Since you asked

I’m a relatively new flight instructor in the Northwest with several students nearly ready for their private pilot practical tests. There are three examiners in our area from which to choose. Since I’ve not yet signed a student off for the exam, I’m not sure which examiner to pick. The first examiner has a reputation for being very tough on the exam, and he is a little intimidating (I took my commercial exam with him). From what I hear, the other two examiners seem to give fair examinations, and one in particular is known for putting her students at ease. I want my students to feel confident because they feel like they’ve earned their certificates, and I am leaning toward the first examiner as a choice for these exams. I’d appreciate any input you have regarding my decision.

A Northwest Flight School CFI

Greetings NFSCFI:

It’s natural for anyone to feel satisfied when they are successfully challenged by a tough exam. It’s also natural for students to interpret the successful passing of a checkride as a confirmation of their skills. But a checkride does not have to be tough, nor must the examiner be intimidating for students to feel that they’ve earned the right to fly. The checkride only needs to be thorough and fair to produce this result. Ultimately, it’s your job, not the examiner’s, to give the student the confidence he or she needs to fly safely.

The checkride should be an opportunity for your students to demonstrate their ability to fly based on the parameters set forth in the practical test standards. It shouldn’t be an opportunity to test their mettle by exposing them to an examiner who might deserve the nickname “Mr. Pinkslip.” As a flight instructor, you should be an advocate for your students. So why would you want to reduce their chances of passing the checkride by sending them to a tough and intimidating examiner? Stacking the odds against your students this way seems self-defeating and unreasonable.

So, here’s what I suggest. Why don’t you let your students make this choice for you? Ask them who they prefer to visit for the examination. I’m pretty sure I know the choice they’ll make. 

How much trim is too much?

I have a student who insists on adding two or three twists of nose-up trim while on short final. He says that it makes it easier for him to flare the airplane. I’ve told him that too much nose-up trim is dangerous because if a go-around is necessary, the elevator back-pressure might cause the nose to pitch up toward an unsafe attitude. I’ve had this discussion with several CFIs, but am still not convinced that I’m wrong. Can I have a ruling here?

R.K.

Greetings R.K.:

The purpose of trim is to reduce the pilot’s physical burden of flying an airplane. Your student is using trim to make it easier on him to flare the airplane. As long as he’s not using the trim wheel to actually flare the airplane, then he’s doing exactly the right thing. Sure, there’s always the possibility that he might be surprised during a go-around by the large amount of forward elevator pressure initially needed to maintain the proper climb attitude.

So why don’t you surprise him first by visiting the practice area and showing him what to expect if he goes around with large amounts of nose-up trim? As long as he doesn’t have tiny little biceps that squeak when you pinch them, there’s no reason he can’t successfully deal with the trim-pitch issue as long as he knows what to expect.

If we were to prevent all students from doing or using anything that might cause the nose to pitch up when power is applied, then we couldn’t let them use flaps, either. That would certainly cause a flap, wouldn’t it?

Dot, dot, dot...

I’m a flight instructor applicant who’s confused about how students should determine their level pitch attitude in a turn. I can understand why you’d place a window dot on the horizon line directly ahead of you when flying a tandem-seat airplane to maintain your level pitch attitude in a turn. But what happens with a student flying a side-by-side airplane? Do I place the window dot on the horizon line directly over the center of the cowling? Or do I place the window dot on the horizon line at a location that’s directly ahead of the student’s seat?

It seems to me that if I place the window dot directly ahead of the student as an attitude reference, then the cowling (and dot) will rise above the horizon in a right turn and descend below the horizon in a left turn, thus providing a false attitude reference. Help, please.

L.K.

Greetings L.K.:

Let’s place you in the student’s seat on the left side of an airplane with side-by-side seating. A windscreen dot placed on the horizon provides an accurate pitch reference in a turn as long as you place the dot directly ahead of your seating position (not over the center of the cowling). The reason for this lies in the constant height between your eyes and that dot in relation to a very distant horizon line.

Here’s a non-airplane experiment you can try to prove this point. Go outside, stand up straight, and move your glasses (you do wear sunglasses, don’t you?) down the bridge of your nose (hopefully you don’t have a drawbridge nose) so that the top rim of your glasses is on the distant horizon line. Let the top rim of your glasses represent the location of the dot placed on the windshield over the distant horizon line. The height between your eyes and that rim (i.e., the dot) will remain constant as long as you don’t tilt your head. Now keep your back straight and bend your knees to move up and down a bit. You’ll notice that the top rim of your eyeglasses (the dot) remains on the horizon line, despite your entire body’s moving up and down.

In a similar way, when you make a right and left turn in the airplane, you are rotating about the center of the airplane, thus moving up and down a few inches relative to the longitudinal axis. Since your eyes and the dot move up and down together, you can’t detect this vertical movement on a horizon that is so far off in the distance.

This is why a windscreen dot placed on the horizon line directly ahead of your seat provides a good aircraft pitch reference during a right or left turn. Of course, the same thing applies when you’re sitting in the right seat, as long as you place the dot directly ahead of you in that seat. 

Rod Machado is a flight instructor, author, educator, and speaker. A pilot since 1970 and a CFI since 1973, he has flown more than 8,000 hours and is part owner of a Cessna P210. Visit his Web site.