So how do you view a manufacturer’s landing checklist with items such as “POWER – reduce to idle” and “TOUCHDOWN – main wheels first”? I will not use such checklists for exactly the reason you mention.
Never a truer word spoken. These aren’t checklists, these are fly-lists, like an instruction manual.
many manufacturer’s checklists are horrible, but the after market checklists are worse. They tend to be do-lists, and the format provided (pages in the POH) is unusable in practice
Exactly.
I really despair at some peoples’ 100% religious faith in these POHs and their checklists. They were not done by gods, they were done by human beings. Up to the seventies, they were often done in a hurry, when a new aircraft type or variant was certified every other month. Over the decades, many of them have been proven wrong, or at least sub-ideal in some points and were never updated. Mixture full rich during taxy is one example which simply doesn’t work in many aircraft.
Starting from the eighties, POHs and checklists were made by lawyers, which made them unusable in pratice.
boscomantico wrote:
o how do you view a manufacturer’s landing checklist with items such as “POWER – reduce to idle” and “TOUCHDOWN – main wheels first”? I will not use such checklists for exactly the reason you mention
I view them poorly, and yes, I have seen Cessna POH checklists like this. They are approved, though the FAA could have done better. People who think to write their own checklists should think about why they are doing it? What will they write that’s better or more necessary, without being needless and distracting? Will they submit them for approval?
Peter wrote:
What is the reason?
To be honest peter it was about 8 years ago. We had numerous checklist rejected. We even submitted the one used and approved by Oxford and they rejected that.I haven’t got a copy of the checklist that was finally approved (its at work) but it is utter dross and is in fact an A5 folder.
To a man we all hate it and think the one used by the local RTF is much better.
Pilot_DAR wrote:
I view them poorly, and yes, I have seen Cessna POH checklists like this. They are approved, though the FAA could have done better. People who think to write their own checklists should think about why they are doing it? What will they write that’s better or more necessary, without being needless and distracting? Will they submit them for approval?
But you would still insist on using these checklists? Possibly checklists for aircrafts needing “type training” are better. I don’t know as I don’t have any type ratings.
I am writing my own checklists. Why? Because
As far as approval goes, in EASA-land you don’t have to use approved checklists for non-commercial operations with non-complex aircraft. (And as you know, EASA means something entirely different with “complex” compared to the FAA.)
AMC1 to NCO.GEN.105(c) does say that “The pilot-in-command should use the latest checklists provided by the manufacturer.” but you may use your own Alternate Means of Compliance without approval (NCO.GEN.101). The only hard requirement is that you should follow the operating procedures in the AFM (NCO.GEN.105(a)(3), referring to Basic Regulation, Annex IV, 1.b), but you can still do that using your own checklists
Airborne_Again wrote:
I am writing my own checklists. Why? Because
They sound like well thought out reasons. If you’re following the approved checklist as much as practical, not adding needless “to do” items. My generic criticism lies not with a succinct checklist, in the original format, which some one may prepare for themselves, but rather with the wordy versions being created by flying clubs, or other organizations, which are massively long and complex, as though to capture every possible thing that is possible. These seem to be an effort to teach basic piloting disciplines at every use of the checklist, rather than demanding that pilots learn and memorize the basic skills generic to flying.
I customize all my checklist. The objective is to get them as lean as possible and remove as much possible self-evident and redundant fluff. Also, so they fit on a double sided A5 or half-US letter size, incl. all emergency procedures… 
boscomantico wrote:
They were not done by gods, they were done by human beings.
Lawyers maybe?
PilotDAR,
I hear what you are saying but there are massive problems with most of the POH Checklists in daily life. Just as an example, my airplane was built in 1965 and has not got a checklist per se in the POH, just some fractions in various chapters. It has been massively modified since, lots of new equipment, autopilot, EFIS e.t.c. which were not even an issue when the POH was written.
So we had to do something to make us a proper operational checklist for our airplane which includes all this.
On the ground, we made it quite elaborate, because there you have time and there you also should prepare everything such that it won’t bother you in the air.
In Flight, we use the absolute minimum necessary. In both conditions, we included everything which the POH has to offer unless it is no longer valid (eg the Mooney Positive Control is no longer there therefore it does not get checked either obviously).
With today’s age of the airframes, almost none of them are in the original conditon, all of them will have to have custom made checklists. When the airplane was last inspected by the CAA for the ARC they looked at the new checklist and were happy with it.
I agree however that it might be a good idea to actually not only rewrite the checklist but the POH as well, as airlines do it, and then have the lot approved by the CAA. It’s a project I have but have not yet done anything as I am too busy with other stuff right now, but it would make a whole lot of sense seeing how the old POH’s are done. I did ask the CAA’s inspector about it and he said no problem, hand it in together with the original and we’ll approve it if it’s ok and tell you what to ammend if not.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
With today’s age of the airframes, almost none of them are in the original conditon, all of them will have to have custom made checklists.
Yes I agree. A 1960’s airplane predates formal flight manual formatting, and some serious effort at checklists. Hopefully the mods on the aircraft are accompanied by flight manual supplements with their own checklists. It is an important exercise to assure that supplemental information is properly incorporated in flight manual, and, maintenance information too!
I don’t know about the CAA, but in North America, a POH (rewritten one) may require formal approval as an aircraft certification effort. Certain certification basis aircraft require certain flight manual (POH) provisions. Airlines may have operational approval opportunities which are not available to GA aircraft.
A well though out, succinct checklist, which specifies the required elements, without becoming a “to do” list is appropriate. It’s the home made, or worse aftermarket money grabber, verbose checklists which are inappropriate.
I’ve just checked the approved checklist of an ATO with CPL/IR approval. Its over 80 pages long!
