Noe wrote:
I landed on the first attempt, and it was my best landing ever
Things only work under pressure 
Snoopy wrote:
In a cirrus the chute is an option if you screw up before you’re too low.
Yes, the chute will not help on a botched approach, so one has to decide early (you get the additional risk of delay)
Ibra wrote:
@Noe, landing at Southend with one engine, was it a one shot approach? (there was not much night airports open around)
Stansted was my nearest backup. It was a beautiful clear day (but with no moon so over the sea it was more like IMC), so I wasn’t concerned about the weather. I landed with over 4h of fuel, so in case of IMC could have “chased” an airfield with better conditions had it come to it.
In my case, I did prepare for a go around, and given the long runway didn’t land with full flaps, to make go-around easier if it needed to be (I landed on the first attempt, and it was my best landing ever, I had a moment of hesitation if I had actually landed (until the nosewheel started “bumping” on the runway lights).
In hard IMC, with time pressure, I would have tried to land on a and tried to land on a CATII/III runway, where I think the lightse are even more powerful (and would have had more confidence following the ILS right down to the ground if needed to be), and large commercial airports are more likely to ahve emergency services on hand.
Yes, a chute is nice to have when rarely flying in imc in a single and experiencing attitude indicator failure.
As long as everything is under control I’d opt for a no gyro PAR approach to the runway. In a cirrus the chute is an option if you screw up before you’re too low.
If the approach is stable, it make sense to go down anyway visual or not at minima (going around on partial panel will not help neither) otherwise I guess the alternatives are: divert to another airport with high cloudbase, become VMC and land off field (@Snoopy pulling that chute?)
Probably, the same question for twins flyers, how approaches are executed on one engine? Will you adjust minima (seems more risk with OEI + going around)
@Noe, landing at Southend with one engine, was it a one shot approach? (there was not much night airports open around)
Ibra wrote:
How you would adjust the approach minima if you have no AI on partial panel, I doubt one will be comfortable going down to 200ft?
I would personally not adjust the minima. As long as the approach is stable it doesn’t matter if I don’t have an AI. Of course there is a larger risk of an unstabilised approach but then you should abandon the approach regardless of minima. Since this would be an emergency, I would look for the airport with the highest cloudbase/visibility.
Ibra wrote:
How you would adjust the approach minima if you have no AI on partial panel, I doubt one will be comfortable going down to 200ft?
What is safer? Continue if stable on the needles or go around partial panel??
How you would adjust the approach minima if you have no AI on partial panel, I doubt one will be comfortable going down to 200ft?
Of course it should not matter what are you using for IF, if approach needles are dead in the centre but the tolerances are not the same between full and partial panel…
RobertL18C wrote:
In EASA land the limited panel sign off is carried out in the SIM, the IR loss of glass exercises carried out with a standby EHSI and DG.
In my 61.58, I had ILS on standby AI and HSI in O2 mask and smoke goggles.
The DG would have to be an electric driven slaved compass HSI to qualify as a limited panel, and they usually are with US schools. EASA limited panel exercises (timed turns, climbs, descents, unusual attitude recovery) are based on a T/C and a compass. The FAA requires a limited panel 2D NPA approach, but usually with a functioning HSI so there is an element of apples and oranges in the comparison.
In EASA land the limited panel sign off is carried out in the SIM, the IR loss of glass exercises carried out with a standby EHSI and DG.
For true masochism the Canadian IR in the 1970’s might include a limited panel (using a compass and T&B in a wheezy Apache) LF four course range approach – at least not OEI/asymmetric.
You might be surprised that nearly all of my FAA IR training, and certainly all of my FAA IR checkride, was partial panel i.e. AI covered up, with the TC and the DI being the only gyro instruments
Every approach down to minima and only then you look up.
Now imagine the VOR runway 04 approach at KCHD, with a VOR inbound and VOR crosscuts (two different VORs!) and only one VOR receiver which has to be continually retuned, while you are flying a heading and altitude, or heading and vertical speed / stepdown fixes. Pure 24ct masochism.
But with 2 flights a day I was damn good, as anyone would be – at the end of the two weeks and for not much longer after that 
I stayed on UK time (in Arizona) so up at 3am, first flight 8am, then a sleep for an hour, second flight 2pm.
It isn’t particularly hard to fly on the TC so long as nothing else goes wrong and you don’t have to do complicated things at the same time.
