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Primary on Monday
- Thread starter Erin M.
- Start date
I still don't understand that stuff. Fortunately, once you get past the training command, instrument procedures are mostly "make it happen." And it helps that I haven't seen an actual TACAN needle in...I don't even know.
Someone needs to get to the boat.
Well, by actual, I meant analog. The little head and tail markers are there on the HSI, but you don't have to rely too much on "falling tails" or whatever when you can see the TACAN itself on the moving map.
TACAN Point to Point is one of those things where I'm surprised how often it's needed and how easy it comes back. "Hmm, 110deg from BRC at 3 miles, I'm over here, little pencil move, boom. Come left blah blah degrees." As much as I bitched about it as a Primary stud, it's not something stupid.
Even with a real time plot of where everything is, like armada mentions, the concept of head falls/tail rises is actually helpful when dipping, as well, especially at night.
Even in a moving-map type environment, I'm still very glad I understand the concept, even on the civilian side. It's something that if you understand, makes some of the more antiquated gear in GA more helpful.
Even in a moving-map type environment, I'm still very glad I understand the concept, even on the civilian side. It's something that if you understand, makes some of the more antiquated gear in GA more helpful.
I don't have any problem understanding the concepts of navigating with a TACAN, but visualizing it in terms of manipulating the instrument ("turn this way and the needle will do this") always seemed much more confusing to me than visualizing it in terms of putting the airplane at a specific spot in the sky ("that needle is telling me I'm here and I want to be here, so turn this way").
Six in one, half-dozen in the other. I'm the same way - I like to visualize a God's-eye view of the NAVAID, and figure out where I am, where I need to be, and what I need to do to get there.
The 'tail rises, head falls' thing is great, but my SA throughout any flight should be good enough where I always know where I am in time and space, and don't have to rely on those rules of thumb to figure those types of things out. Even when holding, I should use all available resources to figure out where the winds are coming from and their approximate velocities prior to entry, so that it's no surprise where I am in relation to the radial.
Edit: Just to be clear, I'm not discounting the importance of learning how the radial intercepts/holding/etc. work using just the needle. I think armada and I have a different way of visualizing things, which I use to augment/QA the behavior of the needle.
MasterBates
Well-Known Member
Different people have different ways of understanding instrument nav. You figure out which one works for you and run with it... Sometimes being exposed to a new way to skin a cat helps but sometimes it doesn't.
In the meantime, don't lose sight of the big picture and have helmet fires over "head falls/tail rises" vs "God's eye view of the map," figuring out holding (it's not that hard... really... stay calm and remember to watch your fuel, set up your navaids, do landing checks, listen to the radios, or whatever it is you're really supposed to be doing).
When sitting on deck, sometimes I like to ask studs for a rough direction to xyz fix or navaid (xyz being something that will soon be important during the flight). Responses vary from "Really? It's obviously right over there" (good job, junior, keep it up) to "I... hadn't... thought of it that way before now..." (well there you go, and I hope this one small thing helps the flight go better).
In the meantime, don't lose sight of the big picture and have helmet fires over "head falls/tail rises" vs "God's eye view of the map," figuring out holding (it's not that hard... really... stay calm and remember to watch your fuel, set up your navaids, do landing checks, listen to the radios, or whatever it is you're really supposed to be doing).
When sitting on deck, sometimes I like to ask studs for a rough direction to xyz fix or navaid (xyz being something that will soon be important during the flight). Responses vary from "Really? It's obviously right over there" (good job, junior, keep it up) to "I... hadn't... thought of it that way before now..." (well there you go, and I hope this one small thing helps the flight go better).
I didn't intend to say you guys were saying it was irrelevant skill, just that it can help if your brain works that way. Ironically, when you dip, you have an updated God's-eye view, but you also have to gauge the rate at which a "head" falls.
I miss an RMI when I don't have one, even if there's something like a moving map in the cockpit. When I've flown with my dad recently, he's had a 496 set up. I loathe using that thing (the 696 spoiled me), but he also has an old Apollo GPS that only gives range/bearing/radial from the active waypoint. It's almost faster just looking at the radial (kind of like at the boat) than trying to futz with the 496 and its tiny screen. For me it works. Maybe not so much for others.
I'm the same way. A lot of studs get into this "GPS is mo' betta" mindset and I never did that. To me, it's pretty damn easy to dial up a TACAN and do things the old fashioned way.
Edit: That being said, the T-6 RI syllabus isn't really lacking and they DO teach "head rises/tail falls" across the street. Call me crazy, but I have literally NO IDEA why studs can't seem to go from a T-6 to a TH-57 or T-44 or whatever. The concepts are the exact same, the gauges just look a little different and the GPS is old.
What GPS is in the T6B? The alpha had the same POS that the T-34 had, as far as I knew.