Originally Posted by
Ewfflyer
My experience in the last few years dealing with our customers, whom are owner/pilots, is that about 75% of them carry 5-10+ kts extra on final than they should. I have yet to see a good and justifiable reason for it.
I think this is beat into them by nervous CFI's, check airmen, DPEs, and Feds. I think they instill that faster is better for 2 reasons:
1) The faster you are, the more margin for error to reduce the likelihood of a stall. A check airmen who has never flown with a student has no idea how the student will react, or if they even will if they are 5 kts slow, but theres much more comfort in 10 kts fast. Rule #1 of checkrides - don't scare the examiner.
2) IIRC, the PTS for pvt at least is +10/-5 kts. In a way, the FAA has said that if you're not going to be right on speed, faster is better. If you've got 15 kts of wiggle room and you're not on your game, goal would be to be 7kts from either limit...thats fast in this case.
I also think that the idea behind it is that I'm much more likely to die if i stall 200ft AGL than I would going off the end of the runway at 10 kts. <-Though, I'm with you, there's no reason to ever be close to either scenario.