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Flying in turbulence.
So what tips or questions does everyone have about flying in mid day turbulence? Please share and or ask away. Love to see a lengthy thread about this that can benefit us all.
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21 Replies
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Glad you posted this. I am a new pilot (50 hrs or so). Recently did my longest cross country, about a 2 hour flight. About half way through we hit what was heavy turbulence for me. After watching some others videos, I realized the turbulence probably wasn’t as bad as I thought at the time. But during the flight my wife and I discussed what to do. We were about halfway and with wind direction turning back would have taken longer. We debated landing on a private field, I figured the owner would understand. We ended up making it home and landed no problem. Although arm’s, butt, and brain were very tired.
My wife (also a new pilot) and I have talked about it several times. The one thing we can think of is changing altitude. I was at 3000msl most of the flight and went up to about 4000 with not much change. Not sure why but that altitude seems to be my comfort zone. I also realized that most of my actions/reactions were too late and at best useless and probably made things rougher.
Now I feel like Im over analyzing the weather and never flying.When I do go up if I hit a few bumps it’s not fun so I do my landings to stay current and park the plane.
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Was that your first experience in that much turbulence? Did you fly in similar or worse conditions with your instructor before solo?
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It was the worst I had flown in. I had been in some turbulence with CFI but not as rough and definitely not as long. I posted a short clip of the flight. I was taught to have thumbs on top of bar but at this point I had a death grip as you can see.
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Indeed you had a death grip. Tensing up on the controls is one of just a couple things a trike pilot can do which can lead to loss of control. Contorting your body (you did not) is the other… Sitting square in your seat, relaxed on the controls is usually your best bet.
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But I guess a new pilot as myself would get so nervous in midday turbulence tensing would be the natural reaction. I thought flying midday for trikes is not the safest thing to do is this truth?
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Flying anytime you are pushing your own personal envelope is a recipe for trouble. Some new pilots should not fly past 8:30 in the morning. Some advanced pilots should not fly in over 20 MPH surface winds. Whatever your skill level, it is important to build skill while staying within your safety envelope. And this takes a lot of will power and good decision making. I tell my students that they should not do a Xcountry until they know they can handle substantial wind and turbulence. The reason is things can change when you fly away from the airport and return 2 hours later. CONTROL YOUR ENVIRONMENT until you know you can handle whatever weather might develop. And the way to do that is shoot touch N go’s every 5 min in the pattern while the weather is changing in the mornings. When your last landing was challenging, stop and put the trike away.
If you want to fast track the learning, go up with an instructor in rough mid day conditions and get your technique right and effective with an expert in the back seat.
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I watched your video Steve, and yes the air was definitely rough. One thing that Larry critiqued me on was had position on the control bar. If you widen out your hands on the bar and relax your arms, the weight of your arms pulling down on the bar will dampen some of the turbulence. Then you let the bar dance around a bit and make input corrections when necessary. I too have been in some rough stuff and it is scary, but once you realize that your aircraft can handle much more than you can that anxiety will lessen. The more time you put in the air and experience rougher air the less nervous it will make you. God Bless and fly safe!
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Thanks for the comments. As I was reading I could feel my instructor tapping my shoulders, telling me to relax my arms and grip. I also realized that by the time I gave imput the turbulence was already over. So I was mostly correcting what I had caused not what the turbulence had done. I can see what you mean about that could really get you in trouble.
Does altitude change anything or does it just depend on the environment. I think it’s the second and dependant on weather factors but wanted to confirm.
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Almost anytime you can get above the lower cloud layer or sometimes there is a haze layer, you can expect smooth air above. If there are mountains, then that is a whole other story and you must be upwind of the obstruction. But let’s not forget, we have to land in these conditions. So if you are uncomfortable in the air, you will probably be very out of your comfort zone to land. And anything upwind of your landing zone can make it dangerous and impossible to land safely depending on your skill, the wind speed and the size and proximity of the obstacles. So that is always my main concern with loss of control from weather. Let’s face it if you let go of the controls the trike would enter a spiral dive within several seconds and then you would have about a minute for every 1000’ to recover. There is simply almost never anything to crash into up in the sky and the trike will not flip over from turbulence. Only a rotor has the ability to flip an aircraft.
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Larry that statement about only a rotor having the ability to flip over the trike is actually good to know from a standpoint of confidence. I’ve gotten puckered up pretty good in some turbulence that piece of information will be helpful in staying calm.
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Hey Ken!!!
HAHAHAHAH. While I was reading it, I was thinking that you and I both had to go P and as I read further, that’s exactly what you said. So funny and so much fun. I love you brother. Oops I’m sorry I forgot I just called to say I love you ha ha ha
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Good advice Ken Thanks
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this is good info. Being flipped over even when doing turns is something I had to learn is not the norm. I think i will talk to my CFI about flying mid day when i get more confidence
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This is a great topic, These are my opinions for entertainment only. I always joke with Diane and tell her it is just air.
1. Don’t fight the down drafts, go with them, Don’t fall into the trap of pushing out on the bar to stop your decent.
2. Control the nose of the aircraft and and don’t let it get too high.
3. Don’t over control, Don’t be the cause: that is pilot induced oscillations.
4. On slightly turbulent days that is when you will get your practice and learn to relax. If you always try to get out of turbulence you will never learn to enjoy it, Yes i said that.
5. I hold my elbows in in heavy turbulence. This works better for me than just resting my arms on the bar. The elbows in, kind of work like shock absorbers and dampen the effects of the bar movement and give a smoother ride.
6. Don’t be in a hurry to get the bar back to level. Put pressure on the bar in the way you want it to go and trust that it will come back to where you want it. You will many times end up with a very nice ride like your on rolling hills instead of bumps. (goes with the pilot induced oscillations principal. Some big turbulence you have to be slightly more aggressive.
7. Different kinds of turbulence. Check airspeed compared to groundspeed. If the same, your not in turbulence caused by wind. Your in updrafts and down drafts. (up and down winds i guess). If you watch your groundspeed carefully as you fly, you will be able to determine the wind directions, the thickness of the layers of winds and the speed of the winds. Remember that if you have a wind going in one direction and then another layer of air going in a different direction, where those winds come together is where it is most turbulent. Flying higher or lower you can often get out of the turbulent layer.
8. High wind does not mean necessarily a bumpy ride. I have flown in 35 mile an hour winds and it was totally smooth with the exception of a small layer where it was bumpy. Once your in that wind, if it is not an updraft and downdraft you don’t feel that wind at all.
9. The trike wing is great in winds.
10. Surprisingly Cold air turbulence can be worse than warm air thermals. We have experienced some cold air turbulence to be pretty harsh. I often fly all day long in Arizona and if you get some wind on a warmer day it breaks up the thermals. The thermals have a range of where they are weaker to stronger to weaker depending on altitude. The big ones you can’t climb above so flying lower to the ground is sometimes the key.
11. The air won’t hurt you but the ground will. Have enough altitude when crossing over mountains to be safe from down drafts and rotors.
12. Relax and control your adrenaline. ;). Next time you find yourself in an adrenaline situation, breath deeply and move your eyes around. Don’t fixate.
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I am soaking up all the great advice about flying in turbulence and putting it into action as I practice.
Does anybody have advice specific to climbing through turbulence? It seems that most of the advice is centered on landing and cruising. Am I wrong or is there something different that should be done when climbing? For example, when climbing through turbulence should I reduce the RPMs a little to reduce the added load? Is the risk of an accelerated stall increased with turbulence (beyond the normal stall speed increase from the added load)?
I fly in northern Georgia and we get some pretty strong thermals in the pattern at my airport. I’m often pulling all the way in to keep my nose from going above 30 degrees when climbing out. I’ve watched several trike flying in turbulence videos and I feel like I’m over-controlling compared to what I see other pilots doing. However, in one of Larry’s excellent videos, he suggested to work pitch attitude first and that will make keeping roll in check easier. Roger concurs in the previous post. My question is do you do anything differently while climbing through thermals versus cruising or descending to control the pitching up?
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Hi Neil, climbing in turbulence is most definitely the hardest. Pitch control again is even more critical. Where I see people mess up is they pull back on the bar to lower the nose, but then they tend to hang on to the bar and then the trike speeds up and then they can’t let go without it pitching up. Remember, quick tugs (pull in fast and then immediately let out) are the key to lowering the nose. The faster the better. Pulling in slowly will cause the trike to speed up and then pitch up in many cases, so you can actually cause more harm than good in many cases.
Climb out at your proper speed of VY (medium speed usually) in the bumps. Going fast in bumps is a no-no and will beat you up and your equipment. If the bar is slightly behind trim (because you have a recommended slight back pressure) you will not stall. And remember, accelerated stalls are just stalls (with the bar way out) when flying at over 1 G (which is not related to climbing out, even steep climbs) Accelerated stalls will happen when you stall in a turn or comin out of a dive. But in all cases the bar must be pushed forward to critical AOA. The only time a trike can stall with the bar not all the way forward is when the nose is pitched up and you step off the gas and get a sharp nose down break as the trike runs out of airspeed. This is not an accelerated stall either. Just be careful not to come completely off the throttle with the nose at a very high nose up attitude.
Also a wet wing or frost on the wing or a spiral dive can allow the wing to stall before the bar makes it very far out. Otherwise you WILL NOT STALL with the bar neutral regardless of climb attitude.
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Thanks for the great information! Also, thanks for starting this discussion. It’s super helpful to learn from different points of view.
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I figured that someone else would have mentioned this, but maybe it’s not known as I thought is was. Anyway, just get off the base bar and fly the uprights. Completely different feel and you use the much larger muscles of you back and chest vs smallish muscles in your upper arms and shoulders.
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Thanks Mark. Where did you get yours from?
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The grey portion are 3D printed TPU and the rest are various hang glider parts from years ago.
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Well, that explains why I couldn’t find it anywhere for purchase. I’ll rig something up. Thanks.
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