Instrument Flying Skills: The Scan, Approach Charts And Holds

What Instrument Flying Asks Of You

The checkride standard is FAA-S-ACS-8C, in force since 31 May 2024. It splits the rating into eight areas of operation, and 14 CFR 61.65(c) lists the same eight as the training you must receive. Here they are in plain words.

Area VII also contains two engine-out tasks. They apply only to applicants in a multi-engine airplane, so in a single-engine trainer you fly the other two.

The standards are numbers, not impressions. Task IV.A asks you to hold altitude within 100 feet, headings within 10 degrees, airspeed within 10 knots and bank within 5 degrees in turns, solely by reference to instruments. Task III.B, holding, uses the same altitude, airspeed and heading limits and adds a course needle kept within three-quarter scale. The full task list, and how the knowledge test lines up with it, is on our page about the instrument written and the ACS.

All of it sits on top of a private certificate. To apply for the rating, 14 CFR 61.65(a) requires you to hold at least a private pilot certificate, or to be applying for one at the same time. If you have never flown, that path starts with a $229 discovery flight from our ramp at Van Nuys.

The Scan, And Why Your Inner Ear Lies

The ACS names the skill in a single line. Task IV.A, skill element S2: use proper instrument cross-check and interpretation, and apply the appropriate pitch, bank, power and trim. Cross-check is the scan, your eyes moving from instrument to instrument on a rhythm. Interpretation is reading what each one is actually telling you. Neither lasts long if your body is voting against them.

Your inner ear senses acceleration, not attitude. In cloud, with no horizon to correct it, it gives wrong answers that the AIM catalogues in paragraph 8-1-5. Roll into a bank too gently for the inner ear to notice, correct it abruptly, and you can feel as if you are banking the other way: the leans. Hold a long, coordinated turn and the inner ear stops reporting it at all. Notice the altitude unwinding, feel a wings-level descent, pull back to stop it, and you tighten the turn and lose more height. The AIM calls that the graveyard spiral.

The one that catches pilots close to the ground is the somatogravic illusion. A rapid acceleration on takeoff can feel exactly like the nose pitching up, and the AIM's warning is that a disoriented pilot may push the airplane into a nose-low attitude to correct a climb that is not happening. A rapid deceleration does the opposite.

The AIM's prevention is blunt. These illusions can be prevented only by visual reference to reliable, fixed points on the ground or to flight instruments. In cloud, that leaves the instruments. The ACS lists spatial disorientation and optical illusions as a risk element of Task IV.A, next to the situations that degrade your cross-check.

One habit worth building from the first hour: when your body and the attitude indicator disagree, believe the instrument and confirm it with a second one. Each illusion, and what to do about it, is covered in our guide to spatial disorientation and the somatogravic illusion.

Reading An Approach Chart, Top To Bottom

An approach chart is designed to be briefed in order. The Instrument Procedures Handbook (chapter 4) says the FAA format "is presented in a logical order, facilitating pilot briefing of the procedures", and it calls the top section the Pilot Briefing Information. Read the chart in four passes, the same way every time.

Precision, Non-Precision And The Missed Approach

AIM 5-4-5 sorts approaches by what the needles tell you. A precision approach gives course and glidepath deviation from a system built to precision standards; the AIM's examples are PAR, ILS and GLS. An approach with vertical guidance, an APV, also gives a glidepath but is not required to meet those standards, and LPV and LNAV/VNAV are both APVs. A non-precision approach gives course guidance only, as on a VOR, NDB or LNAV approach.

The minimums follow the guidance. Lines that support vertical guidance publish a decision altitude (DA); lines with lateral guidance only, such as LNAV and LP, publish a minimum descent altitude (MDA). You fly down the glidepath to a DA and decide there. You descend to an MDA and level off until you either have what 14 CFR 91.175 requires to go lower or reach the missed approach point. What you must see before you leave the minimums is explained on our FAR 91.175 page.

The checkride asks for both kinds. ACS-8C Task VI.A requires at least two different non-precision approaches, in simulated or actual instrument conditions, and its appendix sets conditions on the mix, including a course reversal on at least one. Task VI.B adds a precision approach, and Tasks VI.C to VI.E a missed approach, a circling approach and the landing.

Fly the missed approach as often as you fly the approach. 91.175(e) tells you to execute it immediately if you reach the missed approach point or DA without what paragraph (c) requires, or lose sight of the airport while circling. The IPH gives the reason to start it on time. The published missed approach protects you from obstacles only if you begin it at or above the DA, or at the missed approach point. It also assumes a climb of 200 feet per nautical mile unless the chart asks for more.

Holding Patterns In Practice

AIM 5-3-8 sets the rules. A standard hold turns right unless the chart or the clearance says left. The inbound leg takes one minute at or below 14,000 feet MSL. The maximum speeds are 200 knots indicated from the minimum holding altitude through 6,000 feet, 230 knots from 6,001 to 14,000 and 265 knots above that. A Warrior that cruises at about 128 knots never comes near those limits, so in a trainer the work is the entry and the wind.

The AIM describes three entries, parallel, teardrop and direct, chosen by your heading at the fix relative to a line 70 degrees off the holding course on the holding side. It calls them the procedures recommended by the FAA. Wind is the harder half. The AIM's rule is to correct for drift on both legs and to triple the inbound correction on the outbound leg, then adjust the outbound timing until the inbound leg comes out at a minute.

Holding comes up twice in an instrument pilot's life. It is a checkride task, flown to the limits above, and it is one of the three items 14 CFR 61.57(c) requires within the six calendar months before an IFR flight. Fall more than six calendar months behind on them and only an instrument proficiency check restores your currency. Our guide to holding patterns covers entries, timing, speeds and wind with worked numbers.

Simulated Instrument Time: Foggles, Safety Pilots And The Simulator

14 CFR 61.65(d)(2) asks for 40 hours of actual or simulated instrument time, 15 of them from an authorized instrument instructor. Much of that can be simulated, in one of two ways: a view-limiting device in a real airplane, or an approved training device on the ground. 14 CFR 61.51(g) says you log instrument time only while flying solely by reference to instruments, in actual or simulated conditions.

In the airplane, 14 CFR 91.109(c) sets three conditions. The other control seat must hold a safety pilot with at least a private pilot certificate in the airplane's category and class. That safety pilot needs adequate vision forward and to each side, or a competent observer on board to supplement it. And the airplane needs fully functioning dual controls, with a narrow exception for a single throwover control wheel in a single-engine airplane. Our guide to foggles and view-limiting devices covers the devices themselves and the safety pilot's job.

On the ground, 14 CFR 61.65(i) lets you credit up to 20 hours in an advanced aviation training device, or up to 10 in a basic one. Three conditions apply: the FAA approved the device, an authorized instructor gives the time, and the FAA approved the training done in it. Paragraph (j) caps everything from simulators and training devices combined at 20 hours, outside a Part 142 training center. 61.51(g) adds that device time counts toward the rating when an authorized instructor observes it and signs for it.

Our Redbird MCX is an FAA-approved advanced aviation training device, and our instrument package puts 20 of the package's 40 dual hours in it. Which device hours count toward which certificate is laid out on simulator hours that count.

One honest limit. The simulator trains the scan, the procedures and the radio work, and it is never cancelled for weather. We do not claim it recreates the inner-ear illusions above. You learn those on the ground, and you meet them with an instructor beside you in actual cloud.

Where You Train These At Van Nuys

Instrument training here moves between the Redbird MCX and the two airplanes we list for instrument work, the Warrior and the Cirrus. Your instructors are Francis, our Instrument and Multi-Engine Instructor, and Alex, our founder and chief flight instructor, whose ratings include the instrument rating. Instruction is $110 an hour, in the airplane or the simulator. Van Nuys itself is a towered Class D airport under the Los Angeles Class B shelf; how that airspace works is in our Los Angeles airspace guide.

The Redbird MCX Simulator

A full-motion Redbird MCX with single- and multi-engine profiles, approved by the FAA as an advanced aviation training device. It is never cancelled for weather and has no weight limit. $200 an hour retail, $120 inside a package, or $189 for a 60-minute session with an instructor if you want to try it first. More on our full-motion flight simulator page.

The Piper Warrior

Two of them, N3034Q and N6312C: four seats, a low wing, 160 horsepower, about 128 knots and IFR-equipped. $269 an hour retail, $179 inside a package. If we were choosing an airplane for your first approach in real cloud, it would be this one: steady, predictable and well under half the Cirrus's hourly rate. Specifications are on our Piper Warrior PA-28-161 page.

The Cirrus SR22 Turbo

N422SN: 310 turbocharged horsepower, 215 knots, FL250, Cirrus Perspective glass and the CAPS parachute. $649 an hour retail. It is the nearest thing on our ramp to a modern glass flight deck, and a pilot who learns the rating in the Warrior can add Perspective time before or after the checkride. A high-performance endorsement in it is $1,799. More on our Cirrus SR22 page.

The Diamond DA20-C1

N306EF and N308EF fly private, commercial and spin training rather than instrument work, but the DA20 carries a Garmin 430, and so do the Piper Arrow N316EF and the Seminole N311EF. The commercial and multi-engine ratings that often follow the instrument rating are flown in those airplanes, so time spent learning the 430 pays again later. $329 an hour retail, $229 inside a package. If you have not flown at all yet, a two-hour first lesson for $349, in the Cessna 162 or the Warrior, is where all of this starts.

Questions About Instrument Flying Skills

Can I Practice Instrument Flying In The Simulator?

Yes, and it counts. 14 CFR 61.65(i) allows up to 20 of the 40 instrument hours in an FAA-approved advanced aviation training device, given by an authorized instructor. The Redbird MCX at Van Nuys is one, and our instrument package uses all 20 of those hours in it.

Do I Need A Safety Pilot To Wear Foggles?

In the airplane, yes. 14 CFR 91.109(c) requires a safety pilot with at least a private certificate for the category and class in the other control seat. The safety pilot needs adequate vision forward and to each side, or a competent observer, and the airplane needs fully functioning dual controls. If the flight is for currency, 61.51(g)(3) also asks you to log the safety pilot's name.

What Does The Instrument Checkride Cover?

All eight areas of FAA-S-ACS-8C, from preflight preparation to postflight procedures, on the ground and in the airplane. The examiner's fee runs roughly $800 to $1,000, and it is not part of our package price.

How Many Approaches Keep Me Current?

Six, plus holding procedures and tasks and intercepting and tracking courses, all within the six calendar months before the month of the flight, under 14 CFR 61.57(c). A simulator or training device can count if it represents the airplane category. The details are on our IFR currency requirements page.

What Is The Difference Between A Precision And A Non-Precision Approach?

A precision approach gives course and glidepath guidance and ends at a decision altitude; a non-precision approach gives course guidance only and ends at a minimum descent altitude. For the checkride, the ACS-8C appendix defines a precision approach as one flown to a published decision altitude using approved vertical guidance.

What Does Instrument Training Cost Here?

$11,700 for the package: 20 hours in the airplane, 20 in the simulator, 40 hours of dual and 10 of ground. You can pay $2,500 down and four payments of $2,300, or finance it over up to 15 years through Stratus Financial after a soft credit check.

Keep Reading

• Minimum Sector Altitude (MSA), Explained For Instrument Pilots
• Holding Patterns: Entries, Timing, Speeds And Wind Correction
• Foggles And View-Limiting Devices For Simulated Instrument Time
• Spatial Disorientation And The Somatogravic Illusion
• Instrument Rating In Los Angeles: The Course, Price And Marine Layer
• Private Pilot Maneuvers: How To Fly Every Checkride Maneuver