the retard phase (A319/320/321/330/340)

[guclu]

Hi all 'bus' drivers,

just wanted to hear your ideas about the retard phase.

-When to retard ? (Obey the retard sound or delay it a bit further to avoid tailstrike especially for 321, or a smoother touch down or even retard well before the retard sound treshold)

-Move thrust levers to idle very fast (trust the FADEC) or move them slowy like a conventional airplane.


We are considering sufficent runway length, dry runway and no back wind conditions.

I see that every one has some kind of his/her own style.

Guclu

[unplugged]

My personal experience after flying the A320 and A321 for over 7 years is
DO NOT RETARD WHEN THE COMPUTER SAYS SO!
The retard voice always comes at about 30 feet on the A320/1.
for average wind and average trim - just about the right time to pull the throttles back firm.But,
for exampel on an empty flight, your pitch is extremly nose up. I have done landings in a case like this where I retard the throttles upon touch.
The oposite case: tailwind - I had a case where I retarded at 100 feet once!
These exampels all turned out to be the right choice,otherwise I would not share this experience.
Have a good one

[Sawbones]

I tend to listen for the 30 foot call and then slowly ease the thrust levers towards idle and then start a flare. As I fly the 319/320/321, someone once told me that the bigger they are the less you flare, and I have to think that's quite true.

If it's extremely gusty and/or turbulent, I will often hold onto the power a tad longer and then aggressively "chop it."

My 2 cents worth ...

[Dream Land]

Well,

I imagine you will get as many answers as responses on this one, here's mine, I do believe the retard call is at 20 ft with a/p off and 10 ft with a/p on. I operate A320 and 321, CFM and IAE, I was taught to retard thrust at 30 to 50 ft, the retard call just being a reminder, I am not slowly increasing pitch attitude until touchdown, I begin my flare at 30 ft and then before the mains touch down I reduce pitch, this technique from my own trial and error, tried the hold it off until touchdown method but it can be a handful (when u muck it up) when the nose gear is still high in the air when the spoilers activate (wee).


Dream Land:cool:

[R3Hard]

Firstly am not sure what you mean about move the thrust levers very fast or trust the fadec, the times i see people slam the thrust levers - especially in the sim its amazing the quadrants dont fall out of the mountings. The bottom line is sink rate, speed and attitude ie energy! Each landing is different and you should use your accumulated skills to correct for each variance. If speed is good and sink rate with it then an airbus numbers landing can normally be made ie. retard thrust levers when prompted pitch up to @ 5 degrees and just before MLG touches commence a slight derotation to countrract spoilers deploying - control nosewheel to avoid slamming it into the tarmac.

However how did we ever land aeroplanes without a retard pro=mpt - by looking at the numbers. The airbus is a scan killer especially wrt airspeed, look at what the aeroplane is doing and most important look at your attitude! A greaser in an airbus is normally a sign of bad technique, have watched many an experienced F/O glide past E at LGW on a calm day and not be worried about runway length as they make a 7 degree pitch attitude greasy landing!!! Smiles on other side of face during debrief.

Slow speed or high sink rate either 'go around' or allow things to stabilise, given a 2500m+runway before retarding. I have watched many pilots forget that manual thrust is available - just be aware of the ecam autothrust below 100 radio popping up.
If speed too slow knotch the thrust levers just fwd of the climb detent for a surge of power before retarding.

Autothrust is not the b all of everything especially on a windy day in a heavy 321.

TTFN

[swh]

The idea behind moving them quickly is that in AT SPEED mode you can get an increase in thrust as you flare, with AT on it will try and keep the target speed, unless you disconnect AT (this is achieved by bringing it to IDLE).

By slowly moving them back the engines will spool up to maintain the speed in the flare.

The thrust levers are switches with digital signals going to FADEC, nothing like old engines. FADEC looks after the reducion of thrust to IDLE, so if you move them back quickly, that commands a thrust setting to FADEC, FADEC then will do the reduction to the commanded thrust setting.

[Dream Land]

Again to mention like SWH, have watched many a new pilot slowly retard thrust in the flare only to get a big shot of thrust while still flaring, half the time they're retarding and they still haven't reduced anything.

DL

:oh:

[guclu]

OK, so far so good.

As you all say different situations require different techniques that is why I said we are asuming sufficent rwy length, no backwind,...

I wanted to open this discussion because I wanted to hear the reasons of different techniques. (Brain Storming)

My technique for 'normal conditions' is to retard the thrust levers nearly half way to idle rather fast at about 40 feet then to idle rather slowy. I like to retard rather slowly because on the 321 I don't like to land with high Pitch attitude as there are numerous tail strike events.

But from your posts I see that most of experienced bus drivers like to cut thrust to idle quickly and let the FADEC do it as fast as it can within its software.

Another issue from R3Hard;
'If speed too slow knotch the thrust levers just fwd of the climb detent for a surge of power before retarding'

This is also an interesting case as you state. I had to use this technique 2-3 times but in my opinion this is the bad side of having thrust levers and not throttles. Especially when approaching very hot conditions (+38celsius) with 220 pax on 321 the speed lags well behind Vapp and nearly stays just at Vls and FADEC is not increasing the thrust. You just don't have time for setting the thrust levers to corect N1 (or EPR for IAE engines) and disconnect A/THR , the only thing you can do is move the levers above CL and back to CL. I don't like it. But as you say it works.

Regards,

Guclu