The ‘good old days’ weren’t so good

The reality is that most things from the good old days really weren’t that great when viewed through today’s lens. I would agree that there are too many silly FARs, but today’s airspace nomenclature isn’t all that confusing anymore, my sometimes-bratty daughters have turned out to be wonderfully thoughtful adults, and, wow, “partial panel” has become an almost unnecessary skill in many airplanes.

It was that last one that had famed Bonanza flight instructor Bill Hale and me scratching our heads during a recent flight. I was participating in a Baron and Bonanza Pilot Training course in Norfolk, Virginia, flying a new-to-me Beechcraft Bonanza A36 with a recently upgraded panel. The 1998 Bonanza was delivered to my two partners and me the day before I left for the trip to Norfolk. Its Garmin G3X Touch primary flight display and GTN 750Xi navigator were familiar, but just different enough from the panel I was used to that I had to hunt a bit to find certain information—all the more reason to attend a weekend BPT course and fly with some experienced Beechcraft instructors. I’ve participated in numerous BPT courses over the years and find it a great use of a weekend. The ground school courses provide in-depth refreshers on systems and techniques and the flying portion does wonders for scrubbing the rust off instrument skills. The courses are relaxing and fun because there’s no pressure. You’re there to improve your skills, not pass a checkride.

Unless you majored in electrical engineering, you may have trouble understanding what systems affect others in a modern cockpit, so it’s good go out and practice this stuff.The weather was scuzzy at Norfolk and forecast to get worse. We headed west where the weather was better and soon were practicing maneuvers and instrument approaches. When it came time for partial panel, we realized how hard it is to replicate realistic failures in a modern glass cockpit. The solid-state G3X Touch is backed up by the G5 standby instrument, with its own four-hour backup battery. The G5 is the primary input for the GFC 500 autopilot, which takes its navigation instructions from the GTN 750Xi. Should the G3X fail, the autopilot would still be fully functional. Should the primary alternator fail, our airplane has a backup alternator. The likelihood of the screens on both the G3X and the G5 failing is extremely remote. But in that instance, I had an iPad with ForeFlight on it, which not only can function as a moving map, but also can display attitude and heading information.

But even with the backups, things can still go wrong. The airplane has only one air data and attitude heading and reference system. What happens if you lose it? We pulled the ADAHRS circuit breaker to find out. (Yes, circuit breakers shouldn’t be used as switches, but exercising them a couple of times a year for test purposes is not a problem.)

Quickly red Xs were placed over the outside air temperature gauge and the true airspeed indicator on both the G3X and the G5 and wind information was replaced by a “No Wind Data” message. Clearly the air data computer information was gone—and along with it synthetic vision and the coveted flight path marker, the green circle. The heading indication on both displays was also Xed out. On the G3X display, we had a red X over the transponder window, but the standalone transponder continued to function. The autopilot continued to function in GPS mode. The G5 reverts to Track mode in the absence of heading information.

The point is, unless you majored in electrical engineering, you may have trouble understanding what systems affect others in a modern cockpit, so it’s good to go out and practice this stuff. While it used to be simple to understand the impact of a vacuum pump failure, for example, things are more complicated when you go all digital. On the other hand, the likelihood of a complete failure with a glass cockpit is much lower, and when things do fail, you are likely have multiple levels of redundancy to help get you to a runway safely. I will take the modern-day problem over the “good old days” any time.

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