I taught a go around.

[shaun ryder]

Flaps first or power? What do you do? Bearing in mind the a/c is rolling after touchdown. Short field ops.

Would appreciate your input.

The reason is, I am fairly green. He nearly killed me on that day.

I was taught on a short grass field, flap came after power, we handled it. I exercised the same method and we entered a stall with full flap and power at about 20ft.

I told my peers and am very embarrased, did I do the wrong thing?

[chicken6]

You told your peers, that's the RIGHT thing because now they have another little reminder to keep on their toes. And now you've told us, that's the right thing too, even though some of us don't instruct any more it's good to hear stories like this.

As for flap before power, ask your boss and do what they say. Mainly depends on runway length, the main idea is to understand what the aeroplane can and can't do. If you have 1km of asphalt, you have a bit of time to retract to takeoff flap, if you don't then either do stop-and-goes or ask your boss what the best plan of action is. Surely the definition of "Short" field covers this? Is it actually short or are you just pretending for the landing part?

I have taught at a big sealed aerodrome in C152s, land as normal, nosewheel down, flap to 15, wait for the motor then add power, and at a long skinny sealed aerodrome with a just-as-long grass runway in PA38s, that was land, nose down as for normal landing, retract one stage of flap then power.

End story, ask boss follow instructions! They're ultimately legally responsible for what's taught but you're ultimately in the poo if it goes wrong. Instructing's like that, isn't it great! Keep it up.

[hugh flung_dung]

On a short (but sufficiently long!) field there's only really one choice - full power then get the flaps up a notch whilst you're accelerating. If this leaves you with more flap than you would normally have for take-off, you need to remember that the safe attitude will be slightly more nose low than usual. As soon as the speed is in a safe area and you're moving away from the ground you can gradually raise the rest of the flap.

It sounds as if you selected the wrong attitude and therefore couldn't maintain or gain speed.

HFD

[DFC]

Touch and go's are a landing followed by a take-off.

Thus the actions were always land, configure, take-off. If after setting the take-off configuration there will not be enough runway left then stop and taxi back.

Interesting that a short time ago the CAA were jumping up and down over pilots having landing problems / incidents / accidents when using flap settings other than ones in the pilot handbook.

They seemed to have missed the opportunity to comment on the number of take-offs that are commenced with the flaps in the landing position.

I can't put my finger on it but there was something some time ago from the CAA about changing the flap setting during the take-off but I think that concentrated on the old trick of adding a notch or two of flap to jump the wall at the end!

With full power selected and the aircraft accelerating I think that one should not be fumbling round for a flap switch or lever.

Regards,

DFC

[tacpot]

BTW: I'm not an instructor,

But surely there are go-arounds and there are "touch and gos".

The technique I was taught for a go-around was, apply full power, select the climbing attitude (appropriate to amount of flap you have), and when you've got a positive Rate of Climb, retract the flap in stages - the point being that the aircraft can and should climb with full flap, albeit at a leisurely rate.

For Touch and gos, DFC's description is correct. If you have landed, and want to take off again, you should really only do so with an amount of flap approved for T/O by the Aircraft's POH/FM. Changing the flap setting during the take off run is a technique that falls into my 'Advanced' category!

So the question is when does a situation stop being a Go-around and become a "touch and go" (or vice versa)?

For me, Touch and gos are a normal, planned operation. A Go Around is an non-standard operation, taken in response to an emerging situation (cow on the runway etc.) or instructions from ATC.

If you planned to go touch and gos, the runway length should be sufficient for the student to set an appropriate flap setting (including any travel time for electric flaps), and apply full power and rotate at the correct speed. (As DFC said.)

Thanks for sharing your bad experience with us, it's has helped me clarify my thinking on this point.

[BEagle]

Firstly, the information presented seems incomplete. Was this a go-around or a touch and go?

A touch and go on a short field seems a potentially hazardous undertaking if the 'touch' part was in any way delayed. Bearing in mind that the stalling speed with full flap will be less than with less than full flap, and that selecting flap up in some aircraft will result in sink and/or trim changes, it would be quite hazardous to reduce the flap setting shortly after the 'go' part. Whereas on a longer RW, there is no problem with landing, reconfiguring and then applying power before taking off again.

Some aircraft (such as the Bulldog in RAF service) always used to fly touch and goes (or 'rollers') leaving the flaps as set for landing. Whereas in the PA28, I always teach that flap should be selected fully up on the ground before power is applied to take-off again. But I do NOT advocate resetting the stab trim on the RW during a touch-and-go.

So to summarise, my generic suggestions:

1. If the field is 'short', do NOT even try to practise a touch and go. Land and taxy back for a further take-off.

2. For a go-around, full power, establish a climb, then cautiously retract flap in stages.

3. For a touch and go, land, reconfigure the flaps, then apply full power.

But how 'short' would a field need to be before it became too short to practise touch and go landings safely? Consider a Warrior with 2 PoB and half tanks, AUW 2000 lb operating at sea leval, 15 deg C, zero wind, zero slope hard dry RW. A full flap landing (without any safety factor) will require a LDR from 50 ft of about 960 ft until stationary. If the a/c is then reconfigured for a 25 deg flap take-off, it will need a TODR of about 1020 ft to the 50 ft screen height. Add these together and for a stop-go you would need 1980 ft. Add in a safety factor of 1.43 for the landing and 1.33 for the take-off and this becomes 2730 ft for a full stop-go. (NB - figures are taken from an unofficial source and should not be relied upon).

But for a 'touch and go', you would need less than this - but how much less depends not only upon the runway and conditions, but also upon the time assumed for converting the landing into a take-off. So it's up to you, but for a PA28 anything less than an 800m bare dry runway on an ISA zero wind day might perhaps give you cause for thought?

And very well done for raising this point of discussion with your peers!

[mad_jock]

BY putting the power on you are sort of commiting to departure.

I wouldn't want to do that until I was configured for departure.

Things i can see possibly going wrong.

1. Sink just after getting airborn.

2. Wheel barrowing

3. Problem getting flaps up on electrical types.

4. A habit for later on which may cause grief if they go on to flying twins.

5. Ground effect causing premature lift off without enough speed to climb above ground effect.

And to be honest with full flap down i can't see you get any real benefit in having the power on for the extra 15secs with the drag flap out.

But as always read the POH there is no standard procedure if the POH recommends a method you have to do it.

MJ

[Whopity]

Shaun

It is not apparent if you are an instructor or not!

If you are not, then what are you doing teaching when you clearly don't know the answer?

If you are, then please tell us where you did your FIC course so we can avoid it!

[BigEndBob]

Shaun i think you reached that tough decision as to when to take control. Every instructor or person doing a checkout has been there. You may be very familiar with the short field technique but extra allowance has to be made for the inexperienced.
Taking off with full flap will probably need a s & l attitude just to keep flying with margin climb. Most pilots are unfamiliar with this attitude, but needs to be practised on a longer strip.
You have the combined danger of the student hauling the nose up to a familiar climb attitude and raising flap, feeling sink then pulling back even more.

[hugh flung_dung]

MJ: If you guesstimate an average speed of 40kts this equates to about 18 metres/second - or 270 metres! That seems fairly significant to me. In practice it's more like 5 seconds than 15, but even that equates to about 90 metres which is not insignificant.

I seem to be the odd one out in this debate but at every level I was taught to add power before retracting flap when on a short(ish) field and that's what I have always taught. If you choose to re-set the flaps before adding power you will be eating-up valuable runway during the process and will be lower at the end as a result.
There are a couple of caveats to this:
if the landing is going to be too far down the field then obviously it must be a full stop (or go around)
with tailwheel aircraft the skill is in the final stages of the roll-out so I tend to make these full stop anyway
in the early stages of training and during tests I brief that I will raise the flap for them on request

Stopping to re-configure is unrealistic on many runways so this would mean a taxi-back with the attendant time and cost for the stude, IMHO and experience this is not justified.

MJ: there is an obvious potential issue with retractable undercarriages but what's the problem with twins? I suppose you're thinking about the engine failure case on the ground but this is a tiny window of maybe 1-2 seconds whilst your hand is operating the flap control (I know, sod's law can strike) - I teach the same technique in twins.

(Whopity: I've been instructing for many years and I keep finding things to which I don't know the answer - it's nice to find someone to turn to who knows everything ;) )

A good debate. I thought this was a no-brainer until the question popped-up.

HFD

[mad_jock]

I am with you on the instructor doing the configuring. Then it all happens at the same time with the student looking out the window keeping it in a straight line.

By twins i meant complex types ie retractables.

I was always taught that you don't touch anything in twins until clear of the runway when solo and when doing t&G's it was always the instructor doing the configuring then power up when he said go.

To be honest I wasn't allowed to do T&G's solo while doing my PPL.

My feeling is that it is preferable to be not accelerating while changing the configuration of the plane. After the power is applied you will have the associated yaw etc. Your eyes should really be out the front not inside hunting around for a control.

It really depends on what you put as your piroity. My piority is being able to stop if something isn't right. The best chance of that is by not accelerating until everything is right for departure. If you wait until configured the plane is as per the POH set up. If you apply power first there is many variables which mean that there is a possibility that the plane is going to depart in a configuration which isn't covered in the POH. Which i think Shaun had his bum bitten by.

So both methods work but I think the configure then power is the safest

And Whopity i think your comment is a bit unfair. As we all know the FIC are all taught to the FII particular flavour of flying. And the reason why you have the FI(R) and FI is because there is a learning period when you are expected to be supervised and to ask questions. And good on the chap for asking the question. Its not as clear cut as you think with BEagle ex RAF instructor, current SEP instructor and examiner going with one method and Hugh flung_dung MEP instructor prefering the other method.

Personally if the runway isn't long enough to take the extra roll so the plane is fully configured before power on its proberly border line if you should be letting students do touch and goes on it anyway. And i think 800m suggested by BEagle is a pretty good marker.

MJ

Edited to add: If i was doing a check out on a visiting pilot and they did put power on first i wouldn't even mention it if the T&G was safe. It really gets me when PPL holders get forced to change their operating methods on every check ride to those of the instructor. If they are safe using a method leave them alone. Even if you think your method is better you are making the person less safe because they will have confusion in there motor responce.

Another one is where to put the first stage of flap down. Just before turning base, during the turn, after the turn. When asked before a check out i reply "where ever you like m8 what ever works for you"

[BEagle]

Discussing this further yesterday with a FIE, we concluded that there is no cut-and-dry guidance on touch-and-go field length limits. Not a problem for JAR-FCL ab-initio training as the runway must be licnesed and will, by default, be of sufficient length. But it could be a problem for those adding ratings or revalidating exisiting ratings?

For a Warrior on a shortish strip, I would suggest landing with full flap, then full power, flap to 25 and take-off again if and only if the strip is actually long enough for touch and gos to be practised safely. Whereas on a normal RW, it would be flap up first, then full power.

I disagree totally with the FI reconfiguring the a/c for the student; if it is a single-pilot a/c then the student must be taught to fly it as such from the outset.

Tailwheel touch-and-gos were prohibited in the early stages of solo flying when I learned on the Chipmunk many years ago - I certainly agree that full-stop landings need more practice than touch-and-gos would provide due to the skills needed in the latter stage of landing roll-out.

[mad_jock]

My argument would be that if the strip is that short the only way you are going to be able to do a T&G is because of that extra few meters you have saved by putting the power on first. Its not really suitable for T&G's

RE the FI configuring for the student.

Its a bit harsh making the student do that in the start of circuit training. Once the novelty of getting the sod on the ground has worn off then get them doing it. And checkouts you don't touch anything unless you are going to die

Does anyone know what they do at Netherthope about circuits and T&G's

MJ

[hugh flung_dung]

Well BEagle, we seem to be in formation on this one, with the slight exception of who raises the flap. The reason I do it in the early stages is simply that I don't want the stude to be eyes-in, later on they can cope.

MJ: 'agree totally with experienced pilots. If what they do is safe and demonstrates good airmanship then that's all we can expect, but it's sometimes worth having a chat about the alternatives during the debrief. There are many different ways to skin cats (I'm told) - they all end up with a pink pussy but some are probably more messy than others.

HFD

[BEagle]

But what about the cat?

:E

[Speed Twelve]

Agree with BEagle that the instructor should not be taking workload from the student on a regular basis and then expect them to cope with something additional and different when solo.

Regarding 'eyes inside' when on the roll, other than a quick glance to locate flap lever and confirm locked and indicating when selected, the student's eyes should be outside anyway, having already been taught the technique to look at and control the attitude during flap selections when airborne. (When I was instructing in a flying club environment on C150s with a variable, unstaged flap selector I used to get the student to locate the selector and count x number of seconds to get the flap setting they wanted whilst looking out and controlling the aircraft.)

I have seen quite a variation in 'technique' from experienced instructors over the years. The guy that trained me for my initial FI rating insisted that I manually retrim the C172 that we were flying on every roller, including the 'head in the cockpit' bit in order to locate the T/O trim setting in the annunciator. We had a debate about it and settled on me configuring flap, selecting full power and sorting the trim out when airborne rather than either running out of runway or veering off the side whilst fecking around with trim. This was on an 1800m runway, incidentally, and I was curious as to how he thought his technique would translate to a narrow 800m runway with nil wind...

Reminds me also of an experienced instructor I once worked with who used to chastise pilots for trimming to the glide attitude on EFATOs as he considered it a waste of time.... Stall/spin anyone?

ST

[BEagle]

I have also banned re-trimming on the RW during touch-and-go landings after a couple of students went off the edge when solo.

No instances since the ban was introduced!

And yes, if a student can find the flap lever without needing more than a quick glance, then train him/her until he/she can. Do not try to do it yourself!

As for engine failures, we teach to maintain level until the speed has decreased to the gliding speed, then enter and trim for the glide. No 'converting speed to height' in little puddlejumpers - any vigorous use of the controls to attempt such a thing will invariably cause drag and use up total energy.

[foxmoth]

IMHO there are other factors you may need to take into consideration here - for example, ever done a Go around in an old style (manual flap) Cessna 150 after a full flap approach! you would have a very high forward stick force and I would suggest getting airborne after a T & G in this situation without reconfiguring and retimming would be very uncomfortable:sad:

[Speed Twelve]

Foxmoth

Used to instruct on the old 100 hp C150. As mentioned above, flap to up on the runway during the roll then full power. The out-of-trim force on the yoke is easily managed on the rotate and trimmed in the climb.

Agree that the out-of-trim force on that aircraft is high in the G/A, but again easily managed (not that you initially have any choice :) )

A few rotary mates at work reckon this is all girls' blouse stuff compared to hydraulics-out on some of the stuff they fly anyway. :ok:

ST

[Lowtimer]

It might not always be a Cessna 150. A while ago I did my SEP dual revalidation flight in a type new to me, a Cessna 206. I'm a pretty big bloke and have no trouble hefting most SEPs round the sky, and I've flown some types both heavier and more powerful than a lot of club flyers get ther hands on. So I was VERY surprised at the out-of trim forces on the touch-and-go. It was the first time in my life I've ever been grateful for electric trim, because I had both hands on the yoke pushing, and would not have been keen on taking one hand off to retrim. C of G was on the front limit, which undoubtedly increased the intensity of the work-out, having trimmed a long way back for a short-field approach.

[3 Point]

Agree with Beagle regarding tailwheel T&Gs. I teach new t/w students to stop then re-configure then take off again. You'll never learn to control a taildragger in a strong crosswind if all you do is a high speed T&G! I've also had some of my most interesting moments in a Chipmunk with the front seat pilot raising flap during a T&G, I either do it for them (until experience allows them to do it without frightening me) or teach them to go with Full Flap.

3 Point (or, in this instance wheeler!)

[tunalic2]

Quote: 'It really gets me when PPL holders get forced to change their operating methods on every check ride to those of the instructor. If they are safe using a method leave them alone. Even if you think your method is better you are making the person less safe because they will have confusion in there motor responce.'

so nicely put I had to put it again, well done M_J

with regards the flap selection, not all aircraft have lovely positive 'select and forget' flap switches, I'm thinking 150, 206 or even duchess here so they do need monitoring sometimes with more than a quick glance

great thread, what Pprune is all about
T2

[Centaurus]

Mad Jock. What on earth is wrong with solo touch and go's? We did lots of dual and solo touch and go's in Tiger Moths which were harder to fly than a Cessna 150. In the Boeing 737 simulator we sent students off on solo touch and go's as a confidence builder. They loved it. Most of the students had only 250 hours just off CPL course.

If you have been conducting dual touch and go landings then presumably at some time during that training your instructor would certify you competent to do so. I mean to say, how many touch and go's do you need to do before you can do them competently?

In touch and go landings in any flapped aircraft you should always retract the flaps on touch down and then select full power as the flaps retract. It is folly to take off with full flap down. In a go-around you apply full power and follow the manufacturer's POH recommendations as to when to retract flap.

In a Cessna 172 you immediately retract the flap to 20 degrees as soon as full throttle is attained. You do not wait for a positive rate of climb before selecting flap to 20. That is because 30 or 40 is drag flap. And you will not sink if you change the nose attitude carefully as the flaps come up. The only time I have seen specific drills for a touch and go technique is on the Boeing 737 and that is laid down in the manufacturers operating manual.

[mad_jock]

I have got no problem with sending student for T&G's. And have sent many a sortie out. And usually the student got sent solo T&G's for half an hour on there second solo.

In the states the CFI had dictated that there was to be no student solo T&G's when I was a PPL student. But as he was a tight git i presume it was more to do with his maintance being done off a wing tacho. Thus one hour circuits solo would only reg about 30 min airbourn.

In touch and go landings in any flapped aircraft you should always retract the flaps on touch down and then select full power as the flaps retract. It is folly to take off with full flap down. In a go-around you apply full power and follow the manufacturer's POH recommendations as to when to retract flap.

Err yes that was what I was arguing for. It was more when you apply full power. When everything is set up or full power then configure the aircraft. I think configuring first is safer than configuring with full power on accelerating.

MJ

[hugh flung_dung]

Centaurus: " In touch and go landings in any flapped aircraft you should always retract the flaps on touch down and then select full power as the flaps retract."

This may be fine with a mile of tarmac but not on a short (but sufficiently long) field. In this case it's more appropriate to select t/off power and then to reset the flap whilst accelerating. This maximises the height at the end of the rwy.

HFD

[Onan the Clumsy]

I think if the runway is short enough to make you question a touch & go, you should do what they do with float planes and do a very large, fast circle around the airport back to the arrival end of the runway at which point you'll be able to take off quite easily. :8