Checklist? (And forgive me if this has been covered)

[Tracey]

I'm sure this has been asked before (although I just did a search and didn't come up with a thread).

My question is: Do you always use a checklist-- not for pre-flight and run-up, but for cruise & pre-descent (and not just GUMPS, but pullilng out the actual checklist and going over it).

... and thanks for your input!

 

[Jim Logajan]

My question is: Do you always use a checklist-- not for pre-flight and run-up, but for cruise & pre-descent (and not just GUMPS, but pullilng out the actual checklist and going over it).

My CFI gave me a printed checklist for a C-152 that included the following, but I have never consulted it during those phases of flight:

CLIMB
1. Flaps - UP
2. Airspeed - CRUISE-CLIMB

CRUISE
1. Power (65%) - SET
2. Mixture - SET
3. Engine Instruments - MONITOR
4. Heading Indicator - MONITOR
5. Next ATIS - MONITOR

IN RANGE
1. ATIS - REVIEWED
2. Heading Indicator & Altimeter - SET
3. Radios - SET
4. Approach - REVIEWED
5. Mixture - ADJUST

To me, most of above points aren't really check-list material (at least for VFR flying) but are so fundamental that they need to be committed to memory as part of the ongoing flying process.

 

[Jim Logajan]

What if you forget one or more? Same answer(s) as frequently appear in NTSB reports? Forgot #2 on cruise checklist, fuel exhaustion, crashed. RIP

In theory, for optimum stoichiometric ratio, mixture needs to be changed every time the airplane changes altitude. And you can change altitude several times in cruise flight; do you believe then that a printed checklist should be consulted after every altitude change? When leveling off, I was taught the mnemonic "pitch, power, trim" but my personal, and no doubt anti-authority position, is that "pitch, power, trim, mixture" is slightly more complete and the one that should be committed to memory.

In my humble and no doubt dangerous opinion: manual mixture controls are an unfortunate engineering abomination. Where they exist they should be treated as a flight control on the same par as rudder pedals, yoke/stick, throttle, carb heat, and flaps. Pilots shouldn't be trained to consult printed check lists as reminders for any of these for any of the basic maneuvers, whether climbs or descents or turns.

However, I am merely a low-time pilot, and casual readers need to treat my opinion as singularly unique. There may be perfectly good reasons for why mixture needs to be treated as a non-flight control such that it should be on a printed checklist for flight maneuvers. The only dubiously "good" reason that I can think of is that instructors do not believe or train in a way that treats mixture as affecting flight performance. In that case, I can see why it becomes an annoyance that has to be relegated to a printed check-list.

 

[Jim Logajan]

You should rest comfortably in the knowledge that most low-time pilots have low-time answers. And since they have committed everything they need to know to their unfailing (so far anyway) memory, there's no reason to use any other resources. Carry on.

So you believe that a pilot, when in the pattern coming abeam the numbers on downwind, should consult a printed checklist containing the items "carb heat on, throttle back, trim, flaps, turn with low bank, flaps, turn with low bank, flaps, flare," lest the pilot forget one and crash. We know such crashes happen - so clearly printed checklists must be the solution, right?

The above "solution" is the simple logical progression to the kind of training dependency you are defending, which doesn't have any sound or consistent basis, notwithstanding whatever personal acquaintance you had with the Wright brothers.

Note to Tracey and other student pilots: my views are (mostly) quite outside the mainstream. Rely on the ways your CFI trained you. My arguments here are on a more abstract level and directed toward CFIs.