hours and then I got tired of trying to read my handwritting and dropped the paper logbook. Most logbook software allows you to print out your book using the standard Jepps formate, or one that you customize. Sure it is nice looking back over all the handwritten entries and remembering each flight, but the ease of typing an entry line in (and actually being able to read it) is more of an advantage.

As to the origional question. I would just note the error on the page where the error is and then use one line on the current page to correct the flight times and reference the error page.
 
When I was totalling my time for my interview I had to go through and list all aircraft flown and times in each. So I got Excel going. It turns out I missed adding in an entire page! So went to the bottom of the current page and made all the corrections and pasted the spreadsheet in the back of the book and called it "Logbook audit, March 10th, 2005"

The interviewer appreciated the corrections and the documentation. I'm not sure what they thought of my error in overlooking a whole page though. Humans!
 
I'm very picky on my logbook. I keep an electronic logbook and a paper logbook. At the end of every page in the paper logbook I make sure it matches the electronic logbook. So far everything adds up except a couple of columns where they are .2 and .3 off and I can't find the mistakes...which drives me crazy! :banghead:
 
i had a few mistakes early on in mine that had to be carried forward about 40 pages. That looked really ugly! I took a blank page and made my corrections there in the logbook with the new totals.
 
Page totals in pencil

All my logbook entries are in black ink, but my page totals are all in pencil. Most logbook errors are math errors when you do your totals. If you find a total error it is very simple to go back and erase all the affected totals and re-write them. For the errors I made prior to changing over to pencil totals I made a corrective entry stating the date I made the change and included the necessary corrections in the logbook column. Example:
Date A/C ID From TO Total Time ASEL AMEL ..... Comments
12/11/05 ........ ...... ... -5.6 -5.6 +1.2 Corrective entry for miscalculations on dates: 1/1/01, 2/5/02, 3/7/03

Then when you run the totals from then on, the numbers will be accurate. I also do a quick total audit every time I total a page, ie. Total time = ASEL + AMEL + Rotorcraft (and whatever other times you have) it's a quick way to make sure your totals are still on.
 
For all who were FE's. Did you log FE time at all? Did you log it total time? I logged it under an FE column, but did not log it total time. I know some who have logged it under total...but nothing else. Then again....I know alot who never even entered it into their log.

What did you guys do?
 
Thanks for this topic! It has been slow this week at work with Christmas coming up and I've been spending my time entering my whole logbook onto http://www.logshare.com/.

Over the course of all of this I've found three minor errors that are fixable, just that they foul up the totals on all of the pages that follow. I think I will follow the suggestion to make an entry to note the corrections and reference the entries that were in error on the last page and then fix the totals.

The plan from now on is to make my logbook entries on the fly with logshare.com while the paper logbook sits in the fire safe at home. Then every once in a while I'll take some time to sit down with a tasty beverage and update the paper one.


Mike
 
Van_Hoolio said:
Thanks for this topic! It has been slow this week at work with Christmas coming up and I've been spending my time entering my whole logbook onto http://www.logshare.com/.
Click to expand...

I did mine in MS Access. It took me two days to do 1500 hours or so (almost all 1.0 hour flights too!). It is nice, because on airline applications, some of them ask for things such as "Night, PIC, Xcty" (I think this was from ameriflight's). With Access, I can just do a query and get the results within 0.5 seconds. Otherwise, I'd have to look through each page in my logbook and look for all the night, then PIC, and see if it was xcty or not. It was well worth it. I'm sure one could do the same with software (Logbook pro comes to mind) but access for me was free. I'd look into it if I were you, it could save a LOT of time later on.

And for the original poster, I made one line entries to cancel out the time. When I made the above mentioned Access logbook, I found even after doing several audits over the course of a year I still missed things. I basically had to re-write almost every page in my first logbook (using a line to get rid of the previous value, then writing over to the side of the column). It wasn't ever mentioned at the regional I interviewed with, and they hired me so I never got a second opinion. Just make sure your totals at the current time are totally accurate.

~wheelsup
 
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