Yet more good press

Check out this UK reference to our favorite airplane:

I love the great press, and the original MIT Technology Review magazine is a wonderful, credible source; but there’s an aspect of this which worries me.

Is HITS technology coming? Probably.

Does our favorite airplane contain a whole lot of steps in the right direction? Absolutely.

But… there is much about flying that keeps cost-effective, mass-available, acceptably-reliable, totally automated flight beyond reach, at least for now.

So what worries me?

“On the final approach, Hansman needed only to issue a few verbal instructions for (12-year old) Alex to make a safe landing.”

I suspect that most of us believe that either Alex has had quite a bit of aviation exposure, or the quote understates reality somewhat. We know that landing is at least somewhat similar to riding a bicycle - it takes practice, and it can’t be learned solely from verbal or written descriptions.

I worry that non-aviation people will read this and start thinking that flying is inherently safe (it isn’t); and that anyone can do it (not yet).

Don’t get me wrong - I applaud any and all efforts - on anyone’s part - to further the cause of G.A. I still can’t put my finger on exactly what makes me uneasy about articles like this, but there is something…

Anyone else feel this way? Maybe you can find the words I’m searching for.

  • Mike.

I worry that non-aviation people will read this and start thinking that flying is inherently safe (it isn’t); and that anyone can do it (not yet).

Don’t get me wrong - I applaud any and all efforts - on anyone’s part - to further the cause of G.A. I still can’t put my finger on exactly what makes me uneasy about articles like this, but there is something…

Anyone else feel this way? Maybe you can find the words I’m searching for.

  • Mike.

John King found the words you are searching for in the March issue of FLYING magazine. He points out that aviation is doing itself a disservice when it keeps emphasizing how safe and/or easy GA flying is, when our focus should be on recognizing and managing the inherent risks of flying. I was surprised with his candor, and recommend that pilots and students read his article. I agree 100 percent.

But… there is much about flying that keeps cost-effective, mass-available, acceptably-reliable, totally automated flight beyond reach, at least for now.

This subject interests me a lot, because (disclosure) I’ve recently finished a book on what the overlapping revolutions in General Aviation technology might mean for the average traveler. As everyone on this site is aware, but as the general press has barely begun to notice, these innovations include:

  • design and comfort changes, a la Cirrus;

  • steps both big and small on safety, also a la Cirrus;

  • aggressive pricing strategies, shown even more dramatically by Eclipse (if it can deliver) than by Cirrus;

  • use of advanced “lean manufacturing” techniques, again notably by Eclipse;

  • big breakthroughs in navigation, guidance, orientation, and ease of flight, as shown not just by the new airframe makers but by companies like Avidyne, UPS’s aviation division etc;

  • radical breakthroughs in propulsion, especially by Sam Williams, creator of the turbine engine used in the promised Eclipse jet;

  • proposed breakthroughs in traffic flow, and small-airport utilization, largely led by Nasa;

  • plus a bunch of other stuff.

Everyone here is aware of these developments, which makes it the more intriguging that, for instance, the main NASA programs (AGATE, GAPS, SATS, and so on) have essentially never been mentioned in any major newspaper.

And everyone here is at some emotional distance from the question of whether any of this will matter to the typical American traveler. We’re interested in the little planes in their own right, regardless of whether they change the prevailing mode of travel at all.

But here is the way I found it useful to think about what these changes might mean for the general traveling public. It turns on the relationship between “Hobbyists” and “Civilians.”

In aviation terms, Hobbyists are people who find things that fly inherently interesting. They like the process of flying and learning about flight at least as much as they value the efficiency of actually getting from place to place. They are willing to put up with inconvenience, obscure knowledge requirements, and the other arcana of the modern GA system. The fact that an airplane has a lot of complicated controls is for many of today’s pilots a plus rather than a minus. Hobbyists are mainly male, and they are a tiny little minority of the population. Licensed pilots represent less than one quarter of one per cent of the U.S. population.

Civilians are everyone else. They view airplanes not as fascinating objects but as transportation. Airplanes are better than cars or trains to the extent that they are faster (or cheaper or more convenient or safer). Civilians have come to accept give big airplanes the benefit of the doubt when it comes to safety, but they view small planes with deep mistrust.

The significance of these two groups is that although the hobbyists are the minority, they are the ones who, in their obsession with flight, create the systems that the civilians ultimately use. It was fascinating to me, when doing reporting for the book, to find that all the principal characters had “always” wanted to fly, and usually began doing so as teenagers. One example: Bruce Holmes, Mr. General Aviation at NASA, earned money for college doing things like crop-dusting and pulling banners.

So there are different layers to the question of whether all the new aircraft innovations really will matter to ordinary people. One layer is to ask: will nicer planes turn more civilians into hobbyists? That is, will any significant number of people decide that it’s worth learning to fly?

Bruce Holmes is quite forceful in saying that this will happen – over the very long term. People who are now 10 or 12 years old could, he thinks, grow up in an environment where flying is considerably easier than it has recently been, and where the practical benefits are more apparent (because of all the other changes in plane design, safety, small-airport use, and so on.) And as for whether people’s skills are up to the challenge: a century ago, you would never have predicted that all adult human beings were presumptively up to the challenge of handling cars that travel at 80 mph in closely-spaced lanes.

Maybe Holmes is right. Even if he is not, I can imagine in the shorter term some recruiftment of “latent hobbyists.” I think Chris Blake has been quoted in airplane magazines saying something I have thought too. He had been interested in flying for a long time, but was deterred by the cruddy, Havana-taxi-fleet nature of the existing rental stock, until new planes like Cirrus made their debut. If better planes brought out the “latent pilot” population, they could bring the headcount of pilots to a full one per cent of the population.

But in the foreseeable future, the real question (IMHO) will be whether the whole suite of new planes, from Cirrus and (perhaps) Lancair to Eclipse and (perhaps) Safire, can appeal to civilians as reasonable travel alternatives. And that in turn depends on carrying out the “air taxi” vision – getting enough of these planes deployed, safely enough and fast enough, that people start to think that they constitute an alternative to hub-and-spoke hell. Super-safe propellor planes, at discount prices, flown by hired pilots, for short hauls; jets for everything else. If this model catches on, then the small-plane revolution can make a tremendous difference. If not, then it’s just more amusement for the still-small tribe of hobbyists.

Or that’s my view of the moment. Book, btw, will be called “Free Flight: Inventing the Future of Travel.” Talks about the people inventing these various systems, including at Cirrus, and what it might all mean. The big payoff in journalism is getting to learn about one thing – then getting to learn about another. In this case, got to talk to Sam Williams about how he designed his extraordinarily light turbine engine, got to talk to all the folks at NASA about how they got the ideas they did, got to talk with the parachute experts at Cirrus about how they refined its design, etc.

Now on to something else – groan, probably politics. jf

Mike,

I had the same reaction to the MIT Technology Review article as you. So much so that I sent an E-mail to the TR editors to the effect that there is no way anyone can master a smoothly professional landing on the first try, and that it requires much practice (6 to 12 hours) to do it safely without an instructor present, regardless of the “new age” equipment on board.

The article struck me as containing a bit too much fantasy about it. It was written in the manner one would expect of an ingenue, as if the author was an innocent, or at least inexperienced, with a touch of unworldliness. It makes me wonder about the credibility of the MIT prof, too, assuming he knew what was being written.

FWIW, I don’t necessarily subscribe to your view that flying is inherently unsafe. When the annual assessments of accidents are made, the substantial majority of accidents are the result of boneheaded decisions such as fuel exhaustion, gross weight/density altitude problems, flight into higher terrain, flight into IMC by the untrained, flight into icing/thunderstorms, and so forth. This is not to deny the risks present when the inevitable and otherwise unforseeable mechanical problems occur, which risks are obviously much lower to motorists who remain attached to terra firma. But such risks are a small minority to the bonehead risks.

Gary S. pointed out John King’s views that safe flight involves a focus on recognizing and managing the inherent risks (with which I also agree 100%), which is largely a professional’s way of focusing training to minimize the number of boneheaded decisions.

If anything is inherent, it is the consummate ability of us humans to make dumb decisions or choices. In other words, to err is human; it’s a truism. For me, at least, the major safety objective of flying is to do all I can to avoid turning the territory north of my neck into solid bone, cracked bone at that.

When compared to driving on highways, where one must contend with huge numbers of other drivers similarly possessed of the ability to err, I will always favor flying (weather, equipment and health permitting). In contrast to driving, there is rarely an occasion to be speeding along within very close proximity to one another, and there is rarely an occasion where my safety is literally in the hands of another operator’s potentially erroneous decision making.

Pete

I love the great press, and the original MIT Technology Review magazine is a wonderful, credible source; but there’s an aspect of this which worries me.

Is HITS technology coming? Probably.

Does our favorite airplane contain a whole lot of steps in the right direction? Absolutely.

But… there is much about flying that keeps cost-effective, mass-available, acceptably-reliable, totally automated flight beyond reach, at least for now.

So what worries me?

“On the final approach, Hansman needed only to issue a few verbal instructions for (12-year old) Alex to make a safe landing.”

I suspect that most of us believe that either Alex has had quite a bit of aviation exposure, or the quote understates reality somewhat. We know that landing is at least somewhat similar to riding a bicycle - it takes practice, and it can’t be learned solely from verbal or written descriptions.

I worry that non-aviation people will read this and start thinking that flying is inherently safe (it isn’t); and that anyone can do it (not yet).

Don’t get me wrong - I applaud any and all efforts - on anyone’s part - to further the cause of G.A. I still can’t put my finger on exactly what makes me uneasy about articles like this, but there is something…

Anyone else feel this way? Maybe you can find the words I’m searching for.

  • Mike.

Jim,

Terrific post!

Better yet - news that you’ve just finished a book on our favorite subject. When will it be on the bookshelves?

If indeed you move on to writing books about politics, I will be sad - I’m an aviation “Hobbyist” (read: Enthusiast), but a politics “Civilian” (read: I know nothing about it).

I hope that Civilians and Hobbyists by the thousands devour “Free Flight:…”.

Good luck with it.

Mike.

Jim, great post. I, for one, am a person who got back into GA because of the innovations that compainies like CD, Garmin, et al{even ARNAV} bring to safty and situational awareness. If Eclipse and Safire deliver and if CD and Columbia come through. I look for GA to grow dramatically,as other compainies follow suit. The automation and affordabilty {relivitly speaking} WILL allow people, who never dreamed about flying, start to think seriously about getting involved. They will do it not so much for the fun of it, but for the convienance and flexablity owning you own aircraft can offer, now, and in the future. While we will probably never have an “aircraft in every garage”, the number of people who fly or own {see timeshare jets}, will continue to grow as the technology and safty improve. After all that, where can I get a copy of your book?

The Civilians vs. Hobbyists model is an excellent way to break this down.

Being a hobbyist, as is everyone on this board imagine, I completely identify with your post about embracing new technology, always wanting to fly…etc. And knowing many civilians, I think you are right on in characterizing them. I’d go so far as to say most people are a hell of a lot more afraid of flying then they admit. I think a lot of civilans are rational, and get the safetu factor of commerical aviation, but there’s no doubt when that jumbo leaves the ground, the thought goes through their head “this could be the day…” Also no doubt they never feel this way getting on a bus.

What fascinates me, and perhaps I just have to wait for your publication date, is how GA can follow in the footsteps of driving, and if that is indeed even a reasonable model to follow.

I was wondering if you had a sense of what this country’s attitudes towards early automotive travel were? Did people think it was as scary as most civilians find GA – even if they don’t admit it. Obviously, we can’t really study this anymore, because everybody grows up seeing cars everyday. So much so that it is obvious to anyone who drives on a freeway that people have in fact forgotten how inherently dangerous driving can be. Every pilot who has become a more careful driver after learning how to fly raise your hand! (Me for sure) But I was wondering how long it took for people early in the 20th century to accept driving. My guess is it was a much more natural transition from the horse and wagon to the horseless wagon. Now we want them to get in a wagon with wings…! After four thousand years of ground-based travel, it amazes me any civilian ever gets in an airplane. Should it?

Which gets at the more fundamental question, and something I think people may overlook, which is that there is something very biological about NOT LEAVING THE GROUND. If that’s the case, then it is going to take may generations of people taking air-taxi’s before this vision of GA becomes a reality, IF EVER. It’s so engrained… think of chicken little “the sky is falling!” not “that wagon is out of control” or even Icarus – he didn’t build a faster chariot, he flew to close to the sun. All our myths of freedom, leaving, and ultimately over-extending come from flying.

And another question for you, Jim, specifically – did you take that first ride in the SR20, one which led to you buying one (I love that! – you should do a follow-up for the old grey lady) doing reseach for your book? Or did that ride inspire you to write it? My guess is it’s the former.

Of course, I’m expecting you to have answers to all of these questions. And once I get them, I’ll ask for the meaning of life, itself.

Dean

PS – I find it interesting how driving and owning a car is actually a part of identity now. Manhood, success…etc. People “love to drive” in large numbers… Do you think that will ever translate to leaving the ground?

Now on to something else – groan, probably politics. jf

Jim, All of us hobbyists owe you an expression of gratitude for your journalistic involvement in our passtime. Now that you’re moving on, let’s hope you’ll keep your plane, and keep up your contacts with this community. Who is publishing your book?

A few posts ago you said you’d be moving to D.C. I guess that’s related to your new directions. Good luck (and “don’t try to get yourself elected”).

Thanks very much for these nice replies. To answer in one place several (also from emails).

  • Book will be published in June and will be available in normal (“civilian”) bookstores plus the usual-suspect online sites. The Atlantic Monthly will run a big excerpt before that, and some other magazines may do smaller ones.

  • On the Civilian/Hobbyist divide, I’m very much in the same category I described with Chris Blake. Had always been somewhat-but-not-extremely interested in aviation. Decided to take lessons several years ago despite the amazing cruddyness of the existing rental fleet. Would never have considered buying an airplane if Cirrus in particular had not changed the value-landscape. (Ie, pre-Cirrus the planes I could have afforded my wife would hate to spend time in; the ones she would tolerate I couldn’t afford.)

  • Question about history of driving is an interesting one; I haven’t looked at it in depth, but I believe that early-on it was clearly a “hobbyist” pursuit too. I’ll look more before book-tour time.

  • On the inherent, almost-biological reaction to leaving the ground: this is of course what makes flying fascinating to those who like it. Perhaps it’s not surprising that the same reaction is a powerful negative to many other people. May be why modern airliners do as much as possible to conceal the fact that you’ve left the ground. They’re like being in a big flying basement.

  • On politics, I guess this is the time to reveal that writing about politics is the way I’ve spent most of my life. Have worked for the Atlantic Monthly for 20+ years and done a number of books on poitical-type themes in those years. “Breaking the News: How the Media Undermine American Democracy” a few years ago, and before that a couple of books about Japan and China, one about military policy (“National Defense,”) some about water pollution etc. Had a big cover story about Al Gore last year in the Atlantic, which I think stands up well. Web links on request – main one is www.theatlantic.com

  • Again, thanks for nice notes. jf

One of the joys of GA flying is the avoidance of crowds on freeways and at airports. As long as the aviation infrastructure can be maintained and innovative companies like Cirrus Design remain financially viable, why would any GA hobbyist want civilians on board? Driving LA freeways is not an enjoyable experience. Flying LA skys is less enjoyable and more risky when more planes are added (even safer airplanes with better ATC systems). Outside of the lofty goal of bringing the GA flying experience to the masses, what motivation is there for the GA community to rally around any effort to welcome the civilians to this cozy club?

Good People ~

FWIW, I have thoroughly enjoyed the great posts and discussions under “Off Topic”, “Hobbyists”, and “Up and Down” immediately above and below. Much food for thought here. Thanks to all who added their two cents, and to Clyde for keeping this all together.

Cheers!

Pete

But… there is much about flying that keeps cost-effective, mass-available, acceptably-reliable, totally automated flight beyond reach, at least for now.

This subject interests me a lot, because (disclosure) I’ve recently finished a book on what the overlapping revolutions in General Aviation technology might mean for the average traveler. As everyone on this site is aware, but as the general press has barely begun to notice, these innovations include:

  • design and comfort changes, a la Cirrus;
  • steps both big and small on safety, also a la Cirrus;
  • aggressive pricing strategies, shown even more dramatically by Eclipse (if it can deliver) than by Cirrus;
  • use of advanced “lean manufacturing” techniques, again notably by Eclipse;
  • big breakthroughs in navigation, guidance, orientation, and ease of flight, as shown not just by the new airframe makers but by companies like Avidyne, UPS’s aviation division etc;
  • radical breakthroughs in propulsion, especially by Sam Williams, creator of the turbine engine used in the promised Eclipse jet;
  • proposed breakthroughs in traffic flow, and small-airport utilization, largely led by Nasa;
  • plus a bunch of other stuff.

Everyone here is aware of these developments, which makes it the more intriguging that, for instance, the main NASA programs (AGATE, GAPS, SATS, and so on) have essentially never been mentioned in any major newspaper.

And everyone here is at some emotional distance from the question of whether any of this will matter to the typical American traveler. We’re interested in the little planes in their own right, regardless of whether they change the prevailing mode of travel at all.

But here is the way I found it useful to think about what these changes might mean for the general traveling public. It turns on the relationship between “Hobbyists” and “Civilians.”

In aviation terms, Hobbyists are people who find things that fly inherently interesting. They like the process of flying and learning about flight at least as much as they value the efficiency of actually getting from place to place. They are willing to put up with inconvenience, obscure knowledge requirements, and the other arcana of the modern GA system. The fact that an airplane has a lot of complicated controls is for many of today’s pilots a plus rather than a minus. Hobbyists are mainly male, and they are a tiny little minority of the population. Licensed pilots represent less than one quarter of one per cent of the U.S. population.

Civilians are everyone else. They view airplanes not as fascinating objects but as transportation. Airplanes are better than cars or trains to the extent that they are faster (or cheaper or more convenient or safer). Civilians have come to accept give big airplanes the benefit of the doubt when it comes to safety, but they view small planes with deep mistrust.

The significance of these two groups is that although the hobbyists are the minority, they are the ones who, in their obsession with flight, create the systems that the civilians ultimately use. It was fascinating to me, when doing reporting for the book, to find that all the principal characters had “always” wanted to fly, and usually began doing so as teenagers. One example: Bruce Holmes, Mr. General Aviation at NASA, earned money for college doing things like crop-dusting and pulling banners.

So there are different layers to the question of whether all the new aircraft innovations really will matter to ordinary people. One layer is to ask: will nicer planes turn more civilians into hobbyists? That is, will any significant number of people decide that it’s worth learning to fly?

Bruce Holmes is quite forceful in saying that this will happen – over the very long term. People who are now 10 or 12 years old could, he thinks, grow up in an environment where flying is considerably easier than it has recently been, and where the practical benefits are more apparent (because of all the other changes in plane design, safety, small-airport use, and so on.) And as for whether people’s skills are up to the challenge: a century ago, you would never have predicted that all adult human beings were presumptively up to the challenge of handling cars that travel at 80 mph in closely-spaced lanes.

Maybe Holmes is right. Even if he is not, I can imagine in the shorter term some recruiftment of “latent hobbyists.” I think Chris Blake has been quoted in airplane magazines saying something I have thought too. He had been interested in flying for a long time, but was deterred by the cruddy, Havana-taxi-fleet nature of the existing rental stock, until new planes like Cirrus made their debut. If better planes brought out the “latent pilot” population, they could bring the headcount of pilots to a full one per cent of the population.

But in the foreseeable future, the real question (IMHO) will be whether the whole suite of new planes, from Cirrus and (perhaps) Lancair to Eclipse and (perhaps) Safire, can appeal to civilians as reasonable travel alternatives. And that in turn depends on carrying out the “air taxi” vision – getting enough of these planes deployed, safely enough and fast enough, that people start to think that they constitute an alternative to hub-and-spoke hell. Super-safe propellor planes, at discount prices, flown by hired pilots, for short hauls; jets for everything else. If this model catches on, then the small-plane revolution can make a tremendous difference. If not, then it’s just more amusement for the still-small tribe of hobbyists.

Or that’s my view of the moment. Book, btw, will be called “Free Flight: Inventing the Future of Travel.” Talks about the people inventing these various systems, including at Cirrus, and what it might all mean. The big payoff in journalism is getting to learn about one thing – then getting to learn about another. In this case, got to talk to Sam Williams about how he designed his extraordinarily light turbine engine, got to talk to all the folks at NASA about how they got the ideas they did, got to talk with the parachute experts at Cirrus about how they refined its design, etc.

Now on to something else – groan, probably politics. jf

Someone who works for an airplane company, but whose company doesn’t allow posts by employees on public bulletin boards like this, sent along an email with a more extensive answer to DeanG’s question. (The person sent me his real name, contact info, and so on, and I am confident he is legit.) It’s on what the evolution of past technology tells us about when airplanes might ever become mainstream. Here goes:


The Model ‘T’ Ford had the spark advance lever in the center of the steering wheel. It took electric starters and automatic transmissions to make the auto into vehicles for everyman and everywoman. Today, a ten-year-old can certainly start and drive a modern vehicle amongst fixed obstacles, along a prescribed course.

Motorcycles once took serious physical effort to start, and the ride was harsh and loud, and then you needed to service them before the next ride. Honda fixed all that. Today, appropriately sized, ten-year-olds routinely drive such a vehicles amongst fixed obstacles, along a prescribed course.

Small powerboats, with two stroke engines especially, were once only the realm of hobbyists. The personal watercraft, with no propeller, one-touch starting, and easy launching and storage, now appeals to the masses. Appropriately sized, a ten-year-old can certainly drive such a vehicle amongst fixed obstacles.

Computers used to demand real mastery… today my toddler boots, plays, and shuts down with only safety supervision…

Airplanes like Cirrus are now comfortable and easy, though not cheap, to maintain. Starting is not yet “one-touch” [editor’s note from JF: No kidding!] but could be. But such a vehicle is still not cheap to store, nor even easy to put away. And current airplanes do not respond intuitively to the “up” control and the “slow” control, or even the ‘stop the turn’ control.

When the EZ-Fly (decoupled - NASA, Joe Stickle, Chicago Tribune June 17, 1990!) controls are added to something like the LibertyXL, with folding wings, you will have a breakthrough airplane. And it may well happen first
in the ‘Sport Plane’ category. The highway-in-the-sky course depiction, plus an active control systems which prevents departure, are the ‘automatic transmission’ for personal aviation. Both are much closer than the mainstream prognosticators, or even the aviation press, recognize, though they could deduce it from reading a few magazines on navigation and robotics.

Airplanes like Cirrus are now comfortable and easy, though not cheap, to maintain. Starting is not yet “one-touch” [editor’s note from JF: No kidding!] but could be. But such a vehicle is still not cheap to store, nor even easy to put away. And current airplanes do not respond intuitively to the “up” control and the “slow” control, or even the ‘stop the turn’ control.

Jim: Please be careful. You mentioned (although I understand you were quoting someone else) the “UP Control.” As far as I know there is no up control. I hate to open this pandora’s box, but the closest thing to an up control is the throttle.

The elevators(what a horrible name) or flippers, really control the angle of attack.

We can debate for a long time the instantaneous result from moving a control surface and the long term effects, but angle of attack has more to do with airspeed and thrust has more to do with ‘up’.

If anyone is really interested, please read “Stick & Rudder.” It is very dated, but the laws of physics have not changed. In my opinion, it is the best book on the subject.

Now, after this discussion, does anyone still wonder why general avaition is not mainstream? Heck, the avid enthusiats cannot even agree on one of the most basic principals!

On safety and risk:

I don’t think anyone among us goes into a flight thinking, “Gee, I think I’ll take dangerous risks today.” We all believe that we can handle the risks or we wouldn’t fly. The issue is human nature (training) about the risks, and our ability to really comprehend them with respect to our abilities, the airplanes capabilites and the system’s capabilities.

I tell myself that I will never run out of gas, keep my skills much more current than most private pilots (and FAA regs) and feel that I have just eliminated 75% of the risk. Have I? Hope so, but if someday you read my obit., then I guess not.

How about that Bonanza driver in NJ? He was, at least on paper, one of the most qualified Bonanza IFR instructor pilots. Even well published on the subject. I doubt he thought the conditions were beyond his or his airplane’s capabilities, but with an unplanned vacuum failure in low IFR, became spatially disoriented, or at least unable to control the plane and crashed.

The risk are there and we, as pilots, and our passengers have to become comfortable with them. Will technology ever make it significantly safer? I hope so, but for now, the BRS and the all electric SR22 seem to have made a significant step in that direction.

Because of the parachute, I now have friends who will fly with me. That is a step in the right direction regardless of how you feel about the parachute in the first place.

Marty

Jim, still respect your work, a lot.

Hi Marty –

  1. Please understand, I was passing along this enclosure as an email forwarding service. These are someone else’s thoughts, not mine.

  2. But also I think you’ve misunderstood the original writer. I am sure that he was using the phrase “the ‘Up’ control” ironically. I think you’ll see that if you look at his message again. His sentence was:

And current airplanes do not respond intuitively to the “up” control and the “slow” control, or even the ‘stop the turn’ control. <

The point is,as we all know, there’s no single “up” control. Instead there is the combo of power, angle of attack, and so on that Wolfgang Langeweische explains so well. Similarly there’s no exact ‘slow’ control. There’s the combo of power, angle of attack, etc.

So in the context of explaining why aviation is harder than, say, riding a Sea-Doo, the writer was actually reminding us of the absence of simple “Up” or “Down” switches on an airplane. You actually agree with this guy, at least on this point of complexity of airplane controls.

So let’s step back for a moment and instead of arguing about pitch vs. throttle for the millionth time ask, “Who the hell cares?”

We have automatic transmissions or cars. and electric starters, and GPSs, and gyroscopes, and lightweight computers and servos.

Airplanes could have “UP” controls, and “SLOW” controls, it’s simply a user-interface and control systems problem (and honestly, not a really hard one compared to some other problems we’ve seen out there).

Walt laughs at me and calls me a data-entry operator, because of the features on the '22. If I want, I can be an airbus driver and the autopilot runs the plane for all times over 200AGL. That is ONE of the user interfaces on the plane. It could be improved so we don’t need specialized understanding (e.g. GPS could know about traffic patterns, preferred ATC routes, et al, but those are simply evolutionary changes).

The other one is the yolk, rudder, and throttle. With FADEC engines and the Cirrus combined power lever, we’re left with a single lever control which roughly translates into “do more of the same” or “do less of the same.” No mixture, no prop control. Whee!

With the combination of a good navigation system, existing control surfaces (maybe add spoilers?), and a half decent computer, we could make a plane not significantly more difficult to control than a car.

You might argue that an airplane can’t exactly do “up”, “down”, “left”, “right”, “fast”, and “slow.” Yep, your car has problems with “left” and “right” when you drive excessively fast too. However a 10 year old can still drive it after watching someone on TV because the responses are intuitive to an untrained novice, based upon the control inputs.

We already have many examples of aircraft where dozens of control surfaces are operated by a computer translating relatively simplistic yolk/rudder controls that a pilot enters in the cockpit. It’s translated into that control model because that’s what pilots have been trained for. But why stick with just that?

Just like the yolk replaced the stick and rudder, it’s reasonable to expect that the yolk (and the UI that you and I are familiar with) will be supplanted.

Direct cable/push-rod controls are dinosaurs, and only survive because of weight, regulatory, and inertial constraints (we know how to use them).

If something more friendly comes around, then we will have the “breakthrough” aircraft.

Of course, we old crusty pilots will think it’s the “Microsoft Bob” of aviation and fly our antique Cirrus SR20/22 aircraft. :slight_smile:

Hi Marty –

  1. Please understand, I was passing along this enclosure as an email forwarding service. These are someone else’s thoughts, not mine.
  1. But also I think you’ve misunderstood the original writer. I am sure that he was using the phrase “the ‘Up’ control” ironically. I think you’ll see that if you look at his message again. His sentence was:

And current airplanes do not respond intuitively to the “up” control and the “slow” control, or even the ‘stop the turn’ control. <

The point is,as we all know, there’s no single “up” control. Instead there is the combo of power, angle of attack, and so on that Wolfgang Langeweische explains so well. Similarly there’s no exact ‘slow’ control. There’s the combo of power, angle of attack, etc.

So in the context of explaining why aviation is harder than, say, riding a Sea-Doo, the writer was actually reminding us of the absence of simple “Up” or “Down” switches on an airplane. You actually agree with this guy, at least on this point of complexity of airplane controls.

Exactly. Another Wolfgang Langeweische desciple!

How 'bout a signed copy of your book?

Gee, my airplane has an UP and DOWN control… My Girlfriend! Her: “Let’s go home now” Me: “Yes,dear” In fact, she exhibits this amazing power over much of my life…

Gee, my airplane has an UP and DOWN control… My Girlfriend! Her: “Let’s go home now” Me: “Yes,dear” In fact, she exhibits this amazing power over much of my life…

Just wait until she becomes your wife! Then she’ll have power over your wallet as well.

Gee, my airplane has an UP and DOWN control… My Girlfriend! Her: “Let’s go home now” Me: “Yes,dear” In fact, she exhibits this amazing power over much of my life…

Dean:

Remember too that we men always get the “last word” when talking to our Significant Other it’s:

“YES DEAR” and if you follow that rule - you’ll be very happy in dealing with them. Of course, that just my thought on the subject…

Gerry Mengo,
SR20 - #173