Suggested Reading

[TheCraftyHippo]

Hi there! As the topic title suggests, I'm wondering what you all suggest to students when they ask for further reading. As a commercial student entering into the building hours phase of my training, I'm looking to expand my knowledge, move passed a 'bare minimums' attitude, and try to immerse myself in aviation (not only practically, but culturally). It's always surprised me a little that my FTU doesn't have a reading list beyond the textbooks we're given, and hardly even seems to encourage further reading. What books do you think everyone should read? Since I can't fly in the air every day, I'd like to do some good book flying!

What's on you must read list?

Thanks!

[shamrock104]

Stick and Rudder by Wolfgang Langewiesche

[Av_Av]

Stick and Rudder by Wolfgang Langewiesche

+1. Also try:

Basic Aerobatics
(http://www.amazon.ca/Basic-Aerobatics-G ... 0070629269)

How to Fly Floats
(http://www.amazon.com/How-Fly-Floats-Ja ... 0911721711)

Jeppesen Multi-Engine Manual
(http://www.mypilotstore.com/MyPilotStore/sep/2271)

Applied Aerodynamics for Private and Commercial Pilots
(http://www.skywriters.aero/products/appAero.html)

There are lots of others, but this should get you started.

[dave_091]

Good topic! I love reading about flying when I am not flying.

Subscribe to COPA, they will send you the monthly COPA paper.

I was given a subscription to Plane & Pilot a year or so ago for my birthday, makes great toilet reading.

A book I am reading now that I am really enjoying is:

Flying the Mountains
by
Fletcher Anderson

[tester]

Read "A View from the Hover" by John Farley, a distinguished UK Test Pilot.

The early part of the book is autobiographical and focussed on the Harrier, but in the later chapters John shares his views on many aspects relating to aircraft handling. He has a common-sense way of explaining some complex situations and goes into areas way beyond what you will get from normal flight training experience.

I've been in aviation for almost as long as John and have been lucky enough to do many of the things he did in his career, but I still learnt a lot from reading his book.

I strongly recommend it to any pilot who truly wants to understand aircraft handling.

[ross1]

...not so much for instruction but as you requested "culturally"...

"Fate is the Hunter"...Ernest K. Gann.

Cheers
Ross

[Bede]

Kirchner's advanced flight manual
Imeson mountain flying Bible
Aerodynamics for naval aviators

[AEROBAT]

Aircraft Powerplants by Bent/McKinley it is published by McGraw Hill. It covers engines from the earliest planes right to turbines.

[Shiny Side Up]

It's always surprised me a little that my FTU doesn't have a reading list beyond the textbooks we're given, and hardly even seems to encourage further reading.

Most schools don't, because if they're like me, they've probably gotten used to the idea that their students don't read the base material. I've seen so many uncracked From The Ground Ups and Flight Training Manuals in the posession of students I could stack them to the moon. I've begun to think that I should require a certificate from the Center For Kids Who Can't Read Good And Wanna Learn To Do Other Stuff Good Too before starting their flight training. Seriously, read this stuff first if you find you have an overabundance of time. Its pretty dry, but once you've plowed through them both at least twice, then look for something to occupy your thoughts if you're especially keen getting through your training.

I would speculate that a particularly bright fellow could read these two books and take a pretty good stab at flying an airplane without instruction, not that I would advise doing that, but they really are required reading. Maybe not as dramatic as some of the above offerings, but there's a reason its required reading.

The third book I would say to read would have to be another reccomendation for Stick and Rudder.

[YYZSaabGuy]

Most schools don't, because if they're like me, they've probably gotten used to the idea that their students don't read the base material. I've seen so many uncracked From The Ground Ups and Flight Training Manuals in the posession of students I could stack them to the moon.

Seriously? How does anybody pass their PPL written and flight tests without studying this stuff? I must be even dumber than I thought - I spent hours working my way through both...

Agree with you and previous posters, though, on Stick & Rudder. Interestingly, the author's son, William Langewiesche, is also a pilot and an aviation writer, and did a great piece in 2009 on that Legacy/Gol 737 mid-air over Brazil: see http://www.vanityfair.com/magazine/2009 ... rash200901.

[Shiny Side Up]

Most schools don't, because if they're like me, they've probably gotten used to the idea that their students don't read the base material. I've seen so many uncracked From The Ground Ups and Flight Training Manuals in the posession of students I could stack them to the moon.

Seriously? How does anybody pass their PPL written and flight tests without studying this stuff?

Well that's just it, they can't, won't or don't. There's a whole market for books out there to help people pass written tests based on the simple fact that people don't or won't just sit down, take the time and read. If you've actually sat down and read through the FTGU cover to cover, you're probably in the minority of PPL or even sometimes CPL students. Seems bizarre that we need books often to help you read... books. One of the great rising costs of flight training I find is that people would rather get information often spoonfed to them by an instructor at the tune of $40/hour and up, than read a book for the cheap cost of time and $19.95 (+GST of course).

[Colonel Sanders]

I would speculate that a particularly bright fellow could read these two books and take a pretty good stab at flying an airplane without instruction

That's exactly what Bedford Maule, founder of the
Maule Aircraft company did. Built an airplane of
His own design, read a book about flying airplanes
And off he went. Smart - and really nice - guy.

[TheCraftyHippo]

Thanks for the suggestions!

Any good books on bush flying? Amazon currently think I'm going to be an aerobatic mountain pilot flying naval jets... with floats. I think I should add bush flying to that! There's bushes in the mountains, right?

P.S. I guess I'm weird, I read From the Ground Up... twice.

[Colonel Sanders]

I might suggest this for technical content:

http://www.whittsflying.com/web/index.htm

Personally I have devoured hundreds of books - everything
I could find over the decades - on WWI flying, the air racing
years, WWII, Korean and Vietnam war flying, etc. Plenty to
learn there.

On a more fluffy note, Ernie Gann and Richard Bach, although
almost forgotten today, were pretty big cheeses in their times.

I was fascinated by the tomes of Charles Lindbergh. What a guy,
and I'm not just talking about the solo Atlantic flight. Do you know
that as a civilian he flew P-38's in combat in WWII with the
Marines in the Pacific for MacArthur?!

I digress. The important thing is that there is really very little
new under the sun. I will guarantee that at least 99% of the
aircraft accidents that occur this year will be repeats of previous
accidents. It would behoove you to learn the lessons of previous
aviators, even (especially!) if they have long since died of old age.

[Indanao]

Mechanics of Flight and/or Flight Without Formula by Kermode.
Bruce L Pultz Aviation Training Systems ( e.g.: Flying Instructor Course )

[Colonel Sanders]

For some light reading, with a distinctly Canadian flavour:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bartholomew_Bandy

Oh. You want something more technical. What a bunch of
left-brainers. Ok:

http://www.faa.gov/library/manuals/avia ... r%2004.pdf

http://www.faa.gov/library/manuals/avia ... 80T-80.pdf

http://jeremy.zawodny.com/flying/turnback.pdf

http://www.sacskyranch.com/acatalog/More_Info.html

http://www.pittspecials.com/articles.html

When you get through all that stuff, get back to me and I'll dig up some more.

I read From the Ground Up... twice

You should contact the Guiness Book of Drunken Irishmen and their
World Records. You broke the record by 2x

[AuxBatOn]

You don't learn how to fly in a book. You learn how to fly by flying... At this stage of your career, you should know the theory you need to know for the type of flying you'll be doing in the forseable future.

Now, there are books out there that will teach you a thing or two about being a pilot pilot. Being a pilot is more than flying an airplane, it's a way of life. If you are interested in military aviation, Fighter Pilot, written by Robin Olds is an excellent read.

[Colonel Sanders]

Fighter Pilot, written by Robin Olds is an excellent read

Bizarre. I read that a couple months ago, Aux, and I'm surprised you liked it.

I figured you would have thought that he was an irrelevant dinosaur from an ancient time - a relic from an obsolete gunslinger era.

He has my vote as the best fighter pilot and commander of the post-WWII (jet) era.

And without a doubt, my vote would be for John Boyd as the most influential fighter pilot of the post-WWII era. You fly one of his airplanes, as a matter of fact, long after his death. It's amusing how such a giant of man, so hated by all the petty generals, has such an incredible legacy in comparison to that of all the paper pushers.

Want to learn where the F-15, the F-16, the F-18 and the A-10 came from? Click here: http://www.amazon.com/Boyd-The-Fighter- ... 0316796883

John Boyd may be the most remarkable unsung hero in all of American military history. Some remember him as the greatest U.S. fighter pilot ever -- the man who, in simulated air-to-air combat, defeated every challenger in less than forty seconds. Some recall him as the father of our country's most legendary fighter aircraft -- the F-15 and F-16. Still others think of Boyd as the most influential military theorist since Sun Tzu. They know only half the story. Boyd, more than any other person, saved fighter aviation from the predations of the Strategic Air Command. His manual of fighter tactics changed the way every air force in the world flies and fights. He discovered a physical theory that forever altered the way fighter planes were designed. Later in life, he developed a theory of military strategy that has been adopted throughout the world and even applied to business models for maximizing efficiency. And in one of the most startling and unknown stories of modern military history, the Air Force fighter pilot taught the U.S. Marine Corps how to fight war on the ground. His ideas led to America's swift and decisive victory in the Gulf War and foretold the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. On a personal level, Boyd rarely met a general he couldn't offend. He was loud, abrasive, and profane. A man of daring, ferocious passion and intractable stubbornness, he was that most American of heroes -- a rebel who cared not for his reputation or fortune but for his country. He was a true patriot, a man who made a career of challenging the shortsighted and self-serving Pentagon bureaucracy. America owes Boyd and his disciples -- the six men known as the "Acolytes" -- a great debt. Robert Coram finally brings to light the remarkable story of a man who polarized all who knew him, but who left a legacy that will influence the military -- and all of America -- for decades to come.

[MikeGolfEcho]

Thanks for the suggestions!

Any good books on bush flying? Amazon currently think I'm going to be an aerobatic mountain pilot flying naval jets... with floats. I think I should add bush flying to that! There's bushes in the mountains, right?

P.S. I guess I'm weird, I read From the Ground Up... twice.

Hey,
I have Stick and Rudder on order - looking forward to reading it.
I really enjoyed a book called "Bush Flying, The Romance of the North" by Robert S. Grant. I found it inspiring, educational and a little grizzly in parts! Nice picture of a Norseman on the front too

MGE

[Colonel Sanders]

"Romance of the north" ... that's pretty funny. From the bush pilot forum:

Of the roughly 50 or more types I've flown, the "Single Swine" is the only one that I absolutely hated flying .... more correctly, I hated the lifestyle that went with being a piston Otter pilot. When I was flying the other floatplane types and enjoying being a guy with 1500 hours on floats, I used to wonder why the Otter guys were the most miserable, short tempered, grumpy, foul-mouthed, hard of hearing, stoop-shouldered and bent-backed group of guys I'd ever met in aviation.

Load every super-weird load imaginable ... dozer blades, diamond drill rigs with drunken drillers reeking of puke and booze, lengths of railroad track, 550 pound drums of gear oil, tubs and tubs and tubs of fish, obnoxious fishermen who thought you were their personal slave and they were Saudi Princes, drowning victims coffins or body bags .... complete with mourners spraying Lysol into the air to keep the smell somewhat under control, and who knows what else.

Then fly the vibrating, under-powered, hearing damaging beast to some minimum hop spot about 23 miles away and unload into some lousy dock made of Poplar branches that sink if anyone weighing more than 140 pounds stepped on it, or worse yet ... my first Single Otter trip was to move 50 barrels of jet fuel a whole 17 miles for some helicopter weenies to use at a geology camp, unload the fuel into the water down the barrel slide, and roll the barrel onto shore through Loon shit muck 18" deep. When you made your radio position report back to base, the dispatcher wondered ..... "what took you so long? The next load of drums is waiting on the dock"

After flying 6 hours which started with a takeoff at 0500, if you took 3 minutes to grab a drink of water and make a peanut butter sandwich in the mouse infested "crew lounge," the boss thought your only possible motivation for taking a break was that you had a personal dedication to put the operation into bankruptcy and have the equipment seized by the Sheriff.

Yeah ... that was a really great job flying the Single Swine.

Mercifully, I only did it for one float season before moving to IFR twins. Still, I'm sure I suffered permanent damage from having my brain vibrated off its mounts, and auditory nerve damage by the sound of that engine with grossly inadequate hearing protection.

So ... Single Otter? You can have 'em.

I don't see "piston engine majesty" when I see one, I think of "some poor bastard."

Yeah, a whole lotta "romance in the north"

[Shiny Side Up]

This is going to be a little less interesting, but one of the most useful books I used to have was the Used Airplane Buyer's Guide which they used to publish semi regularly, but I think they don't anymore, the internet largely supplanting it. There was lots of stuff, especially useful to an instructor, or someone who might fly lots of different yet similar birds. Little tidbits like the different braking system Beechcraft used on their light trainers, to how to properly operate a C-175, to the different fuel tank possibilities of the Piper Apache. The really useful part was where most types were prone to corrosion, and damage from typical use, and common mistakes that have resulted in accidents (like the Piper Arrow's automatic gear extension system).

I know, not really interesting to most pilots since it mostly deals with little boring airplanes. The other book, again that I used to have, was the Cessna Flight Training Manual. Picked it up at a garage sale, Like a combination FTM and FTGU but way more specific to using Cessnas, but it also included a lot of technical detail. Of specific interest was reccomendations and excersises for doing multi training in their 300 and 400 series, and specific stuff about learning to fly the push-pull 337, and my favorite tailwheel training with the 180/185. Disappointingly it didn't have stuff about the 170 and 120/140s, but hey you can't have everything. Bonus for campyness, being published in the seventies most of the picture examples involve stylish pilots wearing brown suits sporting sideburns and mustashes and made it really look like the dude used his 150 commuter to actually skip the busy freeway and commute. Notably absent is the still "optional" use of intercomms and headsets in the examples, but the pilot with much more cool flies and makes use of a hand held mike. I suspect that this was done to appeal to people that flight training had a link to the "CB craze" of the late seventies, early eighties. At the very least the book is sort of a step back in time, when the old Cessnas you see today were brand new and things were styling in the general aviation world.

[shitdisturber]

Notably absent is the still "optional" use of intercomms and headsets in the examples, but the pilot with much more cool flies and makes use of a hand held mike. I suspect that this was done to appeal to people that flight training had a link to the "CB craze" of the late seventies, early eighties. At the very least the book is sort of a step back in time, when the old Cessnas you see today were brand new and things were styling in the general aviation world.

Didn't your old truck have a CB in it before the drunk totalled it?

[sidestick stirrer]

I agree with the Colonel on both counts: found the story on Robin Olds to be somewhat flat and predictable. What came to mind, while reading it, was another book from long ago that included a chapter of when this legendary guy came to try his hand at a new fighter that carried a GIB ( guy in the back).
They launched and got into a furball wherein Olds ignored all the information coming from his crewman involving the location and probable intentions of those two-crew airplanes all around them. The result was that he got his ass handed to him on a plate.
Now, I like the cover picture: sweat soaked, big cigar, shades and obviously adored by his men for his "mano-a-mano" prowess but-in a way-sad too as it is an era that has passed on.
Boyd was quite the character and to read his story is very interesting. His manifesto on air-fighting is available online although it appears written by someone semi-literate and a little hard to grasp, at least for me.
Especially enjoyable is his "Fighter-Pilot Mafia" reputation when he rose to the Pentagon. His "take no prisoners" approach to normal processes in there means he viewed every discussion, presentation and decision like a dogfight: back to the wall, all weapons online...
For a technical introduction into flying the Big Sleds, I found "Flying The Wing" by Webb and "Handling The Big Jets" by Davies to be the best at that time of the early seventies.
Buy several line-lighters...

[sidestick stirrer]

And for purely recreational reading, the two books that Keep appearing on my night table are "Fate is The Hunter" and "Piece of Cake", the latter by Derek Robinson. His cast of characters is at once totally believable and yet unbelievable, Moggy Cattermole being my anti-hero. In fact, any of his books are amazing and all deal with military aviation.
Few authors can put you into the cockpit with them like Stephen Coonts "Flight of The Intruder" and Richard Bach "Stranger to The Ground". The colors, the feel of the ejection seat, the harness, the helmet, the various knobs and guards and switches, how the stick grip and throttle feel just right, the smells of the mask and the oxygen, the sounds of the airflow over the canopy, the whine of the gyros, the rumbling of the engine, the tinny, disconnected voice of ATC, the hissing of his own pressure breathing, this can only come from someone who has been there.

[Ivan42]

Most schools don't, because if they're like me, they've probably gotten used to the idea that their students don't read the base material. I've seen so many uncracked From The Ground Ups and Flight Training Manuals in the posession of students I could stack them to the moon.

Seriously? How does anybody pass their PPL written and flight tests without studying this stuff? I must be even dumber than I thought - I spent hours working my way through both...

Agree with you and previous posters, though, on Stick & Rudder. Interestingly, the author's son, William Langewiesche, is also a pilot and an aviation writer, and did a great piece in 2009 on that Legacy/Gol 737 mid-air over Brazil: see http://www.vanityfair.com/magazine/2009 ... rash200901.

Thanks for the link - it was a great albeit harrowing read