Day Twenty-Seven – Scheduled Day Off

Today is another day off, so I thought I would give you a little tour of the Piper Cherokee PA-28-140 cockpit. Most people imagine an airplane cockpit to be a mysterious and complex environment of knobs, dials, gauges and instruments. It can be a bit overwhelming at first, but once you get to know your aircraft, it all makes sense.

The left seat (where I sit):

The dials (from left to right) are: the clock, airspeed indicator, artificial horizon, and altimeter. I have no idea what the gauge next to the altimeter is (just kidding) – it has to do with navigation which we’ll talk about later. Below them are the: turn coordinator, heading indicator and vertical speed indicator. The control column, or yoke, is front and centre. On the right side of the yoke are the engine gauges (oil temperature, oil pressure, fuel pressure) and the fuel gauges (left tank and right). To the right of the engine gauges are the: master, electric fuel pump, landing light, and anti-collision light switches, along with panel light dimmers. Below the yoke is the key/ignition/magnetos switch, tachometer (engine RPM), and primer knob. The black lever is the throttle control, the red lever is the mixture control, and the black lever is the carburetor heat. On the floor are the rudder pedals and brakes. The black handle is the parking brake.

The right seat (where my instructor sits):

Not nearly as interesting is it? I guess he’s supposed to be paying attention to me or something. Seriously, the blank space leaves room for additional navigation radios required for more complex instrument navigation. The radio stack contains the radio where you dial in the frequency of who you want to talk to (ground control, tower control, emergency frequency, etc.) and the transponder (provides ATC with information on your location and altitude). The dial to the far left indicates vacuum pressure for the operation of gyro-based instruments (e.g. artificial horizon) and the meter below that records engine running time. Below the right yoke are the circuit breakers. The dial on the lower left is the ammeter, an indicator of electrical power just like in your car.