Test Pilot

GENERAL

1. Who was America's "Ace of Aces"?
2. What popular, post-World War II airplane had specific models known as the Standard, the Trainer, the Inter-City Commuter, and the Patroller?
3. A pilot inadvertently fails to secure a manual, plunger-type primer after priming an engine prior to starting. What is the most likely result?
4. A pilot is tracking along a highway that has a magnetic course of 355 degrees while maintaining a magnetic heading of 003 degrees and a true airspeed of 150 knots. Without using a computer or calculator, determine the crosswind component.
5. Name the specific aircraft type represented by each of the following (unofficial) nicknames.

   Beechcraft Cherokee Blackbird Blue Canoe Dragon/Shady Lady Flying Bathtub Flying Brickyard Fork-Tailed Devil Huey Jug

   Mixmaster Plywood Bullet Rhapsody in Glue Spruce Goose Staggerwing T-Bone Tin Goose Vibrator Zero

6. Air flowing past a surface reduces the static pressure adjacent to that surface, a principle involved in the creation of lift. If this is true (and it is), why doesn't air flowing past the static ports on the fuselage of an airplane reduce the static pressure at those points and cause the altimeter to indicate an incorrectly high altitude?
7. During a preflight weather briefing, a pilot notes that "ACSL" is mentioned in the "remarks section" of a METAR report. What do these letters represent, and what conditions can be expected?

MULTIPLE CHOICE

8. Which of the following does not belong?
   1. Notam (D)
   2. Notam (L)
   3. Notam (M)
   4. FDC Notam
9. From reader David P. Hall: Who was an elected member of the U.S. House of Representatives?
   1. William Boeing
   2. Douglas "Wrong Way" Corrigan
   3. Glenn Curtis
   4. Charles A. Lindbergh
10. Which of the following does not belong?
    1. 122.7 MHz
    2. 122.8 MHz
    3. 122.9 MHz
    4. 123.0 MHz

TRUE OR FALSE

11. Excluding the effects of magnetic deviation, the magnetic compass in an airplane points to the magnetic north pole.
12. No American president has ever been a U.S.-certificated pilot.
13. Many fixed-wing airplanes are capable of inverted flight. There also is a species of bird that can fly upside-down.

ANSWERS

1. Edward "Eddie" V. Rickenbacker, who commanded the 94th ("Hat in the Ring") Pursuit Squadron during World War I and shot down 26 German aircraft in less than six months.
2. The Cessna 150. The Cessna A150 is known as the Aerobat.
3. If the plunger works its way out to the open position during flight, fuel will be drawn through the primer and into the engine. This most likely will result in such an excessively rich mixture that the engine will lose power or fail entirely. Always verify that the plunger is locked in the closed position prior to takeoff.
4. 20 knots. Each degree of crab (or drift) represents a crosswind component of one knot for each 60 knots of airspeed.
5. 1. Beech Model 23 Musketeer
   2. Lockheed SR-71
   3. USAF L-27 (militarized Cessna 310)
   4. Lockheed U-2
   5. Aeronca C-2/C-3
   6. Space shuttle (referring to the heat-resistant tiles)
   7. Lockheed P-38 Lightning
   8. Bell UH-1 helicopter (from the early HU-1 designation)
   9. Republic P-47 Thunderbolt (originally named Thunderjug)
   10. Cessna 337 Skymaster (a.k.a. "Push Me, Pull You")
   11. Lockheed Vega
   12. Cessna T-50 (Army Air Corp's wooden UC-78 Bobcat, a.k.a. "Bamboo Bomber")
   13. Hughes-Kaiser HK-1 Hercules flying boat
   14. Beech Model 17 biplane (a.k.a. the Flying Backstagger)
   15. Beech Model 50 Twin Bonanza
   16. Ford 4-AT and 5-AT Tri-Motor (from Ford's automobile, the "Tin Lizzy.")
   17. Vultee BT-13 Valiant (from its more-than-adequate stall-warning buffet)
   18. Mitsubishi A6M fighter (Allied name "Zeke")
6. The air immediately adjacent to the static ports is the thin boundary layer of the airflow, which is virtually motionless. This also explains why the boundary layer adjacent to the surface of a wing does not blow off dust that might be on the wing.
7. AltoCumulus Standing Lenticular clouds indicate the presence of a mountain wave.
8. (c) A (D)istant Notam relates to safety of flight; a (L)ocal Notam usually is not critical to safety; and an FDC (Flight Data Center) Notam relates to changes of a regulatory nature. There is no such thing as a Notam (M).
9. (d) Charles A. Lindbergh, the father of famed pilot Charles A. Lindbergh, was a Republican congressman (Minnesota) from 1907 to 1917. (Lindbergh's kidnapped baby was Charles A. Lindbergh, Jr.)
10. (c) The others are conventional unicom frequencies used at airports without operating control towers. 122.9 mHz is a multicom frequency that is used for more specific purposes. (Refer to AIM 4-1-11.)
11. False. A magnetic compass aligns itself with the Earth's lines of magnetic flux, which are influenced by mineral deposits and other magnetic disturbances in the Earth and rarely are aligned with the direction of the magnetic north pole.
12. False. President Dwight D. "Ike" Eisenhower had a pilot certificate. (President George Bush was a military, not a civilian, pilot.)
13. True. Because of its angled wing structure, the hummingbird can fly inverted for short periods.