Hi- John from Fly8ma.com and today I'm going to walk you through doing a
pre-flight on our Piper Cherokee here.
First thing we want to check is that we have our required documents on board.
That'll be our arrow or registration and radio operator's license
if that's applicable. Here in the United States we don't need
a radio operator's license to be a pilot. Our operating handbook our POH is our O and
our W is our weight and balance. So our air worthiness certificate and registration
is right in our back seat there. We don't need a radio operators license. Our
operating handbook is located right back here our POH and our weight and balance
is on our back shelf in ourbinder there. Next thing we want to do is make
sure our control wheel is released, so we don't have any control lock-in on our
control wheel we can move the controls freely, that's good. Our flaps we're gonna
want to make sure are down, so that means handle up to low our flap so we can look
outside here and see the flaps go up and down, so this is handle up, that's handled
down flaps, up flaps down, handle up. Alright we've got our flaps down, our
master switch we'll go ahead and turn on. And as we turn our master switch on we
want to make sure we look out in front of us make sure there's no one else
walking near propeller just in case the engine were to turn over as we turn our
master switch on and actually supply power to our starting circuit. So master
switch is on, prop didn't turn that's good. Fuel gauges we're going to go ahead
and check here we've got about five gallons on the left side and about ten
gallons on the right, so we're going to need some fuel before we go flying today.
Next thing we want to check is our fuel pumps. We're gonna look here at our fuel
pressure look over here on our left for our blue
switch turn our blue fuel pump switch on we can hear our fuel pump running and we
can also see that we have some fuel pressure showing right there. We'll go
ahead and turn our fuel pump off. We'll go ahead and check our lights now so we
have our rotating beacon turned on. We'll go ahead and turn on our landing light,
turn on our nav lights we'll just put them to dim, and we'll go ahead and turn
on our strobe light. We'll now go ahead and walk outside the airplane, do a quick
walk around, and make sure all our lights work. Starting with our right wing here
we have our green nav light is working and we can see the strobe on the belly
is flashing, we can see our strobe on the tail our rotating beacon is working,
and we can see our landing light is working on our nose there, and our red
navigation light on our left wing is working. Now we can go ahead and turn all
our lights back off. We'll leave our beacon on landing light off, navigation
lights off, strobe light off, and then our master switch off. Always leave the
rotating beacon in the on position that way it's on as
soon as you turn your master switch on to start your engine. Also if you walk
away from the airplane and you leave the master switch on the battery will die
and by leaving the rotating beacon on you'll have that big flashing red light
to let you know hey you left the master switch on you need to go back and turn
it off. Now we'll go ahead and complete our walk-around. We're gonna start
with our right wing checking the flaps make sure they're secure and not damaged
no dings or dents. We'll also check them from the front
side and check our flap actuating rod, the rod that controls the flap movement up
and down, make sure there's some a little bit of free play there it's not too
tight or too loose. So we work our way down here we're looking for dings, dents,
rivets popped out , anything like that we'll work our aileron up and down
here our hinge pins are in place and all our screws are in place and we can see
back inside the cockpit as we move our ailerons up and down the controls turn
left and right as well so this is how we control the bank of the aircraft when
we're in the air and when we're flying.
We'll come around here and we're going to check that our counterbalance weight is
attached. You'll see it right through this little access hatch here good place
don't see anything missing no dings or dents will come around side tip here
inspect for dings, dents, missing screws. Everything looks good. We'll work our way
along the leading edge. We'll go ahead and confirm our fuel level. We already
know it's low, but we would look down inside our tank and confirm our fuel level. If
we didn't think we need to add any before going flying.
We'll come down here if we had a tie-down attached we would go ahead and
remove our tie-down chain we don't. We'll check our fuel vent. There's no mud
daubers nests and it's clear. If it's dripping a little bit of fuel that's
actually probably a good thing. We'll check our main gear tire here, no flat
spots on the tire, we have good tire tread, we have an axel potter pin here
holding your tire on so that's not going to come off on us. We'll work our way inward
here. We'll check our brake assembly. When we check the brake assembly not only do
we look at the ground for any puddles of brake fluid, but we also touch underneath the brake
line to make sure there's no brake fluid dripping from there and be red or black
50 6:06 brake fluid we can check our brake assembly and we're looking and we
have good pad material left to pour down the rotors got a good
amount of material left to it and there's no obvious signs of cracks or
leaky brake fluid or on anything that might be wrong with our brakes we'll go
ahead and look just above our main gear tire here and we'll notice this little
valve here if we push up on it we'll be able to drain a little bit of fuel it
will hold our little test tube against with something white so that we can see
that we have a good fuel there's no water in it no separation if we did have
any water in our fuel this is what it would look like it would separate so you
would have blue fuel on the top and clear water on the bottom and you can
really see that separation there right in the middle of the tube now if it's
very good clean fuel you could consider pouring it back into your tank but in
the course if there's contaminated fuel you want to just pour it into a
receptacle somewhere I always port into a receptacle you don't want to pour it
on the ground and you really don't want to pour it back in your tank just in
case you happen to have a little bit of water or dirt in your fuel that you sump
tout of the tank pour it into a gas can somewhere and or in a designated
receptacle somewhere on the ramp area as we work our way up to our notice here
make sure that all our wires are intact nothing's frayed or broken everything
looks right we'll go ahead and look inside here no obvious signs of oil
leaking or tripping nothing that looks really awry inside here no obvious signs
of cracks or wires hanging loose making like that also want to go ahead back
brake to grab a paper towel wipe off back in just like that ready about 6
quarts of oil Nancy before just bringing on the circling make sure you drink your
pH to see what lovely hair play needs to be at oftentimes airplanes don't like me
fill it all the way full usually and out the extra oil counts the belly
to be over hello to down inside the cowling there so I'm keeping them at a
recommended level of sass or flight instructor they'll be able to tell you
exactly that so we work our way forward here go ahead check the leading edge of
our propeller for any Nick's or scratches there may be some wear signs
where some dirt and sand is worn through the paint but as long as there's no
major nicks or cuts or cracks forming. Then we're not really too worried about
it. We'll also go ahead and check this leading edge of our propeller, all looks
good. No major nicks, dings, or dents there. We'll look inside of our engine
compartment, look at our oil cooler here, look inside there make sure there are no
birds or any other animals living inside there. We'll go ahead and check our
alternator belt on this side. They have the alternator belt they'll charge your
battery for us. We have our air filter inside here going to make sure there's
no obstructions that leaves our dirt debris any just any birds nests forming
anything that would be inside of the air intake blocking the airflow to the
engine well observe our nose strut here and looks like a pretty good level
they're about four inches showing check our exhaust that there's no cracks
forming on the tip of our exhaust and our nose wheel looks good oftentimes
airplane tires may look a little bit low but as long as they're at the
appropriate values and flayed to what they are supposed to be at then they're
all good so this might look a little low but that's actually right where it needs
to be and we don't see any signs of flat spots or cracks on the rubber tire
everything looks good there
last thing we'll check mr. Spiner make sure we have all our screws in place
that it's round and smooth so it's not going to vibrate or shake on us and then
it's firmly attached. As we work our way around this side we have the cabin air
intake, so this is what's actually going to keep the cabin cool with outside air
blowing right at your feet there. Here we have outside air blowing in they'll blow
right directly up at you and your face if you turn your air vent up, and you
have this little storm window you can open up for some extra airflow as well.
Rhis is your outside air temperature probe in case you're wondering what that
is. As we come along this side we're looking for any dents or dings to the
leading edge of our wing, observing this gear strut tire and brakes so again we
have a potter pin in place our axle nuts holding our wheel in place. No flat spots
on a tire, good tread remaining, tire pressure looks good. We're going to touch
underneath here make sure we don't get any brake fluid on our hands. The
brake pads look like they have a good amount of material remaining on both
sides. Rotor looks good, good amount of stretch showing there so it's not low on
nitrogen or over full. We'll go ahead and sump a little bit of fuel out of this
tank and we can see a little bit of remaining water from when we added water
before just to check that but fuel looks good to me we'll hold it up against
something white so we can see blue fuel go ahead and dump this in our receptacle
so our last fuel something we want to get here is right here at the Gasca
later that's right below the engine cowling this is the most likely spot
you're going to get water in your fuel. It's the lowest part of the fuel system.
Now we can see there we'll hold it against something white we've got nice
blue fuel looks good and clear to us we'll go ahead and dump this in our fuel
receptacle, not back in the tank. And as we work our way out on our left wing
there's a few extra things to look at. Again we have our fuel vent, if it's
dripping little bit of fuel that's probably a good thing that's venting but
we want to make sure there's no mud dobbers nest or anything living up
inside there. Work our way out here we had a chain on here we'd undo our chain
at this point and coming out here you can see something different we have a
pitot vane not a pitot - but a pitot vane on this airplane and the pitot vane
is basically your airspeed indicator so you have the air coming in the RAM
air pressure the drain hole in case you get rainwater and things in there that
can drain right now on the very back side of this panel vane is where your
static port is located that little tiny hole right there is your static port so
you don't want to touch that with your bare hands don't want to get any dirt or
grease inside there wanna make sure it's totally clear and we'll come back to the
leading edge of the wing and right here we've got another fancy little device
that is a stall sensor basically an angle of attack sensor imagine if you're
flying along the wind is hitting the wing going smoothly over the top and
bottom and holding this down and if you were to raise the wing too much in the
air were to start to hit from the bottom it would push that up and you would have
a little red light go up in the cockpit it's very common to see that little red
light go off during takeoff and landing since you're near stall speed and
approaching a stall nothing to worry about but that is how our stall sensor
works just by air flow coming from below the wing and the wing getting near its
critical angle of attack it's going to warn you by flashing that little red
light in the cockpit again we'll go ahead and check our fuel level on this
wing and the other things we're looking for besides just all the items on the
checklist is the overall health of the airplane dings dents no major corrosion
all the rivets are in place something's popped out all our screws are in place
we're not missing any major parts coming along this side we're looking at our nav
light all looks good our wingtip looks good
we'll go ahead and put our aileron up here so we can check our weight is
firmly attached our counterbalance weight looks good under
the aileron looks good all our nuts and bolts are in place nothing's coming
loose no dents or dings come on up here look at the top look at our hinges all
our screws and hinge pins in place bollocks good this flaps a little bit
loose that's exactly what's supposed to be a little bit loose not too much not
bound up in our actuated rod is a little bit loose there has a little bit of
FreePlay that's perfect as we work our way back here along the fuselage we're
looking for any dents or dings any rivets popped out of place anywhere a
fuel truck might have backed into the airplane all our antennas are attached
with it's been knocked off our communications antennas our TPS antenna
light dome up there our LT antenna that little black one
there we have some antennas on the belly here we have an old ADF antenna that we
don't use anymore we have a transponder tena that's the one that looks like the
shark went there work our way back here again looking for all our screws are in
place no dents or dings we'll go ahead and look at our stabilator
this is not an elevator or stabilizer it's a staple later it's a combination
elevator and stabilizer screws are in
the corner here along here we're looking at all our hinges all those to push or
pull on it we're just going to look that all the attachment points are in there
again don't grab onto your trim tab just simply grab on the tip of the elevator
move it up and down back and forth as we move this back and forth we can look
inside the cockpit and notice that the controls are actually moving in now so
this is controlling the pitch of the aircraft also the airspeed so pitch is
really what controls your airspeed and powers what's going to control your
altitude everyone thinks this makes the airplane go up or down it really just
makes the pitch go up or down and then pitch nose up or nose down controls your
airspeed. Working along here our routes are in place no dents or dings.
Everything looks good and we are right back to where we started at. We'll go
ahead and review our checklist at this point. Make sure we didn't miss anything.
Go item by item, say it out loud, make sure that you've done each and every
single thing and you are all ready to hop in and go complete your engine start
checklist and go flying. Hi guys- thanks for doing a pre-flight with us and we've
got a challenge for you. There is one missing screw on the airplane, if you can
be the first viewer to find where that missing screw is leave it in the comments
below and we will send you a free Fly8ma.com t-shirt no charge
shipped right to you. Also don't forget to check out some of these other helpful
videos of how to do your startup engine checklist and shutdown checklist. Very
methodically work through both of those. Check out some of our other videos on
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Thank you everyone!