It shows an instrument departure, ‘airways’ cruise and an ILS.
Unusually, he has managed to get quite a lot of the instruments in too.
This might be instructive for anyone wanting to know what an IFR flight involves.
Jujupilote wrote:
ATC let you descend but how would you have got before diverting if the cloud base had been lower ?
Well, if conditions were poor, instead of doing a normal visual approach, I would have used the new feature in the latest software upgrade for my Garmin GTN 750 – the “visual approach” (information about this in other threads).
This effectively gives you a synthetic ILS for any runway anywhere – even grass strips.
I’d happily follow this down to 300 ft AGL if necessary.
I did one of these into Cumbernauld:-
I meant, ATC let you descend but how would you have got before diverting if the cloud base had been lower ? Did you think of a « makeshift MDA » on this visual approach ?
Jujupilote wrote:
How low could you descend near Gamston ? Did you choose a safety altitude yourself or did you find it somewhere ?
Sorry – don’t get the point of the first question – I was landing at Gamston.
I chose to cruise at 6,000 ft as this was a nice convenient level – high enough for obstacle clearance and to clear cloud.
Generally, the lower the better as this minimises trauma to the passenger’s ears (!)
How low could you descend near Gamston ? Did you choose a safety altitude yourself or did you find it somewhere ?
I didn’t get that from the video.
Sadly, my Robin runs out of puff after 10,000 ft – I’ve had her up to 12,000 but definitely no higher.
A turbo would be nice!
Well, two key bits of that (oxygen and flight levels) are easy 
You already have a plane which has enough altitude capability.
Yes, to make the most of an Instrument Rating oxygen, a turbo, pressurisation and the Flight Levels are required.
However, in the real world, not many of us (myself included) can aspire to that.
For me, the main benefit of the IR training was that it lifted my flying to a whole new level of accuracy, gave me access to controlled airspace as necessary and removed the fear of flying in cloud and poor conditions.
In short, it made getting home much more reliable and I heartily recommend it.
In Sweden, you can fly IFR in class G below 5000’ without anyone knowing it, but that’s not really good airmanship and such a flight can also be fully “in the system” if you file a flight plan and talk to FIS.
In Sweden, indeed
I think David’s video is an illustration of why an ICAO PPL IR in the UK is a privilege largely exercised for its own sake.
That’s a very good observation too.
The next Q is: What use is an IR in the UK, where you can fly “everywhere” in Class G, VFR/IFR (with the IMCR), non-radio even…? It is useful mainly for longer flights, where the following might apply:
The biggest use of the IR is flying outside the UK, where it removes loads of airspace and ATC procedure issues, and makes flight planning vastly easier.
But to get the best use of it, you need oxygen or pressurisation. I use oxygen on all my trips, except going IFR to Le Touquet (which I do only when there is dodgy wx) and then I go only to FL070… but London Control has recently been chucking out those short FL070 flight plans, leaving me to stay OCAS i.e. 5400ft.
Question, perhaps for another thread, why don’t we make more use of PIREPS in northern Britain? The Scottish FIS frequency is uncluttered, and it takes just seconds to say “N1234 IMC at four thousand feet at New Galloway” or “VMC at five thosand feet on top of of six octas at Kirkbride, estimating tops at four thousand”. In an area almost devoid of METARs, that would be priceless.
Perhaps because there is almost nobody up there to hear it
LeSving wrote:
To me this looks like VFR conditions. A bit depressing and dark, but good vis and adequate ceiling (by the looks of it, since it was VFR from the start).
That’s a good point, but cloud at Cumbernauld was 8/8 at about 1500 ft AMSL and that’s probably too low for comfort over the southern uplands, to which those cloud conditions often stick like a dollop of porridge.
On the other hand, with an IR(R) and a few Class D clearnces David could have flown a straight line from Cumbernauld to Retford rather than meandering off towards the Irish sea in a (mostly unsuccessful) attempt to fly in CAS.
Or, with even less hassle, an IR(R) PPL could have flown down to LANAK or SUMIN, then direct POL. He would have been IFR OCAS over the southern uplands with a radar traffic service from Glasgow and Prestwick while in IMC, then on top of broken cloud with an excellent “basic” service from Scottish Info until south of Penrith, before picking up a traffic service again from Warton (on a weekday) and then from Leeds and Manchester.
Arguably, Scot Info would have given a more relevant service than Control, with participating traffic info and the Corsock METAR (just south of NGY). After Corsock, there’s no useful met source until Leeds – but see below…
Without a “full” IR he would have had to descend to 3,500 ft before the Manchester TMA, but that’s no worse than having to climb to FL90 over broken cloud barely 50 miles from home.
On the whole, I think David’s video is an illustration of why an ICAO PPL IR in the UK is a privilege largely exercised for its own sake. Which is not to criticise or belittle what is a considerable achievement.
Question, perhaps for another thread, why don’t we make more use of PIREPS in northern Britain? The Scottish FIS frequency is uncluttered, and it takes just seconds to say “N1234 IMC at four thousand feet at New Galloway” or “VMC at five thosand feet on top of of six octas at Kirkbride, estimating tops at four thousand”. In an area almost devoid of METARs, that would be priceless.
