Carefully following checklists is a crucial component of aviation safety, and the practice has spilled over into medicine as well (e.g., see Atul Gawande’s Checklist Manifest)
In this post, I describe how I created the following checklist (please don’t try to use it; you have no reason to believe that I didn’t make any potentially dangerous errors.)
Background
When I first met with an aviation medical examiner for medical clearance to start flight training, I asked what general advice he might have for an aspiring pilot. He responded that pilots should go through the aircraft’s official Pilot Operating Handbook (the source of truth for procedures and checklists), and go through the checklists line by line to create their own checklist.
I filed away the suggestion but didn’t take it too seriously. There’s an obvious danger for an inexperienced student pilot to try to adapt official procedures – we don’t know what we don’t know, and the possibliity of inadvertently introducing a dangerous error or omitting a crucial step seemed too great.
(And it’s also why you should NOT be using the checklist I’ve produced. You shouldn’t trust me.)
Imperfections in a provided checklist
So like most students, I started off using the checklist provided by the flight school. But, very quickly, it became clear to me that there was room for potential improvement:
- order of operations sometimes had you walking back and forth between different parts of the plane – not efficient
- some steps were not relevant (referencing equipment that did not exist) in that specific plane
- sections that were repetitive
- organization that was unclear or logic that simply did not flow the way I happen to think
- typographic or formatting errors
- absence of additional useful information that I’d have to carry separately (and adding clutter to the cockpit)
At first I tried to just mark up the provided checklist, but I quickly decided I wanted to create my own. Carefully.
Goals for crafting my own checklist
- double-sided
- laminated
- precisely sized to fit my kneeboard
- modular for easy re-use and re-adaptation
I carefully went line-by-line through the checklist, cross-referencing against the official POH as well as with other Cessna 172 checklists I found online. I tried to create a checklist with flows that were efficient and worked with how I thought.
In addition, I added a few sections with information I wanted close at-hand:
- Updated local airport frequencies and phone numbers
- 3 nearby untowered airfields with their weather and CTAF frequncies, available runways, and elevation
- Passenger safety briefing elements
- Departure briefing elements
- Takeoff emergency briefing
- At the bottom edge, precisely spaced
|markers scaled to sectional / terminal area chart distances to estimate (short) distances (probably too small to be of any real use…)
As I gain experience, I will continue to adjust the checklist to reflect my needs.
(Aviation chart distance scale, at bottom of each side)
Equipment I ended up using
- Microsoft Word
- double-sided color printer (HP Color LaserJet M283 fdw)
- laminator (Scotch TL901X Thermal Laminator)
- rotary paper cutter
- corner rounding punch (Carl corner rounding punch)
Sizing
Using the size of the kneeboard and the size of the laminating pouch (9” x 11.5”), I knew exactly how big I wanted the checklist to be (8.74” x 5.3”), to both fit on my kneeboard and be able to fit two in a single pouch.
My first attempt – trying to set a small custom paper size in MS Word – was a terrible failure. The printer driver will assume that you can’t print all the way out to the edges and things will get cut off, or else will randomly attempt to scale up the size to fully fill the actual printer paper size, negating the careful sizing.
Better method for an 8.74” x 5.3” checklist
Use normal 8.5 x 11 paper size and then calculate margins needed to generate the desired smaller printable area.
Be aware that Headers and Footers are placed in the MARGINS, so need to push them into the printable area. And the distances are from the START of header + footer, which works fine for the header, but for the footer, you need to push it upwards to account for its own height.
- Format –> Document –> Page Setup –> Paper Size –> US Letter (8.5 x 11 inches)
- Format –> Document –> Margins –> Calculate how much for smaller print area
- Format –> Document –> Layout –> Headers and Footers –> From EDGE of PAPER (8.5 x 11) –> Header + Footer
- if set to same as on document, specifies where footer STARTS, so bottom needs to be pushed up/in by its own height
- will push “body” inwards automatically
For a 8.74” x 5.3” checklist with 3 columns, this is what worked:
- top and bottom margins = (11” - 8.74”) / 2 = 1.13”
- left and right margins = (8.5” - 5.3”) / 2 = 1.6”
- gutter 0”
- 3 columns
- (3 x 1.7” width per column) + (2 x 0.1” spacing between columnns) = 5.3” total width
- the header is 1.13” from the top, the exact size of the top margin, so it will start at the top of the goal printed area
- the footer is 1.4” from the bottom, pushed “upwards” 0.27” to fit the height of the footer text
Microsoft Word tips
- Tab stops can be used to include “leader” dots, or left / center / right justify header + footer text
- I also used tab stops placed precisely to match sectional / terminal area chart scales to add a quick distance ruler in the footer
- MS Word Styles allows easy re-use or modification of formatting
- Multiple types of “Headers” for different sections of the checklist, and which are followed by the “Normal” style
- Alert text boxes (red text on yellow background)
- Header / Footer formatting
- Hidden text: sometimes there are checklist elements which are not currently relevant but which may be wanted in the future
- Defining a style formatted with “Hidden” text
- Can then use MS Word Preferences:View:Show Hidden Text to toggle display on/off
Finishing
- Because the top / bottom / left / right margins are the same, printing the 2-page document double-sided results in perfect alignment of the checklist on the front and back of the sheet
- Print + cut to size with the paper cutter
- Two checklists can be fit within each 9” x 11.5” laminator pouch (I preferred the thicker 5-mil pouches, but you could use 3-mil)
- Cut the laminated cards with the paper cutter
- Round the corners with the punch to avoid pointy edges
The end result is both really nice and easy to modify and recreate. Was a very worthwhile craft project.