commercial maneuvers - steep spiral setup in M20J

[dominikos]

hey there, starting to prepare for commercial in my M20J. I went through mooneyspace archives and MAPA training manual. They were helpful with the speeds but I could not find recommendation on the plane setting for the steep spiral. 

Hence the question, to keep speeds under control, should I extend gear/flaps for this maneuver? what do you guys recommend?

thanks, Dominik

[PT20J]

Just do it as described in the Airplane Flying Handbook - that’s what the examiner expects. Idle power, best glide speed, steep bank not to exceed 60 deg. You won’t need gear or flaps. 

[cliffy]

How times have changed

My COM ride was two turns about points and 4 spins - Done!

In my Cessna 140 to boot!

[N201MKTurbo]

The intent is to see how fast you can descend. You want as much drag as you can get. I put the gear down, flaps down and speed brakes out. Idle power and prop forward. steep turn. You can come down at a crazy rate.

I did my check ride at night and did the spiral around a street light in the middle of a farm field.

[Hank]

6 hours ago, N201MKTurbo said:

The intent is to see how fast you can descend. You want as much drag as you can get. I put the gear down, flaps down and speed brakes out. Idle power and prop forward. steep turn. You can come down at a crazy rate.

It's a fun ride! I pegged the IVSI in my little C. It's a lot more fun than the straight ahead, near Vne "put out the flames" descent, and you fall out of the sky much quicker.

[Pinecone]

Do it in accordance with the POH.  You are not showing how fast you can get down, you are showing that you can do what the POH says to do.

Below is the POH for my 252.  It allows either gear up at 196 KIAS or gear down, flaps up at 165 KIAS.  Both give similar descent rates, but the gear down is a steeper angle.

 

 

 

[dominikos]

POH for M20J ‘78 does not have emergency descent procedures… will look for newer model POHs.

[PT20J]

Don’t confuse the Steep Spiral with the Emergency Descent. They are different Tasks in the ACS.

[dominikos]

here is the one from Manual 3203. Thanks for the suggestion @Pinecone!

 

 

[Marc_B]

1 hour ago, PT20J said:

Don’t confuse the Steep Spiral with the Emergency Descent. They are different Tasks in the ACS.

+1.

For initial commercial applicants seeking an ASEL or ASES rating, the evaluator must choose:
• Task A, Steep Turns, or Task B, Steep Spiral;
• Task C, Chandelles, or Task D, Lazy Eights; and
• Task E, Eights on Pylons.

My DPE let me choose which one of the grouping we'd do, so I chose steep turns. 

But when I was training, with steep spirals the whole point was maintaining a constant radius about a point with regard to wind effects on your target point (ala a juiced up turns about a point for PPL)  I had to choose an altitude that allowed a MINIMUM of three 360 deg turns and we often used this in conjunction with a power off 180 when coming back into the field to land.  We usually did these gear down (flaps up), at Va, with 50-60 deg angle of bank (60 at most).

VS the emergency decent which is just focused on getting down quick and using what ever tools you have to do this safely.  In my mind, bank for positive g's and slow below gear speed, drop gear and then speed up to Vle, descending right around the upper part of gear extended speed was a better choice.  We had enough bumps while training I didn't like riding the barber pole (but we did both before deciding to stick with gear down POH emergency descent for remainder of training and checkride).  But this was more of a get down maneuver than a nice looking circles maneuver like steep spirals.  Use your POH (or similar equivalent) to determine your recommended options like above.

Most of my maneuvers were performed targeting Va like steep spirals, eights on pylons, lazy eights...which for my training load was 118-120 kts.  So we just used 120 to make it simple.

But I'm not an instructor and the best person to ask is the instructor you're training with.

[Vance Harral]

As others have said, the Commercial Pilot Steep Spiral is a separate maneuver from the Emergency Descent.  Don't confuse the two.

The Steep Spiral is the commercial maneuver that irritates me the most as an instructor, because the ACS actually provides almost nothing in the way of guidance about how it is supposed to be flown.  There is also nothing particularly "steep" about it - the ACS standards do not require any minimum bank or pitch, so you can theoretically perform the maneuver at very shallow angles of each.

The only salient point in the commercial pilot ACS about this supposedly "steep" spiral, is that you must complete 3 turns before reaching 1500' AGL.  Using optimum turn radius angles of about 45 degrees typically results in a descent of about 800' per turn, and when I start practicing these with new commercial pilot students the first time, they often lose 1000' or more per turn.  So you've got to start the maneuver around 4500' AGL.  The shallower the bank you use below ~45 degrees, the more altitude you'll lose per turn, and that's really the only thing that forces the turn to be "steep".  Again, you could theoretically perform the maneuver with 10 degrees of bank, but you'd need to climb really high to complete 3 turns prior to reaching 1500' AGL.

Up here in mile-high country, we have to climb to about 9000' MSL to start the maneuver, which takes a while in a normally-aspirated airplane (even a Mooney).  To give us a fighting chance to complete 3 turns by 6500' MSL, I teach the maneuver in the clean configuration, and using minimum sink airspeed, which is slower than best glide.  Note that neither the ACS nor the Airplane Flying Handbook actually say to use best glide speed, the ACS says "a specified speed", and the AFH says "gliding speed".  I'm not interested in best glide speed because we're not trying to go anywhere, we're staying put over a specific point.  And since we have a goal to minimize our altitude loss per turn (again, need to complete 3 turns by 1500' AGL), min sink sink speed is a better way to do that than best glide.

[N201MKTurbo]

52 minutes ago, Marc_B said:

+1.

For initial commercial applicants seeking an ASEL or ASES rating, the evaluator must choose:
• Task A, Steep Turns, or Task B, Steep Spiral;
• Task C, Chandelles, or Task D, Lazy Eights; and
• Task E, Eights on Pylons.

My DPE let me choose which one of the grouping we'd do, so I chose steep turns. 

But when I was training, with steep spirals the whole point was maintaining a constant radius about a point with regard to wind effects on your target point (ala a juiced up turns about a point for PPL)  I had to choose an altitude that allowed a MINIMUM of three 360 deg turns and we often used this in conjunction with a power off 180 when coming back into the field to land.  We usually did these gear down (flaps up), at Va, with 50-60 deg angle of bank (60 at most).

VS the emergency decent which is just focused on getting down quick and using what ever tools you have to do this safely.  In my mind, bank for positive g's and slow below gear speed, drop gear and then speed up to Vle, descending right around the upper part of gear extended speed was a better choice.  We had enough bumps while training I didn't like riding the barber pole (but we did both before deciding to stick with gear down POH emergency descent for remainder of training and checkride).  But this was more of a get down maneuver than a nice looking circles maneuver like steep spirals.  Use your POH (or similar equivalent) to determine your recommended options like above.

Most of my maneuvers were performed targeting Va like steep spirals, eights on pylons, lazy eights...which for my training load was 118-120 kts.  So we just used 120 to make it simple.

But I'm not an instructor and the best person to ask is the instructor you're training with.

Huh, when I did my commercial, we did all the maneuvers.

[Vance Harral]

One other tip based on the most common mistake my students make.  When starting the maneuver - which you will do around 4500' AGL - the geometry is such that the point you are about to spiral around will be almost directly underneath you, and you cannot see it (not even in a high-wing airplane, but especially not in a low wing).  If you can see the point you intend to spiral around off your wing as you're about to begin the maneuver, you are much too far away from it laterally.

Because of this, I teach students to use a 4-way intersection of some small country roads that extend into the distance, as the point to spiral around.  Establish a course over the top of one of the roads while still well away from the intersection.  As you come up on the intersection, you'll lose sight of it, but you can use the perpendicular road extending into the distance to know when you're over the top.  Roll in to a 45 degree bank at that point.  You may still not be able to see the actual intersection at first, but you'll know where it is by the crossroads extending into the distance.  As you descend, the actual point will eventually appear off the wingtip.

[Vance Harral]

9 minutes ago, N201MKTurbo said:

Huh, when I did my commercial, we did all the maneuvers.

Not sure when you did your ride, but the current Commercial Pilot ACS covers this on page A-20, which Marc pasted above.  The 2002 version of the PTS has the same selection language, so examiners have had the discretion to evaluate only some of the performance maneuvers for at least 20 years.  They are allowed to require all of them, though, maybe that's what your examiner preferred.

In practice, it doesn't matter, because you have to be prepared to perform any of the maneuvers.  You're not supposed to get advance notice on which ones the examiner has selected for their Plan of Action, and again, they're allowed to require all of them.  I suppose every candidate hopes the examiner will only pick their favorites, but at least around here, no examiner ever tips their hand in advance.

[Marc_B]

1 hour ago, N201MKTurbo said:

Huh, when I did my commercial, we did all the maneuvers.

My DPE pulled up Appendix 5 of the Commercial ACS before heading out to preflight and asked me with each group what I wanted to do...you think this would make it less stressful, but there was a hint of "well you chose them so they better be good" feel to the question.  I chose steep turns and chandelles.  I flew with two instructors for commercial training and on practicing the lazy 8's the second instructor said "oh, your other instructor must have taught you the aerobatic lazy 8's" and this got me nervous that I thought I was doing this just as expected but what if the DPE wanted something else???

[Vance Harral]

39 minutes ago, Marc_B said:

oh, your other instructor must have taught you the aerobatic lazy 8's

Lazy Eights are another maneuver that's weakly specified in the ACS, mostly to accommodate airplanes of varying performance.  Because there is no requirement to enter the maneuver at any particular speed, or gain any particular altitude at the highest point, or use any particular bank angle at the apex (ACS just says "approximately" 30 degrees), you can meet the standard with very little pitch and/or bank.  A poster on another board once called this variant of the maneuver "Comatose Eights".  The argument is that the comatose variant is easiest to fly.  But it takes forever, isn't much fun, and I frankly find it hard to teach them that way because the pilot usually cannot get the airplane to continuously change pitch and roll when the total pitch and roll delta is small.

What I'd call an "aerobatic" lazy 8 is max speed on entry, whatever pitch gets you near stall speed at the apex, and the max bank angle you're willing to tolerate (in the extreme, it's a 90-degree wingover).  That would legally require parachutes, require an actual aerobatic airplane in practice, and probably earn a bust from the examiner even if you were legal due to being grossly in excess of "approximately" 30 degrees at the apex.

I think they're easiest to teach in a typical piston single with about 40 degrees of bank at the apex, and that seems to satisfy the examiners around here.  Note that if you're doing it right (and being evaluated correctly), nobody is looking at the attitude indicator during the maneuver - you judge "approximately 30 degrees" at the apex by looking outside.  The bottom line is that despite the intent of the ACS to take subjective judgement out of the examiner's hands, there is always going to be some degree of interpretation, and this interpretation is most prevalent in the commercial performance maneuvers.  Fortunately, most examiners seem to be reasonable about this, and only bust people on things that are clearly stated in the ACS as standards.  For the lazy 8s, that's having an exit energy at the 180 point which is within 100' and 10 knots of the entry energy; and - the thing my students tend to have trouble with - continuously changing bank and pitch throughout the maneuver.  I spend most of my coaching time pointing out that the pilot has become "stuck" on a fixed pitch and/or bank angle at some point in the maneuver.

[pagirard]

I got my commercial in my M20E last Nov and Steep Spirals and Emergency Descend were indeed a point of contention.

In the scenario-based checkride, it is very common to start with an issue: "you smell smoke/you see flames on your cowling" and evolve to another scenario later.

I put the gear down thinking if I have an engine fire, I might loose my alternator and therefore my electrical gear, but my DPE wanted to see me put the nose down in clean config and try to extinguish the fire with increased airspeed. Make you you discuss this on the ground before you take off for the flight portion.

 

Lastly, be prepared because most steep spirals and emergency descend with be then converted to a power off 180 when you conveniently spiral down abeam the touchdown of an airport.........

 

hope this helps

 

[Vance Harral]

3 hours ago, pagirard said:

Lastly, be prepared because most steep spirals and emergency descend with be then converted to a power off 180 when you conveniently spiral down abeam the touchdown of an airport.........

That used to be an actual requirement, not just something that "could" happen.  But in major metropolitan areas, there's so much training traffic in the patterns that it's almost never reasonable to bomb into the key point from a steep spiral that starts way above the pattern; and I'm betting that's one reason it got taken out of the PTS/ACS.  I'm sure some examiners ask for it in places where traffic permits.  But around these parts, it's effectively off the table - steep spirals and emergency descents are done in the practice area, and power-off 180s are done from a normal downwind, even on the practical test.