I get the impression that most manufacturers "Demonstrated Crosswind Landing Limits" are erring on the side of caution. Presumably for product liability and insurance reasons. There are some aircraft with landing gear known to be at risk of side loads, yet the majority seem to handle landings at greater than these demonstrated figures without problems. I would have thought the sensible thing for designers to do is make the control authority the limiting factor. The other thing mentioned in this thread is training. I did mine at a school with multiple runways, so coping with crosswinds was not something I got that much experience of. Having operated from a single runway for 15 years now, my knowledge is considerably greater. I personally feel that a bit more training should be carried out with respect to short/narrow/crosswind runways. How many times have we read accident reports where the pilots first experience of small airfields was unfortunately not a very pleasant one?.
Last edited by The Flying Pram; 11th November 2007 at 17:33.