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Old 14th Dec 2018, 15:09
  #106 (permalink)  
Pilot DAR
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Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: Ontario, Canada
Age: 63
Posts: 5,622
Received 64 Likes on 45 Posts
Think of landing as requiring the following elements:

Arrive over the threshold at the correct speed and altitude. This sounds basic, but you'd be amazed how many pilots arrive 10 knots too fast, or 20 feet too high, and then wonder why the landing went wrong. If you're worried about being too slow, know that you can still safely fly a nice landing at 5 knots slower than what the flight manual says, but aim for the flight manual speed. My preference is always a full flap landing. I've owned a 40 flap 150M for 31 years, and the only time I land less than full flap is the occasional practice for a zero flap landing. Other pilots differ, but I always land full flap, and doing so has never complicated my landing.

Keep the plane over the centerline, and aligned with the runway. Do what you have to do, including having one wing low, it does not matter if you touch one mainwheel first.

Now, as you reduce the power to idle, the plane is going to land, it cannot sustain prolonged flight with no power. Smoothly, gently try to prevent the landing by steadily raising the nose - imagine that the runway is really hot, and you're trying not to touch it until the last minute. Let the plane settle on on its own, maintaining the nose up. You're gently pulling on the control wheel to do this - never push the control wheel during a landing. Relax the pull a little if you need to to modulate your attitude or height above the ground, but never push! If you hear the stall warning horn, and you're only a foot or two over the runway, hold that attitude, and wait, you're about to kiss the plane on.

Once a wheel touches, maintain the track along the centerline, and do not release the pull on the control wheel. Indeed, were you to be flying my C 150, I would mentor you to maintain the pull so as to keep the nosewheel light for as long as possible. If the nosewheel touched as you had the control wheel pulled gently against the stop, I would compliment you. You do not need to have the nosewheel on the runway to steer, if you have enough airspeed to hold the nosewheel up, your rudder is still effective enough to steer. The rudder will steer the plane on its mainwheels very well at runway speeds.

Two things to avoid:

Allowing the nose to rise and fall, select the best attitude for the speed you're flying, and either maintain the pitch attitude, or increase it a little as you flare, and reduce power. And, don't let the airplane wander laterally across the width of the runway - use the rudder and ailerons to keep the plane in the middle. Your instructor is not going to allow you to fly in wind conditions such that you cannot keep the plane aligned on the runway.

As an aside to the foregoing, and having recently discussed this with an instructor colleague, ask your instructor during your upcoming lessons (appropriate to the maneuvers being flown) to experience moving each of the controls to its stop. Examples of this could be full nose up applied after the mainwheels ore on the runway, full nose down for a moment while breaking a stall, full rudder and aileron during a sideslip at altitude. It's important that you know that you have full control, and you can use it! During my type training on the DC-3, the instructor was very clear to draw my attention that the control wheel goes nearly all the way around - something like 175 degrees of rotation either way from center, and I should use all of this if I need it, rather than not using full aileron which I could have needed for full control. During checkouts, I've have a pilot migrating across the runway laterally. "More rudder" I'd say. "I'm pressing the pedal" I'd hear - then I'd press it more! So learn what control is actually available to you!
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