[seanlister1]

Hey!

My math is dreadful and I mean really bad, I passed my GCSE though but I have been looking around online and dabbling in some online tests that use aviation style questions that I can expect. For some I can somewhat quickly determine what process I need to do to get the answer it's just getting my numerical reasoning improved to a satisfactory level. What are my options? I am absolutely dreading aptitude tests etc.

Thanks in advance

Sean

[TopCat]

I do quite a bit of maths coaching (mostly teenagers), and usually the reason they're bad at maths isn't that they're thick, it's that they were taught badly at a crucial stage, fell behind, and it turned into an ongoing bad experience. Time and time again I prove to them that actually they're not bad at maths after all, they just need to learn it properly.

What are you hoping to achieve? If you're determined, you can almost certainly improve. A lot.

[TLRippon]

I'm not brilliant at maths either but I'm working my way through the ATPL at the moment and not finding anything more challenging than a bit of arithmetic and a tiny amount of trigonometry which involves learning formulae and bashing the variables into a calculator. Year 8 stuff.
For PPL exams it's mostly adding and subtraction.
For general flying its mostly iPad.

[seanlister1]

It's my mental maths that is the big hitter, we all know working in a cockpit on a day to day basis involves working with numbers quickly and on the spot which I just can't do. Sometimes I'll look at a problem and have a basic idea of how I may be able to get to the answer but that's about it. I'm yet to start ATPL training as I'm still waiting on my medical.

[leiafee]

It's my mental maths that is the big hitter, we all know working in a cockpit on a day to day basis involves working with numbers quickly and on the spot which I just can't do. Sometimes I'll look at a problem and have a basic idea of how I may be able to get to the answer but that's about it. I'm yet to start ATPL training as I'm still waiting on my medical.

Mental maths is easier to fix than the 'identifying which calc to do'. It's mostly tricks and practice.

One thing you might want to try is the 'new' way they teach mental maths in primary these days which has changed hugely. It may seem a huge step back but they do loads of focus on the mental maths side like number bonds etc really early now and getting those so you can do them without thinking would probably build your confidence in being able to handle arithmetic in your head quickly.

(One of the techniques they teach for example turns out to be perfect for quickly finding the reciprocal heading, even though that's not what they use it for in school!)

A good text for this approach is "Maths for Mum's and Dads" (Though you can ignore a lot of the later chapters)

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Maths-Mums-Dad ... 0224086359

It's what I use with my adult numeracy classes

[rachelandrew]

My mental maths is shocking, and I'm a programmer. Turns out that sitting in front of a machine that does maths all day for 20 years has done a number on my ability to do this stuff in my head! I've started making the effort to do calculations in my head at work, in order to get back in the habit, I'm hoping it is just practice. I also thought this book quite good https://www.amazon.co.uk/Secrets-Mental ... 0307338401 it had methods completely different to those I vaguely remember from school.

[Dusty_B]

6-times table is what you need. And that's pretty much it!
Then fly everywhere at either 60, 90, 120, 150 kts

[Paul_Sengupta]

Like what the RAF do...

[capovolgere]

While I have been looking into training for an ATPL and a career as a pilot maths has been a concern for me also. Adding, subtracting simple multiplication or division is no problem for me at all but it is when you look at some of the aptitude test examples for pilots you are almost defeated before you start. Is it just that we are out of practice?
What exactly must you be able to calculate as a pilot and are these skills you are taught during training?

[TLRippon]

Not much more than the sort of thing you would learn up to GCSE level and even then you will have the best part of four weeks of groundschool even on a distance learning course to revise all this plus a couple of hundred hours of home study.?
The approved calculator for ATPL exams is a full scientific model which even calculates degrees minutes and seconds.
Unless you really have a very poor grounding in maths I wouldn’t let it worry you.

[PaulSS]

At an ATPL level the main things you'll be doing is a bit of addition, occasionally a bit of subtraction and a fair bit of multiplying/dividing by 3.

You'll also find yourself imagining a clock face and, depending on where on that clock face the crosswind is falling, you'll be taking a fraction of the wind. SO, 20 degrees off the runway at 30knots: 20 degrees is 1/3 of the clock face (60 minutes). 1/3 of 30 is 10. You've got a crosswind component of 10 knots and that's within limits.....land.

Of course, you'll also have to double integrate the three dimensions of the INS accelerometers, with respect to time, in order to ascertain the distance travelled in each plane and, thereby, calculate your position (given your starting position) but that only takes a few seconds to do. Okay, a tad of bollards there

[capovolgere]

Thank you for your replies,

That has settled my concerns. Why a fair bit of calculating by 3?

[PaulSS]

Why x 3? Because descents and approaches basically revolve around a 3 degree path. 3 miles, you want to be around 900'. 20 miles, 6000'. You want to be leaving FL350 at about(ish) 110nm. You have to allow a few miles to slow down etc and the 3 times table becomes more accurate as you get down lower but most pilots who have had some sort of training won't just rely on what the VNAV path is telling them (or the Airbus equivalent) but will actually be doing their 3x distance or diving their altitude by 3 to check they're not too close and so on. It does work and helps to achieve a constant descent, which is one of things you'll be trying to achieve both in terms of efficiency, noise reduction and saving some vegetarian whales.

[David Wood]

It's interesting. I'm a mathematical moron but I find that there is a surprisingly modest clutch of useful tricks and short-cuts that do for 90% of the mental maths required including: angles of bank required for rate 1 turns, rates of climb/descent, speed time and distance, time and fuel, cross-wind limits, max drift, TAS etc etc. A lot of it is down to sensible approximation because it simply doesn't have to be accurate to the second decimal. The right ball-park is usually good enough.

Maybe someone should draw together a little summary of 'Mathematical Tips for the Mathematically-Challenged Pilot' .

Someone who actually understands maths, which rules me out.

[Dave W]

Maybe someone should draw together a little summary of 'Mathematical Tips for the Mathematically-Challenged Pilot' .

How about this, for a starter?: Aviation Rules of Thumb (aviacapability).

Pulled together from various online and other sources over a few years. Doesn't mean I can ever remember them, though!