for Peeteechase - It's not just the Airbus
We "solved" this problem on the MD-11 (finally). Some of you probably remember the AD on the MD-11 that lead to the mandatory installation of the "-908 FCC software upgrade." That product was my swan-song for MD-11 flight control development. The major addition in this software upgrade was the extension of the Pitch Rate Damping (PRD) function to encompass pressure altitudes all the way down to field elevation. There were two other additions to the LSAS (Longitudinal Stability Augmentation System) control laws that can command up to 5 Deg of elevator authority:
"Positive Nose Lowering" (PNL) - This is a subfunction that is armed for activation on landing when the automatic ground spoilers are armed. It is a two-stage elevator input that begins by adding about 2 Deg of nose-down input when the main wheels first spin up. Once the FCC "sees" the ground spoilers deploy past 10 degrees, it adds approximately another 2 degrees of nose down. One only need perform a Max braking+AGS landing both with and without the PNL function to know how far it can go to avoiding tailstrikes due to nose rise after touchdown AGS deployment.
"Pitch Attitude Protection" (PAP) - This is just a "politically correct" name for "Tailstrike Deterrence". This function is available on both takeoff and landing, as it is scheduled with respect to Radalt. The R/A schedules a maximum pitch attitude limit that, if exceeded, will cause LSAS to put in some nose-down elevator to counter the nose rise. The key attitude is 9.5 degrees at 0 feet R/A with the main gear compressed. As R/A increases, that pitch limit increases. If you are flying "hands off" (not sure who would be doing this that close to the ground, but I did a lot of it in the simulator testing this feature) LSAS will smartly bring the nose down for you. With "hands-on" it provides a nice little force deterrent to the pilot as if to say "I don't think you want to go there, buddy!" It is not so much of a force deterrent that it would be a concern of limiting the pilot's actions.... With 15-20 pounds of force you could easily pull right thru it and smack the tail.. but one hopes that below 10 feet R/A that any pilot worth his salt is trimmed-up well enough, and aware enough of his pitch attitude that this would never happen....yet it does happen on occasion!
All of this "magic" is made possible by the "hybrid" elevator control architecture of the MD-11. By "hybrid" I am referring to a mixture of conventional mechanical actuation and electronic fly-by-wire actuation. The LSAS is the software part, and it can use up to its 5 degree elevator limit to perform these functions while the pilot is flying. We refer to this as "series control" (i.e. the LSAS operates in series with the pilot's inputs).
Doing it with flaps, while it may be technically possible, would likely be quite messy and expensive, mostly due to the nature of how flap control systems are designed to be slow, methodical, and structured in such a way as to avoid high-frequency transients on the airframe response (i.e typically driven by ball-screw actuators, not the snappy response of the hydraulic actuators used for primary surfaces). I'd take a wild guess that failure modes would play a part in whether or not such a solution would ever meet safety requirements for "improbability" of a failure that could spell trouble.
I believe the LSAS is the best solution (and not just because I designed it!), because it provides the pilot with that immediate force-feedback when you are in the tailstrike neighborhood. It is tantamount to a high-time captain applying a bit of nose-down force on his column while he allows a relatively "green" F/O to complete a landing without risking the tailstrike.