The trouble I keep coming back to with this notion is that for the last 45 year and some six thousand hours in around 55 different aircraft, I’ve always approached the problem the same way and that is to learn the envelope of the machine and correlate the feelings, to data…in an RV-4, or a sailplane, or a TwinTurbine Commander, a Rocket, or a SuperCub the practice is the same. The feelings and sights and sounds all equate to input at a sensory level that we respond to with a margin for error…I’ve made a practice out of margin exceedence for educational purposes in every craft I’ve owned. I’m sure most of us have.
Simply put…stall/spin in the pattern isn’t from poor instrumentation, it’s from poor piloting…ie…failure to prioritize, plan, execute, cascading failures, with overload scenarios….whatever….good pilots don’t stall and spin, when correctly trained.
The training of “incipient spin recognition” is inadequate…it’s akin to telling someone a loaded gun is dangerous, but not letting them see the damage, feel the recoil and complete the equation.
The same group of guys who screw up and stall/spin in the pattern or anywhere else, accidentally, will continue to do so with another light or horn or buzzer. There is simple a contingent of people who are above learning. And I have pissed off people here in This forum with the assertion that todays kit building is not the same educational process as it was 30 years ago. flight training is the same to me…it’s all focused on the airline pathway, with little emphasis on sport flying.
So…as much as I appreciate the advancement of the developing technologies, I think we taught better student back in Cubs and Champs than we do now…I fly helicopters, sailplanes and power planes and they are all building blocks of the feelings and interpretations of data, which I began learning day 1 in an old Champ with a crusty old instructors, who had little tolerance for fear or ignorance and even less for poor execution.
My contention would be, that you are solving the wrong issue, if stall/spin is your reduction goal, Teach people the correct way to fly, which is far from the airline fashion extended patterns…stop with making all the adjustments in the pattern and get the airplane configured for landing BEFORE it’s in the pattern and it’s enlightening how much easier it all gets…
I advocate going beyond the burbles and stick shakes and wobbles…stall the plane….feel it….and the squawk boxes can all disappear and go quiet along with the airspeed indicator…because none of that data is relevant to the feelings of your sense correlating what the aircraft is telling you.
I’ve been taking guys flying forever, covering over the airspeed indicator and saying now what? And the answer is fly.__ you can see the angle of attack, you can feel it and feel the mush, and the burble and the stick…and it DOES NOT ‘MATTER one bit the speed on a gauge…it does it when it does and if you know it…then you respond, now in a fighter jet, coming to a pitching deck…I totally get the thesis and I’m sure there’s plenty more scenarios…
but in my airplane, regardless of weight…against ANY other aircraft and pilot, equipped with any electronic device…I can land on the same strip with not a worry in the world with my airspeed indicator completely covered…so Why on earth would I want one more thing in the cockpit to beep, flash, talk or do anything…let alone to develop it as a crutch to pretend-rely on…?
Not that I am eschewing advanced electronics in the cockpit….in the sailplane, it is impossible to select the best thermals and escape the highest sink without an audio variometer, which I absolutely see and know the value of….but in my 6…in the pattern with 10 gallons in the tanks…my wife next to me and 30 lbs of baggage, coming in to land? Nope…I don’t need an optimal approach for every landing, just a conservative one, 80 indicated in the 6, bled off to 70 over the fence works right up to gross weight…but you have to know your plane.
If my airspeed indicator crapped out tonight on my way home, it wouldn’t amount to a hill of beans for my landing. And that is my worry…those of you who fly thinking AoA indicators, lights, horns, beeps are going to make you safe….I disagree. And this works on my RV-6, Vagabond, old Waco, high performance sailplane….anything…
What will make you safe is realize that the requirement to know your airplane is an absolute. Those of you asking all these questions, to support your AoA theory such as…what about in a 4g turn…blah blah blah….guess what…4g stalls exactly like 1,2 or 3g…with the exception of the acceleration. the aircraft is still benign, as is the recovery…just the force of gravity adds a different feeling…learn those feelings and learn them well.
Ya wanna not stall and spin…??… Keep the ball centered, in fact in an RV….just keep your feet light and near centered and it’s pretty much dealt with.
To me, it’s ano’ther crutch, to allow those who take learning less seriously, to advance at a rate that exceeds their skill and understanding and it’s another mechanical thing that has a failure mode that just learning your machine and its aerodynamics and responses and feelings doesn’t require.
gadgets are neat and fun and I applaud those spending effort and time and money in the pursuit of their dreams, while being thankful that they are not my dreams. Above all…you HAVE to love experimental aviation in that all of us, get to choose what WE want for our own unique paths.
Respectfully…..me
Simply put…stall/spin in the pattern isn’t from poor instrumentation, it’s from poor piloting…ie…failure to prioritize, plan, execute, cascading failures, with overload scenarios….whatever….good pilots don’t stall and spin, when correctly trained.
The training of “incipient spin recognition” is inadequate…it’s akin to telling someone a loaded gun is dangerous, but not letting them see the damage, feel the recoil and complete the equation.
The same group of guys who screw up and stall/spin in the pattern or anywhere else, accidentally, will continue to do so with another light or horn or buzzer. There is simple a contingent of people who are above learning. And I have pissed off people here in This forum with the assertion that todays kit building is not the same educational process as it was 30 years ago. flight training is the same to me…it’s all focused on the airline pathway, with little emphasis on sport flying.
So…as much as I appreciate the advancement of the developing technologies, I think we taught better student back in Cubs and Champs than we do now…I fly helicopters, sailplanes and power planes and they are all building blocks of the feelings and interpretations of data, which I began learning day 1 in an old Champ with a crusty old instructors, who had little tolerance for fear or ignorance and even less for poor execution.
My contention would be, that you are solving the wrong issue, if stall/spin is your reduction goal, Teach people the correct way to fly, which is far from the airline fashion extended patterns…stop with making all the adjustments in the pattern and get the airplane configured for landing BEFORE it’s in the pattern and it’s enlightening how much easier it all gets…
I advocate going beyond the burbles and stick shakes and wobbles…stall the plane….feel it….and the squawk boxes can all disappear and go quiet along with the airspeed indicator…because none of that data is relevant to the feelings of your sense correlating what the aircraft is telling you.
I’ve been taking guys flying forever, covering over the airspeed indicator and saying now what? And the answer is fly.__ you can see the angle of attack, you can feel it and feel the mush, and the burble and the stick…and it DOES NOT ‘MATTER one bit the speed on a gauge…it does it when it does and if you know it…then you respond, now in a fighter jet, coming to a pitching deck…I totally get the thesis and I’m sure there’s plenty more scenarios…
but in my airplane, regardless of weight…against ANY other aircraft and pilot, equipped with any electronic device…I can land on the same strip with not a worry in the world with my airspeed indicator completely covered…so Why on earth would I want one more thing in the cockpit to beep, flash, talk or do anything…let alone to develop it as a crutch to pretend-rely on…?
Not that I am eschewing advanced electronics in the cockpit….in the sailplane, it is impossible to select the best thermals and escape the highest sink without an audio variometer, which I absolutely see and know the value of….but in my 6…in the pattern with 10 gallons in the tanks…my wife next to me and 30 lbs of baggage, coming in to land? Nope…I don’t need an optimal approach for every landing, just a conservative one, 80 indicated in the 6, bled off to 70 over the fence works right up to gross weight…but you have to know your plane.
If my airspeed indicator crapped out tonight on my way home, it wouldn’t amount to a hill of beans for my landing. And that is my worry…those of you who fly thinking AoA indicators, lights, horns, beeps are going to make you safe….I disagree. And this works on my RV-6, Vagabond, old Waco, high performance sailplane….anything…
What will make you safe is realize that the requirement to know your airplane is an absolute. Those of you asking all these questions, to support your AoA theory such as…what about in a 4g turn…blah blah blah….guess what…4g stalls exactly like 1,2 or 3g…with the exception of the acceleration. the aircraft is still benign, as is the recovery…just the force of gravity adds a different feeling…learn those feelings and learn them well.
Ya wanna not stall and spin…??… Keep the ball centered, in fact in an RV….just keep your feet light and near centered and it’s pretty much dealt with.
To me, it’s ano’ther crutch, to allow those who take learning less seriously, to advance at a rate that exceeds their skill and understanding and it’s another mechanical thing that has a failure mode that just learning your machine and its aerodynamics and responses and feelings doesn’t require.
gadgets are neat and fun and I applaud those spending effort and time and money in the pursuit of their dreams, while being thankful that they are not my dreams. Above all…you HAVE to love experimental aviation in that all of us, get to choose what WE want for our own unique paths.
Respectfully…..me
. LOC happens. It doesn't matter how well you are trained or what your backgournd is. I know plenty of really good pilots that have walked home, been picked up from the sea or worse when they screwed up. Hence, I never start a discussion from a position of "been there, done that, got the t-shirt." We all have different backgrounds, but what matters are the facts. My point is, fatal mishap rates haven't changed. I'd be happy as a clam if we could teach aircraft handling to mitigate LOC, but it's not as simple as "we suck at that," because we don't. We have to ask "why do we still kill folks in 2026 for the same reason we did in 1963 (or 1943, for that matter)?" Here's an example of me departing my RV-4 without any aerodynamic cues at all:
