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Bill Greenwood
05-02-2014, 08:53 AM
I think many people like to grade their landings in their mind and I do also, on a scale of 10. Most of mine are 8 or 9. There's really no safety difference between a 7 and a 10, both are safe in most planes. Now if you are flying a Pitts or ME-109 every one may need to be a 9 or 10.

Anyway, these days I mostly fly a Bonanza and they are famous for being easy and forgiving to land. Mine is a B36 with the larger fuselage and the longer wings, so it does loose some aileron effectiveness as you get slower, but you just have to make bigger control movements. And it stalls a little faster than the earlier lighter v tail ones. Still it is pretty forgiving, so it is too easy to get a little complacent and accept an 8 rather than a 9 or 10. The difference is that for the really best landing I need to keep making corrections all the way to the ground, and mostly it is a matter of making a full flare, not dropping in or rolling on the nosewheel.

I came back to Aspen 2 days ago, the weather had been poor, windy and overcast but now was great, calm and CAVU.
I just kept making corrections all the way down and my landing was a 10 !. In thinking about it afterwards I can't see any way to improve on that one. It was on center, nose straight, right speed, a full flare and a touchdown so smooth that one second I am flying and the next I am rolling.

I don't make many that good and while it is more a matter of style than safety, that one made me smile all afternoon. I'm thnking, "Man that was easy, and I'm really good, and why aren't all the rest that perfect."
Now, can I do it on the next one?

pittsdriver3
05-02-2014, 10:31 PM
I woke up the N3N Wednesday and flew it for the first time since late October. First landing was a perfect three point and the tires didn't even chirp. The next two were pretty good but not near as nice as the first one. Bill I have around 500 landings in a Pitts and it was really easy to do a perfect one. Don

Frank Giger
05-06-2014, 07:38 PM
One of my most harrowing landings was also my best, probably never to be repeated.

Small winds, beautiful day, and I had been up for about an hour or so touring the Coosa river when the morning's coffee began to make its case for a landing. Standard downwind, base, and maybe a touch low on final - but that's easy to fix with a little throttle.

A little more speed than I like for my typical three pointer, so I'll put it down on the mains and let the tail drop. So eyes on the end of the runway and let's just gently float down the runway with a little throttle until they touch. And float. And float. Throttle all the way back and I'm getting a little concerned....this could turn Champ-on-pavement nasty in a hurry.

And then the tail drops. I never felt the mains touch.

The ONLY time the local pilots were watching when I made a decent landing and they asked what I was doing the fast taxi past the first turn off for.

:)

champ driver
05-07-2014, 04:49 AM
When I get a perfect landing I'll let you guys know. Most of the time I just close my eyes and wait for the impact.

Bill Greenwood
05-11-2014, 07:47 AM
Well my next landing was maybe a 7, at least I didn't damage anything. To be fair, it was tough conditions. I was coming back into Aspen and the wind was gusting to 25 with about a 30 degree crosswind. Earlier there was a pirep of moderate turbulence on landing/
I was so busy making corrections that I never even had time to take my hand off the controls and lower the last notch of flaps so I landed with half flaps and floated half of an 8000 foot runway. Touchdown was ok, but I had to use full aileron into the wind on rollout to stay straight.

My next landing in good conditions were good, probably a 9. Sure is easier when you are making small corrections to basically as stable airplane rather than trying to ride a bucking horse.

jedi
05-13-2014, 11:57 AM
It is not about smooth landings. It is about short accuracy landings. My last one used 5 feet to stop but there was lots of room so a short field landing was not the issue, accuracy was the goal. Made that one. I have done better but that's the way to things go when it has been too long between flights. Now if I can just learn how to ballance on that wire without falling off.

Wanabe birdman

I_FLY_LOW
07-08-2014, 08:55 AM
No one's ever around to see when you make the perfect landing.
There's always a crowd, though, when you sprang it in, though.
And seldom is there any video...
So, like the age old question of, if a tree falls in the woods, and no one's around.........

rwanttaja
07-08-2014, 10:51 AM
Well... the old timers say, "A good landing is one you can walk away from, but a PERFECT landing is one where you can re-use the airplane."

On that basis, I've got a lot of perfect landings.

A while back, I got too slow on a landing in my Fly Baby, and came down hard. REALLY hard. Here's my G-meter afterwards:
3995
Pegged at +4 Gs....

So you guys can have your greasers... my way is a lot easier! :-)

Ron Wanttaja

I_FLY_LOW
07-09-2014, 09:24 AM
Any damage to the Fly-Baby?

rwanttaja
07-09-2014, 10:24 AM
Any damage to the Fly-Baby?
Nope. My back hurt for several days, though.

The only shock absorption on a Fly Baby is the tires themselves, so more of the landing loads get transmitted directly to the fuselage. Most planes would have had spring steel, oleos, or bungee cords to absorb some of the impact, and their G-meters probably wouldn't register as high.

Needless to say, the Fly Baby has incredible strength around the landing-gear mounts.

Ron Wanttaja

Bunkie
07-14-2014, 05:47 PM
This past Saturday, I did my first solo x-country. I had flown this one before with my instructor. Starting at about 20 miles from my destination I had one of those "where the heck am I" moments. Sky conditions were less than perfect with a fair amount of haze and broken clouds at my planned altitude. I kept to my planned heading and, after a few minutes, spotted my next checkpoint. I was west of my course flying into a towered airport (KRDG, Reading PA). ATIS had 31 as the active runway. 10 Miles out, I called the tower (with the field still not in sight) and was told to expect a clearance for 31. When I had the field in sight, it took a bit of checking and re-checking to visually identify 31 and differentiate it from 36. The tower cleared me to land on 31 using a right base turn. I was actually in a better position for 36, so I made a left turn to fly a very short downwind and then made a continuous turn to final. That approach is over part of Reading itself which is just east of a prominent ridge, so everything had to be done smartly. By the time I was lined up on 31, I was a bit high and feeling the weight of all the responsibility of flying solo. I checked my airspeed (which was right on the money), set power to idle and set 40 degrees of flaps. What followed was the single nicest landing I have ever done. I was right on centerline, I rounded out at just the right height and I smoothly pulled back on the yoke as the 150 settled smoothly onto the runway. It was a thing of beauty.

I can't say if the tower was watching, so I'm not sure if anyone saw it. My instructor had to take my word for it. I was there, though, so it's real to me!

crusty old aviator
05-11-2015, 03:32 PM
I was on short final into Laramie, WY with a 20 degree crosswind from the left at 25, gusting to 36, according to the AWOS. A few hundred feet from the numbers, the left wing dropped about 50 degrees. No problem, just yank the stick over full right, add a bit of rudder to keep her centered, and I'm level again. I wheel landed without bouncing her, and as the tail started to drop, I was airborne again...with the left wing down about 30 degrees. No big deal, just push the stick forward a bit and over to full right, a bit of rudder, and I'm still above stall speed and we wheel land again. Then it happened again, and I corrected again without much concern. The taxiway departs the runway at such an acute angle, it would have put my tail directly into the wind: something to avoid on pavement with heel brakes, so I rolled off onto the taxiway, staying parallel to the runway and informed the unicom crowd that I had departed the active. Then another gust hit me and dropped my left wing to the pavement. There I was in a 3 point attitude, but not the kind she was designed for. Full right aileron didn't do anything until the gust passed and the right main slowly dropped back to the ground. I shut the engine down, sprang out of the cockpit, grabbed the tail, and starting walking her toward the parking area, with her prop into the wind. Two local college students, working at the FBO, saw it all and came running out to give me a hand, which I was appreciative of. The tape on the left wingtip was scraped, but easily patched with 100mph tape to get us home, no big deal.
I realize that many pilots without the muscle memory from decades of flying in all kinds of weather in all kinds of aircraft probably would have rolled the plane into a ball well before the numbers, but I was coming from Medicine Bow, which is an all but abandoned dirt strip, where you have to keep your head out the window to watch the runway for varmint holes that have been dug out by hungry coyotes, with a density altitude of about 11,000 feet. After Medicine Bow, Laramie really did seem like no big deal! I wouldn't even begin to try to rate that landing on a scale of 1 to 10: it was strictly pass/no pass, and that 73 year old dame and I passed! What did I learn? Gusts happen...and we're all in God's hands.

Cary
05-14-2015, 09:51 AM
I was on short final into Laramie, WY with a 20 degree crosswind from the left at 25, gusting to 36, according to the AWOS. A few hundred feet from the numbers, the left wing dropped about 50 degrees. No problem, just yank the stick over full right, add a bit of rudder to keep her centered, and I'm level again. I wheel landed without bouncing her, and as the tail started to drop, I was airborne again...with the left wing down about 30 degrees. No big deal, just push the stick forward a bit and over to full right, a bit of rudder, and I'm still above stall speed and we wheel land again. Then it happened again, and I corrected again without much concern. The taxiway departs the runway at such an acute angle, it would have put my tail directly into the wind: something to avoid on pavement with heel brakes, so I rolled off onto the taxiway, staying parallel to the runway and informed the unicom crowd that I had departed the active. Then another gust hit me and dropped my left wing to the pavement. There I was in a 3 point attitude, but not the kind she was designed for. Full right aileron didn't do anything until the gust passed and the right main slowly dropped back to the ground. I shut the engine down, sprang out of the cockpit, grabbed the tail, and starting walking her toward the parking area, with her prop into the wind. Two local college students, working at the FBO, saw it all and came running out to give me a hand, which I was appreciative of. The tape on the left wingtip was scraped, but easily patched with 100mph tape to get us home, no big deal.
I realize that many pilots without the muscle memory from decades of flying in all kinds of weather in all kinds of aircraft probably would have rolled the plane into a ball well before the numbers, but I was coming from Medicine Bow, which is an all but abandoned dirt strip, where you have to keep your head out the window to watch the runway for varmint holes that have been dug out by hungry coyotes, with a density altitude of about 11,000 feet. After Medicine Bow, Laramie really did seem like no big deal! I wouldn't even begin to try to rate that landing on a scale of 1 to 10: it was strictly pass/no pass, and that 73 year old dame and I passed! What did I learn? Gusts happen...and we're all in God's hands.
I instructed for a time at Laramie, back in the late 70s through the mid 80s. You weren't the first one to have those difficulties! One of the most dramatic was a "landing" (better an "arrival") by a Rocky Mountain Airways twin Otter, which left a series of semi-circles of tire marks from just after the numbers almost to where 30-12 crosses. More than one aircraft left the runway due to more crosswinds than that pilot could handle.

Cary