UK Pfco practice maneuvers

[Dave Smith]

Hopefully be doing my flight test early new year and I'm wanting to get as much practice as possible prior to taking it.

Any recommendations for stuff to practice that you guys felt definitely helped prior to you taking yours?

Cheers
Dave

 

[The Editor]

Hopefully be doing my flight test early new year and I'm wanting to get as much practice as possible prior to taking it.

Any recommendations for stuff to practice that you guys felt definitely helped prior to you taking yours?

Cheers
Dave

Just make sure your are confident with flying Atti mode at altitude (400ft).
Also, as I am sure you are aware, your boldface/Emergency procedures must be known without hesitation or reference to any FRC's etc so make sure you know them off by heart.

My flight assement was also on a quite gusty day on the limit of my operational wind speed parameters as referenced in my ops manual so make sure you are confident and proficient with flying Atti in windy conditions. At some point in your assessment you will probably suffer 'GPS failure' - be ready for it!
Your instructor is not there to trick you or try and get you to fail but he must be happy you are able to operate safely in a variety of situations.

 

[DesertWindAero]

Interesting that the UK requires demonstration of competency as well as knowledge.

In actuality, I am all for that level of assessment and would be supportive of it in the US.

 

[roninsteel]

Be sure you are able to fly in atti mode as described above, my assessment was also in pretty windy conditions typical for Scotland [emoji23]. You will be asked to complete some maneuvers to demonstrate your proficiency for me in was a figure of 8 one way then the opposite, the nose in drift left and right and holding hovers at either end, flying a square and holding a hover at each corner and a few other maneuvers including being able to land without creaming in [emoji23]get as much practice in as possible and it should be a walk in park [emoji106]

 

[Dave Smith]

Cheers guys. Appreciate the advice.

I'm completely new to drones ( 1 hour ) so at the moment I'm doing everything slowly, slowly with beginner mode switched on in the app! However, once I've got the basics squared away it's my intention to do everything in atti mode. My thinking is that if I can become proficient in my handling without relying on GPS it will pay dividends come the flight test, especially if the weathers a bit ropey. Does this sound like a reasonable plan?

 

[The Editor]

Cheers guys. Appreciate the advice.

I'm completely new to drones ( 1 hour ) so at the moment I'm doing everything slowly, slowly with beginner mode switched on in the app! However, once I've got the basics squared away it's my intention to do everything in atti mode. My thinking is that if I can become proficient in my handling without relying on GPS it will pay dividends come the flight test, especially if the weathers a bit ropey. Does this sound like a reasonable plan?

If you only have circa an hour of stick time I would definitely recommend getting some time in on the simulator. The flight dynamics are fairly accurate and you can dial in some strong wind conditions to see how it handles - then get out there for real and try it out.
Remember, if you are practising in Atti and you get into a panic or disorientated just flick your PAF switch up to the right hand side and GPS will kick in immediately and hold the aircraft in a hover on the spot. Then take a deep breath and carry on.

 

[Dave Smith]

Also, how many hours flight time should I consider having prior to the test?

I read an article which suggested twelve which I thought was a bit optimistic. My PPL took 40 hours and I still thought I was pants

 

[Dave Smith]

If you only have circa an hour of stick time I would definitely recommend getting some time in on the simulator. The flight dynamics are fairly accurate and you can dial in some strong wind conditions to see how it handles - then get out there for real and try it out.
Remember, if you are practising in Atti and you get into a panic or disorientated just flick your PAF switch up to the right hand side and GPS will kick in immediately and hold the aircraft in a hover on the spot. Then take a deep breath and carry on.

Good idea. Is the dji sim useful or should I be looking at something else?

 

[The Editor]

Also, how many hours flight time should I consider having prior to the test?

I read an article which suggested twelve which I thought was a bit optimistic. My PPL took 40 hours and I still thought I was pants

That's a really difficult question to answer because everyone is different in how they grasp the coordination and orientation side of things.
As a rule, I would say if you still have to 'think' about how you want to place or move the aircraft then you need more practice. It should be instinctive and automatic with your stick input. In other words, if you were hovering nose in and you wanted to move the aircraft to your right, you shouldn't need to think 'OK, nose in, I need to move the right stick to the left to make the aircraft go right' - you just need to 'do it'.
Once you are at that stage you will have no problems whatsoever.
Hope that helps.

 

[The Editor]

Good idea. Is the dji sim useful or should I be looking at something else?

DJI sim is fine and accurate in how it mimics the Inspire.

 

[Dave Smith]

Thanks Editor, much appreciated.

 

[DesertWindAero]

The 3DR sim is actually pretty good. You can fly through buildings, around trees, around the Statue of Liberty, etc..

Much better than the featureless DJI GO sim.

 

[Dave Smith]

The 3DR sim is actually pretty good. You can fly through buildings, around trees, around the Statue of Liberty, etc..

Much better than the featureless DJI GO sim.

Does it work with a phantom controller or only the 3DR?

 

[Zap222]

Hopefully be doing my flight test early new year and I'm wanting to get as much practice as possible prior to taking it.

Any recommendations for stuff to practice that you guys felt definitely helped prior to you taking yours?

Cheers
Dave

Make sure you know the details on you Flight Ref Cards they will ask questions like what frequency and what power output also describe your return to home protocol etc. This is the bit most fail on as the flying is easy and just consists of flying from point to point, altering heights, maintaining position, switching to atti and doing the same. Simulating airspace incursion, simulated fly-away. Return to home and land. Believe me the flying is the easy bit just make sure you plan well, do your homework on the site and know your I1 FRC well. Good luck buddy let us know how you get on

 

[Eyeup Aerial Solutions]

Make sure you do banked turns - don't do lazy 8's like a newbie

 

[The Editor]

Make sure you do banked turns - don't do lazy 8's like a newbie

No - that is totally irrelevant for the flight assessment.
The instructors are ONLY interested that you can make your flights safely, within the conditions stipulated in your ops manual and in accordance with the Air Navigation Order.
They have no interest how pretty your flight looks.

 

[Raymondo]

Banked turns are not to Look Pretty. Just as in a Piloted aircraft, a balanced turn is more efficient and stops you sliding sideways. You can also do tighter turns at speed. My examiner asked me to demonstrate banked turns. Other manoeuvres included flying a vertical box to show spatial awareness, a horizontal circuit rising at 45 degrees to circuit height, and decending at 45 degrees to land where you started. An orientation excercise with the bird flown away until it was just visible, then spun (like in the game blind man's bluff), I then had to work out the orientation and fly straight back, without using the pov on the controller. And many more manoeuvres, using over an hour of batteries, in both GPS and Atti modes. All good stuff for making you a safe pilot. This was followed by a couple of hours ground testing on procedures, documentation and legislation.

 

[Eyeup Aerial Solutions]

No - that is totally irrelevant for the flight assessment.
The instructors are ONLY interested that you can make your flights safely, within the conditions stipulated in your ops manual and in accordance with the Air Navigation Order.
They have no interest how pretty your flight looks.

Interesting as I paid for pre-test flight training with the assessment centre and it was made clear that they would expect to see banked turns - if nothing else they indicate a higher level of aircraft control. If you want to pass this part of the test with a low score then carry on with "lazy 8s". I was aiming for (and achieved) 100%in this section.

 

[Eyeup Aerial Solutions]

What we may be seeing is inconsistency of approach by NQEs (possibly cussed by similar inconsistencies in CAA inspection regimes?). I would recommend you to contact your test provider and ask them what they expect.

 

[Dave Smith]

Make sure you know the details on you Flight Ref Cards they will ask questions like what frequency and what power output also describe your return to home protocol etc. This is the bit most fail on as the flying is easy and just consists of flying from point to point, altering heights, maintaining position, switching to atti and doing the same. Simulating airspace incursion, simulated fly-away. Return to home and land. Believe me the flying is the easy bit just make sure you plan well, do your homework on the site and know your I1 FRC well. Good luck buddy let us know how you get on

Thanks, great pointers.

Regards
Dave