Cockpit lighting

I have no plans for doing any night flying for safety reasons, so cockpit lighting has been no concern to me. I am getting my license and 3 hours plus 10 landings are required. I did my 3 hours on Friday night in a 172 that had crappy lighting and it made it very difficult to read charts or panel labels.

Im not telling you anything all of you don't know, but the runway sure comes up FAST at night! At least nobody can see you bounce!! Ha!

I still have no night flying plans but I am rethinking cockpit lighting. My instructor had a baseball cap with built in lights that worked great for him. I was stuck holding a flashlight that was too big in my mouth! Ugg.

I wired a circuit to behind the seats for lights if I wanted to mount something on the roll bar of my tip up, but not sure if that is the way to go. I can put under shade screen rope lights above the panel, but that wouldnt help for charts.

Questions
1. Is minimal lighting and a cap with lights or headlamp the way to go?
2. What are other builders using for lights?

Thanks.

Rocky,

I'm with you. I don't fly at night unless I have to. Last time I had to was to get my PPL in 2014. Since then, no thank you. I do, however, carry a reliable tactical flashlight.

No. No night flying for me. Your story brought back memories.

LED Strip Lights

Not my plane, but on one of the Rans S-20s on the field he has a strip of red LED lights that sicks on the underside of the glare shield, end to end. He has it wired to a pot to control the brightness and they run off of 12v. You would never know they were there.

At low it does a great job of just illuminating switches and the placards on the panel. A bit more and you get your maps / kneeboards lit up. Full on, is used to clean up the plane after shutting down. I was surprised how bright they would get.

Here is a link to what they look like. Not sure this is the actual product.

I'll have a headlamp in my RV-3B when it finally flies.

There's a flashlight in the glove box in my Cessna to augment the crappy lighting that's built in. In the last 1,500 hours or so, I've used it once in the air, when circumstances built up and I was needing to fly after dark for a short time. The moral here is, it can happen and it might be unexpected.

Dave

For limited use those eleastic headband LED headlamps with red lights in them are pretty good. They point where your nose goes!

The battery powered sick on flexible strips are also an option if you don?t want to wire for ship?s power and use only occasionally. Personally I like the idea of hooked to ship power, but that?s just me. If battery, change them regularly and make a battery check part of the preflight!

Sometimes night landings are needed

I appreciate your C-172 landing experience and not wanting to repeat it. However a good pilot, as they grow in experience, works at every aspect of flying - including the ability to takeoff, fly and land at night. Some localities during the winter have very short days therefore the need and confidence to safely operate at night becomes critical.

Last fall I flew some night landings in my RV7A and also experienced the sudden runway environment and resultant firm landing you mentioned. Just as important (and in my opinion even more important) is the ability to pickup the landing environment before actually touching down which my older halogen bulb landing light system did not allow. I strongly encourage you to investigate and consider an LED landing light system if your current airplane does not have one. A "red light" head mounted flashlight is always a good type of nighttime flashlight to keep readily available in the cockpit. Spruce Aircraft also sells several different types of permanently mounted cockpit lights that would help you.

Flying is a perishable skill set and demands one to continually practice those skills while also improving on them. IMHO night flying is a great time to fly because it's quieter on the radio and aircraft external lighting makes it easier to spot traffic. However you and your airplane need to be prepared for the challenges that it presents. Spend some money making sure your plane and your personal flying kit are ready to operate at night. Then spend more time and money with an instructor building the confidence you need to safely operate at night. You now have a PPL - improve on that skill set and grow as a pilot.

Even if you don't plan to fly at night, sooner or later you'll want access to the cockpit at night. The light on the roll bar will be handy then, and if chosen and mounted carefully, may provide emergency chart illumination.

I don't plan to fly at night either, but equipped the airplane to do so. It's so much easier than retrofitting.

Under the glare shield, a Flexible Light Strip from Van's was installed with a dimmer circuit. https://www.vansaircraft.com/cgi-bin/store.cgi?ident=1499630128-432-273&browse=lighting&product=led-strip

On the side panels, Eyeball Cockpit Lights from Van's were installed with a switch. https://www.vansaircraft.com/cgi-bin/store.cgi?ident=1499630128-432-273&browse=lighting&product=eyeball

Am happy with the setup even though my only night flying has been in the hangar. The cost was about one tenth of an AMU.

If I should decide to fly at night, I'll carry a headlamp as a backup. Could be handy for the preflight and postflight also.

Cheers, David
RV-6A KBTF

Jim,
I appreciate your comments. You are so right that as I better my piloting skills, I will get better at my landings. Im still working on getting the day landings acceptable!

The landings lights in the 172 looked like a candle was showing me the way. They did zero to help see the runway. I am lucky l live near AeroLEDS to have picked up my lights at the factory. Anyone who has been there will know when I say it was a treat to go there!!

I still have no plans to do night flying and it is one of the restrictions I have placed on my flying, but still have the best landing and taxi lights they have. I will put some kind of lights in the cockpit - just not sure what yet.

The biggest issue I had in my night flight was reading the charts. In my plane, I have the G3X touch screens so I can use them rather than folding maps so that should be easier.

I am looking for suggestions for specific panel or cockpit lights others have used. I like the led rope under the glare shield and a red flood light on the roll bar. If anyone has model numbers or pictures, that would be great. I have the wires already run so hookup would not be a problem.

Thanks for the help.

Dave - your 3 is looking great!

1. Get a smaller LED flashlight that fits in your mouth. Keep it on a lanyard around your neck.
2. Turn the landing light off. It's worse than useless, as you discovered. Good for taxiing, however.

Over the last 3 years I have done a lot of night flying in my -7A.
I came to recognize very quickly that it is very easy to outfit a cockpit with too much light.

It took me a few flights to get the anomalous lights (for instance, jump sticks in the panel) dealt with.
It is very surprising how dim everthing needs to be at night. Those settings in the daytime result in black screens during the day.

I have EFIS panels and common avionics and some steam backups lit with Nulites. The only floods are a pair of single LED eyeballs on the left and right towers that are pointed at the switches along the bottom of the panel. The flight bag is an 8" Samsing tablet.

Point is that you don't need "flood" lighting unless you are trying to illuminate something that you NEED to operate the craft that does not have its own illumination source. Lighting up the panel paint with neon like under car glow lamps does not make any sense to me. It just helps kill your night vision.

In regards to other cabin lighting for ground operations, a head mounted light (I use a Petzl) is better than built in lights. The head mount is universal for preflight, packing, and emergency use if the panel goes dark.

Someone did mention landing lights. I recommend installing the best you can get. I have a pair of HIDs which will blister the paint on a car at 50yds.

I guess I am one of the odd ones, I have always loved flying at night and when I used to instruct I always tried to give my students more than the minimum night time so they would be comfortable with it. With that said the most useful flashlight I have ever used was the old military type with the 90 degree head. They are bright, tough, easy to feel in the dark if you drop them on the floor, and you can hold them between your knees if you want to. It would be cool if one was available with a variable output.

Too much lighting at night is bad!

Dave,
I agree with Bill that too much interior lighting is bad. IMHO it's difficult to have too much exterior lighting for landing. Your G3X touch screen is an excellent EFIS and you have the ability to display approaches (I believe). A red lens map light with an extension cord would also be handy for locating things in the cockpit and I like the idea of Van's flexible led light strip under the glare shield tied to a dimmer circuit. All these are good ideas but you really want to be able to darken the cockpit before hitting the traffic pattern. In cruise flight I want to be able to find things so that's where a map light is most needed.

I also like to display approach plates and map information on my iPad using the reverse color night setting. I find this really handy, even during night VFR. The more information I have the better. But remember, protect your night vision and keeps things as dark as possible at least 20 minutes before landing.

I love flying at night...cooler weather, smoother air, quieter air traffic, good visibility for seeing other aircraft, etc.

I have a strip of white LEDs under the glareshield, with a dimmer. Forget the red lights. The best lighting is white, and yes, as noted, you need it *dim*, especially if you have an EFIS w/ charts and such (you won't really need to read paper maps if that's the case).

I put a flood light (Aveo) in the baggage area (tip-up, so installed on the upper brace running fore and aft), and it's great for loading the baggage in the dark. I also put a movable eyeball map light there (also Aveo), but frankly have never used it.

As for landing lights...meh. My instructor routinely turned them off on me during my primary training, saying "you don't need landing lights...look outside at the runway lights!". I have them, but they're not very useful except for taxiing.

ETA: one more bit of lighting...I stuck two LED lights (6 LEDs each) under the panel pointed down, and they've actually been *very* useful...when getting in the cockpit at night, when working down there during maintenance, etc.

I also have nothing but the two eyeball lights, located on the vertical main spar bulkheads. The pilot side is red, the passenger side is white. They are generally aimed at the switches, and if I had to do it over I would do white instead of red, as they are not nearly the brightest thing in the cockpit anyways, and not pointed at me. They do provide plenty of light for the in-flight phase of night flying assuming you don't use paper charts, but I also keep multiple small flashlights handy, and one of those stick-on LED lights may be handy for loading and unloading at night.

I also agree that flying at night is awesome!

Chris

Thanks for the replies and info.

When I started flying again after 35 years to finish getting my license, I knew I would not have the experience in my lifetime to push limits. I have a few self imposed rules I will follow or not fly.

1. Dont fly in bad weather
2. Dont run out of fuel
3. Dont fly at night
4. Dont buzz anyone or anyplace
5. Dont fly if I need to get there

If I follow those rules, I cut down the risk of flying to a level I am willing to accept. I do not suggest my rules are for anyone but me.

I have AeroLEDS landing, taxi, wing tip, and tail lights - mostly so people will see me. I will put the glare shield LED lights in and probably the lights in the side posts. My son may use them. He is an AH-64D pilot and does most of his flying at night. Maybe if he can get the night vision setup, I would reconsider!

Thanks again.

In addition to extensive cockpit lighting (mostly for loading/unloading), I did a couple map lights plus the LED strip under the glareshield. I haven't had a chart in several years (use Ipad) and have never used the map lights. If I need to see something on my lap, I just turn up the LED strip a bit.

Larry

Swivel LEDS

Hi Rock,

Like many others, I am using the upper brace of the tipper that runs from the baggage bulkhead to the roll bar. I found some nice LED swivel mount lights that have either red or white LEDS in each. I'll put these on my dimmer and should be able to adjust their angle while in flight to satisfy the current need. I placed them forward on the brace to make it easier to reach.

Pic on my site: http://www.mykitlog.com/users/category.php?user=sblair&project=2420&category=10779

http://www.mykitlog.com/users/display_log.php?user=sblair&project=2420&category=10621&log=208403&row=2

Aircraft Spruce sells them, with optional base: https://www.aircraftspruce.com/pages/el/ledlighting_cockpit/754cockpitlights.php

See & Be Seen ...

rockwoodrv9 said:

Thanks for the replies and info.

... snipped

I have AeroLEDS landing, taxi, wing tip, and tail lights - mostly so people will see me. I will put the glare shield LED lights in and probably the lights in the side posts. My son may use them. He is an AH-64D pilot and does most of his flying at night. Maybe if he can get the night vision setup, I would reconsider!

Thanks again.

Click to expand...

I started flying in '72 and finished my PPL 2005, similar personal limits but consider the aircraft lighting as much about "See & Be Seen" in the daytime, as the unintentional need to have them at night, if only to re-position the aircraft on the ground at night. A diversion for weather or other emergency could put anyone into darker skies before getting on the ground. But being seen in daylight is greatly enhanced by WigWag of LED Taxi/Landing and Strobes, current draw is so minimal.

Having hands-free lighting, back-up sources, and directional control of cabin lights is essential. KNOWING where to adjust panel dimming is important day or night. (One thread discussed a daylight EFIS going 'dark' and they couldn't see the soft-keys labels to select/see a functional but dimmed EFIS in daylight.).

Civil Twilight is my personal favorite time, but night flying in a big city (Class B) is not the time to spot other aircraft by seeing their lights against the billions of ground lights as a background.

I have the VP power system that wig wags my landing and taxi lights. I agree that is the best way to be seen. I have even considered a smoke system for crowded skys, at least that is what I tell my wife it is for!

Great thread on interior lighting:
http://www.vansairforce.com/community/showthread.php?t=64051

I installed a COCKPIT LIGHT C-4A (also know as a kit light). On/Off, dim able red or white. It is also detachable from the base. Works great!