Landing the 744

[engine out]

Has anyone got any good tips for landing a 747-400 for those training on them?

[Lunar Landing]

Preferably doing it on the main wheels first and at an operationaly safe speed. I suppose it also depends on whether or not it is an auto land or completly manual which i dont think is carried out...can someone confirm this? I thought that if lateral contol and longitudinal control was done by the pilot, at least the computer would control throttle, right?

Smooth skies,
Dan :)

[G.Khan]

No Lunar Landing - a fully manual landing is quite normal in a B747-400 but a fully automatic landing is possible at airfields where the ILS fits the required criteria.
There are no set 'tips' for a good landing other than fly it as required by the prevailing conditions, no two landings are likely to be the same.

[static]

Start thinking about pulling the nose up when you hear "30", so that you`re actually pulling when you hear "20". Close the THR Levers at "10" and you`re all set. It`s got a huge ground-effect. Not a difficult airplane to land. Type in the mnemonics page of the ACMS "maxvacland" and you can see how well you did after landing :)

[Budgie69]

Basic technique as described by "Static". You need to flare a little earlier at high altitude airfields, or when up to MLW. You have to discipline yourself to look at the far end of the runway and judge your flare by this reference. Enjoy!

[Roadtrip]

As power is pulled to idle at 10 feet or so, hold the landing attitude. As power is reduced, the nose will have a tendancy to drop due to the pendullum effect of the engines.

[pvdmeij]

Good technics prescribed above. Also: look at theendof the runway for good reference and the cocpitheight will never bother you.
Enjoy...

[sudden Winds]

I´ve been flying for a while and I am a CFI, and many times I had pilots ask me for tips to land airplanes real smoothly..I don´t really understand why a great number of pilots are looking for hints or tips to land planes better.

Landing an airplane is nothing but another ground reference maneuver, and it also involves Slow flight. That´s about it.
There´s a procedure that´s preety similar and then some things that change, x winds, ldg in gusty conds, in wet runways, ldg single engine, etc...

Most big transport planes you just fly a 3º glide path at Vref + 5. At a certain height you go to Idle (yes Idle) and slowly raise the nose to ldg attitude, so as to touch down at Vref, at close to 0 sink rate.
Whatever speed above Vref you were holding will be disspated as the VSI moves toward 0.

I say throttles must be brought to idle ´cause once flaps are lowered beyond a certain amount of degrees, idle thrust goes up from about 27.9 N1 to 35 something N1.
That´s designed like that to keep the engine spinning faster in case of a go around or for the thrust reverser to act faster.
I don´t know if Scarebus has that or not. The 757, 767, and 747-400 have that feature, know that for sure.

You need to respect the TCH, and for FAA part 135 and beyond, the plane has to have landed by the end of the touchdown zone (1st third or 1st 3,000 ft, whichever´s less)

Some planes, with the thrust line well underneath the longitudinal axis, you might need to make an additional pitch adjustment at the last moment, to compensate for the engs spooling down (turbofans especially).

Landing is not art but just science.
It´s Aerodynamics. Do what the manual says, and practise.

That´s my opinion.
Thanks for reading it.