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The engine is a good place for transitioning pilots to start their study. Is it a
turbine, or a reciprocating engine? If it is a reciprocating engine, is it carburetor
equipped, fuel injected, or turbocharged? What type of fuel does it use? How much fuel
does it carry? What is the usable fuel capacity? What is the average fuel burn rate
in normal cruise? What type of fuel system does it have? Is it a single tank, or does it
have multiple tanks? Is fuel drawn from one tank at a time, or is fuel drawn from
multiple tanks simultaneously?
More questions: Does the fuel gauge automatically indicate the fuel in
the tank that you have selected, or is there a separate switch that you must activate in
order to get the fuel gauge to indicate the fuel quantity in th tank that you have
selected? Some aircraft have a separate switch for the fuel gauge, and you can be
looking at a fuel gauge that indicates plenty of fuel when the engine quits because you
just drained a tank that the fuel quantity indicator was not set to display. If such a
thing happens at low altitude, it could lead to a disaster. Even when the fuel quantity
indicator indicates the tank selected or when there are multiple fuel quantity
indicators, fuel starvation accidents have occurred because one tank was drained and the
fuel selector had not been switched to the tank that had plenty of fuel remaining.
You will want to know how the crossfeed works. In multi-engine aircraft, the crossfeed
system may work differently in different makes and models.
These are only a few of the kinds of questions that a pilot needs to answer when
transitioning to a new aircraft.
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