NDB's WHY??

[cpt.sam]

As near as I can figure the last time I flew a for real NDB approach in actual IMC conditions without GPS guidance to accurately maintain the inbound track was 1994. I learned IFR in the pre GPS, pre near universal radar coverage days. As soon as GPS showed up I lost all interest in dealing with all the inaccuracies and foibles of the ADF. I still liked to use the needle to help with situation awareness but now that all the GPS units have a moving map I don't even use it for that anymore. The final straw was when my favorite AM rock and roll station was taken over by a bunch of holy rollers and now features non stop lame Christian songs

I see the point about keeping NDB's up in the far north but IMO they could shut down every NDB South of 60N and it would not make a bit of difference to my flying.

AND
it may even force some carriers to put a frickin gps in their airliners!


Now... I don't really see any need of getting rid of them.
They are a challenge to shoot, but thats just more fun.
Try the NDB 34 in YYT in a hurricane w/o a gps to cheat with! Station passage is noted by a wallop of turbulence, associated with Signal Hill and northerly wind!
You will enjoy the challenge....pax...perhaps not!

[cpt.sam]

[/quote]
So, to paraphrase, in the USA they kill themselves by shooting each other with handguns, in Canada we kill ourselves by shooting NDB Approaches.
"You can pry my NDB from my cold, dead hands, eh!" [/quote]


Very nice!

[Hawkerflyer]

The NDB is still widely used in Africa.

[Edo]

Anyway, enough people use NDBs to set heading indicators in the north that it might be useful to keep them..

I don't fly in N Domestic airspace and have never done this. How do you?

[NeverBlue]

Interesting discussion. With respect to static and p-static in particular, the ADF isn't as good a tool as your VHF and even weather radar believe it or not. The ADF is better at detecting noise generated by motors and generators. It's hard to distinguish p-static noise on ADF or HF from normal background and atmospheric noise.

good to hear from you CID

The Dayton-Granger Precip-Static test set is what I use to determine these problems. I just use a simple old AM headset radio and/or someone sitting inside listening to VHF and ADF audio. I charge the wand to about 13000 volts (or somewhere around there I think) and I have been able to solve many many static problems by locating unboned panels or windscreens.

[Colonel Sanders]

locating unboned panels or windscreens

That certainly explains the strange erotic sounds
I hear at night from the maintenance hangar.

[NeverBlue]

...


ok un-bonded

...that was funny

[CID]

Interesting discussion. With respect to static and p-static in particular, the ADF isn't as good a tool as your VHF and even weather radar believe it or not. The ADF is better at detecting noise generated by motors and generators. It's hard to distinguish p-static noise on ADF or HF from normal background and atmospheric noise.

good to hear from you CID

The Dayton-Granger Precip-Static test set is what I use to determine these problems. I just use a simple old AM headset radio and/or someone sitting inside listening to VHF and ADF audio. I charge the wand to about 13000 volts (or somewhere around there I think) and I have been able to solve many many static problems by locating unboned panels or windscreens.

Ahh...in that context you make perfect sense. I thought you were speaking in the operational sense. When panels or control surfaces are not bonded I tend to see it in VHF first. COMs break squelch and NAVs flag when entering precipitation. Then the weather radar starts to act strange.

ADFs are a little tougher because they can go batty with electrical activity in the general area. You don't even need to fly through precipitation. In a controlled test scenario like you described it works great.

[Liquid Charlie]

The only thing I keep seeing is that the NDB approach is "challenging" -- wtf -- it's just putting some numbers together, timing and a little accurate tracking -- pretty easy stuff in reality --

[ettw]

Anyway, enough people use NDBs to set heading indicators in the north that it might be useful to keep them..

I don't fly in N Domestic airspace and have never done this. How do you?

It's a perfect melding of old and new technology.

At top of decent we pull up the page on our GPS that gives us a bearing to the NDB we have tuned up. Then we drive our compass heading in the appropriate direction until the RMI shows the correct bearing to the NDB. Voila! Windage factored in automatically.

You cannot do this with a VOR as the indication you have displayed is the radial you are on, not the bearing to the VOR.

If you have a very good C11 DG or some other INS unit you may be able to get away with just correcting for convergence. No NDB required.

Ye old astrocompass works very well but of course won't work unless the heavenly body you are working off of is visible. So no good in overhead OVC or BKN conditions.

Cheers

ETTW

[Doc]

The NDB is still widely used in Africa.

Unlike penicillin, a lot of stuff is widely used in Africa. AK47s etc., doesn't necessarily make it a good idea idea here?

[Taco Joe]

The NDB is still widely used in Africa.

Unlike penicillin, a lot of stuff is widely used in Africa. AK47s etc., doesn't necessarily make it a good idea idea here?

I dunno, an AK might help with the grouse hunt this year...

[Kabloona]

I grew up old school, transitioned to GPS and now have dual FMS. I still use the NDB all the time for situational awareness, heading correction in NDA and just general location to an airport. We might reach that RNAV goal of 100% coverage but until then leave that NDB intact.

[Edo]

Anyway, enough people use NDBs to set heading indicators in the north that it might be useful to keep them..

I don't fly in N Domestic airspace and have never done this. How do you?

It's a perfect melding of old and new technology.

At top of decent we pull up the page on our GPS that gives us a bearing to the NDB we have tuned up. Then we drive our compass heading in the appropriate direction until the RMI shows the correct bearing to the NDB. Voila! Windage factored in automatically.

You cannot do this with a VOR as the indication you have displayed is the radial you are on, not the bearing to the VOR.

If you have a very good C11 DG or some other INS unit you may be able to get away with just correcting for convergence. No NDB required.

Ye old astrocompass works very well but of course won't work unless the heavenly body you are working off of is visible. So no good in overhead OVC or BKN conditions.

Cheers

ETTW

Thanks.

[Prodriver]

I grew up new school, run w/ the GPS if you can!

[frozen solid]

OK, Justin Bieber.

If you want to approach flying as a discipline, making full use of the "new school" tricks requires an understanding of what came before. Times change; standards stay the same.

[Doc]

OK, Justin Bieber.

If you want to approach flying as a discipline, making full use of the "new school" tricks requires an understanding of what came before. Times change; standards stay the same.

Actually, you're kind of wrong. Some cling to the old ways. Believe me, the new ways ARE better. Navigating by ground based systems are not only unnecessarily complicated, inefficient and more time consuming, it also burns more fuel.
Is easier necessarily a bad thing? I can shoot an NDB approach at least as well as some of you. I dare say better than some of you. But why the Sam Hell should I?
It seems strange, that in order to use a system capable of finding a Coke can in the forest, it must be backed up by a system incapable of finding that forest?

Several years back, I met an old sailor in Halifax. He was a Brit who had just single handed his lovely old wooden ketch from England. I asked him if, being a traditional type of sailor, he navigated with a sextant and by the stars. He said "I'm traditional sunny, I ain't stupid! I have three GPS units on board!" He also had sat phone, ham radio.....but aviation in Canada must remain in the mud hole of the past because TC doesn't trust anything since the Jurassic!

[Doc]

At top of decent we pull up the page on our GPS that gives us a bearing to the NDB we have tuned up. Then we drive our compass heading in the appropriate direction until the RMI shows the correct bearing to the NDB. Voila! Windage factored in automatically.

You cannot do this with a VOR as the indication you have displayed is the radial you are on, not the bearing to the VOR.

ETTW

Sure you can. You just need an RMI that points to the VOR. Voila

[shimmydampner]

No one is suggesting that "new school" navaids go unused or ignored, Doc. Map reading is more difficult and less efficient than being a dumb GPS monkey but it's still an important basic skill of navigation, despite being ancient technology. Feel free to toss your maps out the window along with your ADF, but I'd like to keep both. You may not use them in your corner of the world but I do in mine.

[frozen solid]

OK, Justin Bieber.

If you want to approach flying as a discipline, making full use of the "new school" tricks requires an understanding of what came before. Times change; standards stay the same.

Actually, you're kind of wrong. Some cling to the old ways. Believe me, the new ways ARE better. Navigating by ground based systems are not only unnecessarily complicated, inefficient and more time consuming, it also burns more fuel.
Is easier necessarily a bad thing? I can shoot an NDB approach at least as well as some of you. I dare say better than some of you. But why the Sam Hell should I?
It seems strange, that in order to use a system capable of finding a Coke can in the forest, it must be backed up by a system incapable of finding that forest?

Several years back, I met an old sailor in Halifax. He was a Brit who had just single handed his lovely old wooden ketch from England. I asked him if, being a traditional type of sailor, he navigated with a sextant and by the stars. He said "I'm traditional sunny, I ain't stupid! I have three GPS units on board!" He also had sat phone, ham radio.....but aviation in Canada must remain in the mud hole of the past because TC doesn't trust anything since the Jurassic!

Having a different point of view than you doesn't make me wrong. Take as an example the nifty little Sandel digital RMIs you can get. You can bring up a virtual "needle" that points at the GPS waypoint you've selected. When that waypoint happens to be the threshold of a strip you've made for yourself and marked out with garbage bags in a country that's a uniform white from the east coast to the west coast, and you're trying to approach it on "runway" heading on an overcast day in blowing snow, that instrument provides an excellent source of situational awareness, giving you your bearing to the waypoint superimposed over your heading right in front of your face. The skills you need to maintain a constant track on a given bearing are the same as the one you use for NDB navigation. Much better than trying to maintain your "track" and "bearing" numbers on the screen of a GPS that's probably located somewhere other than your primary instrument panel, and MUCH better than trying to steer a little picture of an aeroplane down a pink line on said screen. If they taught techniques like this using GPS in schools, I guess it wouldn't matter if they scrapped NDBs, but I have yet to see anyone other than folks who know how to use NDBs who would know what the hell I am talking about here. I use GPS extensively, but my knowledge of older navigation techniques enhances my use of the GPS.

Doc, I challenge you to take one of your little co-pilots who grew up only relying on GPS and really try to put his/her situational awareness to the test. You tell me if their ability to navigate, plan ahead and really know where the hell they are matches up with your own in any way at all. Then tell me that everything you learned about navigation before the GPS was invented isn't worth a damn.

By the way I am teaching myself celestial navigation. Besides being able to set my D.G. accurately in the N.D.A, I can't really see it helping me much in the air. It is damned interesting though, and unlike GPS, it will keep working until the end of time, without batteries.