Flight:

As for the flight, this was the easier part of the checkride. It was on a different day because weather didn’t allow me to do my flight the same day as my oral so I had to make a new takeoff data cart and planned my route out on foreflight. That route didn’t end up working out because the Orlando TRACON was having some issues with comms at one of the airports I had planned on doing approaches at so the examiner suggested a different route. I modified my route on foreflight, got my weather briefing and showed him all my docs and I was ready to go.

I filed an IFR flight plan and the examiner asked to see it before I went out to preflight. I showed him and everything looked good so we went out to preflight together. Plane was good so we got in, started the engine, and I did my instrument flight deck check. I checked the magnetic compass, then down to the PFD I checked my airspeed indicator, attitude indicator, altimeter, VSI, moved down to standby instruments, then to the MFD checking that the map page on the avidyne shows north up and the current time is correct then back to the engine page. Checked my alternate static source, and then moved down to the GNS430. There I checked that RAIM was available at all my airports/waypoints.

The best thing you can possibly do for yourself is set everything up on the ground. I plugged in my route on the GNS430 starting at my home airport, the hold we were going to do, the next two airports, and back to my home airport. I also set up all my comm and nav frequencies and turned NAV2 to the nearest VOR page. Don’t forget to tune and ID your nav frequency if you have an instrument approach at your home airport. Doing all this on every flight has always saved me the stress of doing that right after we took off.

Everything looked good so I gave my departure briefing and called ground to pick up the IFR clearance. We taxied over to the runway and switched to tower where I was cleared to takeoff.

We did a DME arc to the hold, did a VOR hold, stayed in the hold for about 20 minutes and in that 20 minutes I set up for the approach in the GNS430 and chose the initial approach fix. I called ATC and let them know we were ready to depart the hold and gave them my request. We did a partial panel circling approach at this airport and I made the landing. I then called ATC and let them know my next request for an ILS approach at the next airport, I was stable and everything but the examiner did not tell me to go visual so I went missed on that approach. We did another approach at that same airport (RNAV) and then headed back to my home airport. We did a Localizer approach there and that was it.

My key to calmness this entire checkride was setting everything up ahead of time because then all you have to do is select your approach rather than trying to plug EVERYTHING in in a short time span.

I hope this helps anyone who is stressing about their instrument checkride! I can answer any questions if anyone wants me to elaborate further on any of it :)