Previous-tacho pre-fill

What it is

When you open the Log Flight screen for a fresh session, the Start meter value is pre-filled from the aircraft’s current meter reading. It is an ordinary editable value, not a greyed suggestion: tapping into the field keeps it and puts the cursor at the right-hand end, ready for you to correct a digit. You can always edit it; the value you submit is what gets saved.

The End meter field is pre-filled too, with the Start reading less its last digit: a Start of 1803.5 gives an End of 1803, and a round Start of 1234.0 gives 123, so the pre-fill always sits just below the Start. It is an ordinary editable value, not a greyed suggestion: tapping into the field keeps it and puts the cursor at the right-hand end, ready for you to type the last digit or two. Nobody writes down a whole meter reading, and an empty End box invites a partial one — “3.5” where the meter says 1803.5. Starting from the Start reading means the leading digits are already right.

The pre-fill sits below the Start on purpose. A form saved with it untouched would have recorded a flight of no hours, and a meter reading is a money record; sitting below the Start, it is refused by the “End must be above Start” rule until you have typed the real figure. The hours read-out beneath it shows a dash until End is above Start, then the hours the two readings describe. That figure is the check on your own entry: you know how long you were out, so a read-out that disagrees says the End reading is wrong. See Usage log fields for the read-out and the two controls beside it.

A “tacho” (short for tachometer, sometimes spelled “tach”) is an hour meter that accumulates engine or propeller running time. The same pre-fill mechanism applies whatever the syndicate has labelled its engine meter: Hobbs, Tacho, or custom.

Who can use it

Everyone logging a flight. The pre-fill is automatic; there is no toggle and no permission gate.

Where to find it

Log Flight screen: the Start field on a new (not editing) log.
Route: /bookings/:bookingId → Log Flight button.

Fields / options

Not a field in its own right. It affects one value on the form:

Field	Pre-filled from	Editable
<Meter> Start	The previous flight’s end reading on the same asset	Yes, always
<Meter> End	The Start reading, less its last digit	Yes, always

Behaviour rules

Pre-fill only, never authoritative. The value is a suggestion. You can edit it freely and the edited value is what gets saved.
End starts just below Start, never equal to it or ahead of it. The pre-fill adds no assumed flight time and never claims a duration you have not stated; and because it sits below the Start, the form cannot be saved with it untouched. An End equal to Start is refused too, with its own message (“the meter has not moved”): two identical readings describe no flight, and saving them would leave the aircraft’s meter where it was and the next pilot’s Start pre-fill behind the real reading.
Both meter fields keep their value when you tap them. On the Log Flight screen the Start and End pre-fills are real values, not greyed suggestions. Tapping in puts the cursor after the last digit so you can backspace over the tail; tap a second time to put the cursor wherever you want it. The one exception is the greyed hint described two rules below.
The plus and minus under End correct it without retyping. Each tap moves the End reading by 0.1, and the hours read-out between them follows. Minus stops once the hours reach zero rather than pushing End below Start. Both controls are inactive until there is a Start reading to measure from, so on a form still waiting for the aircraft’s reading to arrive there is nothing to tap.
A neighbouring flight’s reading arrives as a greyed hint. The form separately looks up the bookings either side of yours on the same aircraft. Where one of those has been logged, its reading can be offered — the previous flight’s end on Start, the next flight’s start on End — and that is the one thing on the form shown greyed and cleared on first tap. It only ever lands on a field the ordinary pre-fill left empty: a hint never replaces a reading already on the form, because clearing on tap would hand you back the empty box the pre-fill exists to remove.
Asset-scoped. The value comes from the asset the booking is for. Different aircraft have independent meter readings.
Includes ground runs and ferry flights. The value is the aircraft’s meter reading, which is the highest end reading any usage log on it has recorded, floored by the opening reading the aircraft was set up with. It is not the most recent log’s end reading: a log entered late, for a flight that happened before one already recorded, does not pull the meter backwards. Whatever booking a reading was logged against counts — a ground run or ferry flight logged during maintenance moves the meter like any other flight, so the next pilot is lined up with the real reading rather than the last member flight before the maintenance.
Only when the engine meter is captured. Pre-fill applies when the syndicate’s captured measures include the engine meter. A syndicate capturing only block time or airborne time has no Start meter field and no pre-fill.
Only on create. Editing an existing log reads the log’s own saved Start value; it does not re-apply pre-fill.
No photo gate. You do not have to attach a photo to confirm the pre-filled value, and a photo does not validate the value either. See Hobbs photos.
Mismatch at finalisation. If the Start you enter disagrees with the previous log’s End, the booking is flagged as a tacho-continuity conflict at finalisation time. auto-finalise skips conflicted bookings; a human admin can still finalise them manually. See Tacho-continuity conflict.
Quick Capture pre-fills from the same reading, but shows it differently. The “I’m flying now” flow seeds its ramp Start field with the same aircraft meter reading — but there it is a greyed suggestion, cleared on first tap and submitted as-is if you leave it alone. That is the one place the two screens genuinely differ: Log Flight hands you a value to edit, Quick Capture hands you a suggestion to accept or replace.