PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - Lockheed Tristar flies yesterday (15 Jul 17) Tucson to Kansas City
Old 20th Jul 2017, 18:35
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tonytales
 
Join Date: Aug 2001
Location: Ft. Collins, Colorado USA
Age: 89
Posts: 216
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The use of DLC which resulted in a stable pitch angle also served to prevent tail strikes on landing. One Captain for unknown reasons disliked this feature and routinely cancelled it. The aircraft then behaved like all the others requiring pitch changes to control the descent. He managed to pull off a tail strike that wore away some aft section skin and got into the rear pressure bulkhead. An expensive repair.
A lot of credit for the excellent handling of the L-1011 must be given to the flying horizontal stabilizer. It was interesting to compare the size of the horizontals on the L-1011 versus the DC-10. The MDC stabilizer was an order of magnitude bigger. I also have wondered if some of the MD-11 landing problems wouldn't have been alleviated if they had adopted the L-1011 "flying tail" and the DLC?
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