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Learning to Land: Strategy and Tactics
Landing Strategy
After decades of teaching hundreds of students to land in airplanes and trikes, I have found the secret to success with landings is two fundamental principles:
1 Learn all the basic maneuvers first: (throttle is altitude, bar is speed, climbs and descents, straight and level, turns to headings, trimming, steep turns, stalls, slow flight, spiral recovery, ground reference maneuvers, takeoffs, energy management and airport patterns. For all this flying, the instructor does a number of landings each so the student sees/feels/experiences landings. Why go through all this when landings are so important? Because you, the student, learns to fly, realizes what is needed to make the trike do what you want it to do before you get near the hard and scary ground. After learning/doing all the maneuvers, you can take the next step and learn low approaches/landings
2 Do low approaches and learn energy management as a step before landing. Why? Experience has shown that staying on the center line, maintaining altitude at approach speed and getting the site picture/awareness all worked out before touching the ground makes landings easy. With low approaches, we are coordinating speed and altitude with the throttle and bar position. An incredibly important skill for pilots. You start high (as an example 30 feet) and work your way down to inches above the ground. I have found that most people are initially scared at going fast near the ground. I typically gently touch the rear wheels in this low approach to show how it is OK to go fast near the ground with wheels. This technique fixes problem of being scared of the ground and rounding out to high. This is why one of the landing techniques for bumpy turbulent air is the power on approach.
The other important concept this technique teaches is that go arounds are OK. You do not have the pressure to land. You do not land unless everything is in good shape. In good and/or turbulent air you can bring it in, get everything under control low to the ground and when everything feels good, let off the throttle slow it down and you land.
Next you work on medium power landings and then steep approach power off landings. Students often comment “power off landings are just like low approaches only no power. Learning the low approach landing makes both of these much easier.
Landing Tactics
Here are the landing tactics, right out of the FAA WSC Flying Handbook. The handbook is great because it has everything PLUS pictures and diagrams. So here it is, the long detailed version of the tactics starting with calm wind technique. Here we go starting on page 11-5 bottom right:
The best way to recognize and become accustomed to heights and speeds for a particular WSC aircraft is to perform low passes over the runway, as discussed earlier, with energy management. Perform a normal approach first, then a high energy pass at a higher speed, and then medium-energy passes at lower speeds. These exercises are performed first in calm winds at a height, as an example, at which the wheels are 10 feet above the runway, then lowering to just inches above the runway as the pilot’s skills build. The objective is to become proficient at flying straight down the runway centerline at a constant altitude. This exercise provides the opportunity to determine height and speed over the runway before any landings are performed. These should generally be performed in mild conditions. Higher energy and greater heights above the runway are required in windier and bumpier conditions.
Round-out (Flare)
The round-out is a slow, smooth transition from a normal approach speed to a landing attitude, gradually rounding out the flightpath to one that is parallel with, and within a very few inches above, the runway. When the aircraft, in a normal descent, approaches within what appears to be 10 to 15 feet above the ground, the round-out or flare should be started and be a continuous process slowing until the aircraft touches down on the ground.
It should be noted that the terms “round-out” and “flare” are defined and used interchangeably throughout the aviation industry for slowing the aircraft during final approach and touching down. The term “round-out” is used in this handbook since it provides a better description for the WSC landing process and WSC students are more successful learning landings using the term round-out instead of flare.
As the aircraft reaches a height where the back wheels are one to two inches above the ground, the round-out is continued by gradually pushing the control bar forward as required to maintain one to two inches above the runway as the WSC aircraft slows. [Figure 11-9] This causes the aircraft’s nosewheel to gradually rise to the desired landing attitude. The AOA should be increased at a rate that allows the aircraft to continue flying just above the runway as forward speed decreases until the control bar is full forward and the back wheels settle onto the runway.
During the round-out, the airspeed is decreased to touchdown speed while the lift is controlled so the aircraft settles gently onto the landing surface. The round-out should be executed at a rate at which the proper landing attitude and the proper touchdown airspeed are attained simultaneously just as the wheels contact the landing surface.
The rate at which the round-out is executed depends on the aircraft’s height above the ground, the rate of descent, and the airspeed. A round-out started excessively high must be executed more slowly than one from a lower height to allow the aircraft to descend to the ground while the proper landing attitude is being established. The rate of rounding out must also be proportionate to the rate of closure with the ground.
When the aircraft appears to be descending very slowly, the increase in pitch attitude (slowing of the WSC) must be made at a correspondingly low rate.
Visual cues are important in round-out at the proper altitude and maintaining the wheels a few inches above the runway until eventual touchdown. Round-out cues are dependent primarily on the angle at which the pilot’s central vision intersects the ground (or runway) ahead and slightly to the side. Proper depth perception is a factor in a successful round-out, but the visual cues used most are those related to changes in runway or terrain perspective and to changes in the size of familiar objects near the landing area such as fences, bushes, trees, hangars, and even sod or runway texture. The pilot should direct central vision at a shallow downward angle of 10° to 15° toward the runway as the round-out is initiated. [Figure 11-10]
Maintaining the same viewing angle causes the point of visual interception with the runway to move progressively rearward toward the pilot as the aircraft loses altitude. This is an important visual cue in assessing the rate of altitude loss.
Conversely, forward movement of the visual interception point indicates an increase in altitude and would mean that the pitch angle was increased too rapidly resulting in an over round-out. The following are also used to judge when the wheels are just a few inches above the runway: location of the visual interception point in conjunction with assessment of flow velocity of nearby off-runway terrain, and the similarity in appearance of height above the runway ahead of the aircraft to the way it looked when the aircraft was taxied prior to takeoff.
A common error during the round-out is rounding out too much and too fast. This error can easily be avoided by gradually increasing the AOA with a controlled descent until the wheels are one inch above the surface and never climbing during a round- out with a gradual and controlled round- out.
Touchdown
After a controlled round-out, the touchdown is the gentle settling of the aircraft onto the landing surface. For calm air conditions, the round-out can be made with the engine idling, and touchdown can be made at minimum controllable airspeed so that the aircraft touches down on the main gear at the approximate stalling speed. As the aircraft settles, the proper landing attitude is attained by application of whatever control bar forward pressure is necessary. In calm wind conditions, the goal is to round out smoothly and have the control bar touch the front tube as the back wheels touch the ground. [Figures 11-11 through 11-14] Once the rear wheel settles to the surface, the nosewheel settles to the ground. The control bar should be pulled all the way back to eliminate the possibility of lifting off the ground because of a wind gust. Pulling the nose down completely can also be used for aerodynamic braking if needed.
here is the technique for bumpy air page 11-16
Power-on Approach and Landing for Turbulent Air
Power-on approaches at an airspeed above the normal approach speed should be used for landing in turbulent air. This provides for more energy and positive control of the aircraft when strong horizontal wind gusts, wind sheer, or up and down drafts, are experienced. Like other power-on approaches (when the pilot can vary the amount of power), a coordinated combination of both speed and power adjustments is usually required. It is easiest to think of flying the aircraft onto the ground at an airspeed above the stall speed. The additional power provides the pilot the ability to reduce the descent rate to touch the wheels gently to the surface at a higher speed. Landing in turbulent air is where practice and experience in energy management are utilized. This precise coordination of power and speed for higher energy landings should first be practiced in calm air and can be used as the next step in learning landings after the student becomes proficient at low approaches.
To determine the additional approach speed to flying in turbulence, one procedure is to use the normal approach speed plus one-half of the wind gust factors. The wind gust factor is determined by how much the airspeed varies while flying. If the normal approach speed is 50 knots and the wind gusts are at 15 knots, an airspeed of 57 knots is appropriate.
Another method is to ensure the aircraft is at least at Vy speed plus the wind gust factor. In any case, the airspeed that the aircraft manufacturer recommends.
An adequate amount of power should be used to maintain the proper airspeed and descent path throughout the approach and the throttle retarded to idling position only after the main wheels contact the landing surface. Care must be exercised in not closing the throttle before the pilot is ready for touchdown. In this situation, the sudden or premature closing of the throttle may cause a sudden increase in the descent rate that could result in a hard landing.
Landings from power-on approaches in turbulence should be such that the touchdown is made with the aircraft in approximately level flight attitude. The pitch attitude at touchdown should be only enough to prevent the nosewheel from contacting the surface before the main wheels have touched the surface. Most WSC are designed so the front wheel is higher than the back wheels in this situation, but each WSC is different. This must be evaluated for each model.
After touchdown, the pilot should reduce the throttle to idle and pull the control bar in to prevent the WSC aircraft from lifting off until it slows below the stall speed. The aircraft should be allowed to decelerate normally with the aerodynamic braking of the wing with the nose lowered slightly, and assisted by the wheel brakes as required.
Crosswind Approaches and Landings
Many runways or landing etc…..
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2 Replies
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All that good info and not one reply.Thanks Paul.
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Lots of good info here, provided the student is reasonably competent I tend to only do 3 to 4 hours airwork before moving to the pattern – main exercise I do before moving to the pattern is flying a ground reference rectangle in level flight, in full power climb and an idle decent once they can do this we move to the airport and fly the pattern first do go arounds from approach, then low passes, then the landing – I teach idle approaches and landing if it is a slow wing then I initially apply a little continuous power which we hold to touch down – give the student more time to sort things out.
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