First circuits and landings.

[ronniehuang]

Well, after 6 hours, on Monday mid-morning I did my first circuits with 5 T/G and a full stop. After a couple of demos from my instructor and the inital couple of landings with much assistance from the intructor, I did manage to get the plane down in one piece with no more than just verbal assitance from the instructor.

I can honestly say those last few seconds as the plane is about to touch down felt like an eternity. It was very tempting to flare too early especially with the ground rapidly approaching and it doesn't help the nerves one bit when the instructor tells you to "drive the plane right into the mark". But do you know what, when you resist the urge to flare early and wait until just the right moment, it makes for the sweetest of landings. By the end of the lesson I must've sweated off a couple of pounds because my shirt was absolutely drenched in sweat(it didn't help that it was like 30 degrees outside).

I do hope it gets easier with time. Do you ever lose that feeling, which seems to be an equal mix of fear, excitement and dread, when you come in to land?

[BackPacker]

For me, landings are still some of the most exciting moments in flight. Not the drenched-in-sweat, lose-10-pounds kind of fear, but it's still a moment worthy of concentration.

Particularly on short runways, in gusting conditions with a lot of x-wind. Although those sorts of landings are typically my best. Must be a focus thing.

[FlyingStone]

It does get easier with time. Common advise on when to begin the flare is to delay it until death/crash is imminent :)

[BackPacker]

When flying at night, flare when your head is inbetween the runway edge lights.:eek:

Another advice I got from my instructor was to wait until you could see the runway being illuminated by the landing light (the one located on the engine cowling of a PA28). On our second circuit, the landing light broke down (on downwind) but we didn't notice that until we saw the runway in the glow of the position lights (those weak thingies on the wingtips). To this day I don't know who of us yanked the yoke back first but we did land (rather firmly) on the main wheels, saving the nosewheel, prop etc. ILAFFT.

[Pilot DAR]

ILAFFT ... after hard landing check?

Ronnie, you may find that once you start practicing power off landings, your judgement for the flare improves. Having the power to strech the flare is nice to get used to things, but you'll have to manage without the power at some point.

As long as you prevent the nosewheel striking, flaring a little too low is probably less dangerous that flaring too high. Aside from adding a bunch of power, once the flare begins, you are using up stored energy in the inertia of the aircraft. Once that energy has mostly gone, you're close to the stall, and settling. Because you're close to the stall, you can't arrest the settleing by raising the nose more, and you're gonna hit.

With your instructor's concurrance, and a longer than normal runway, you can fly closer to the runway, a little fast. As you begin your falre from there, it is much more a horizontal maneuver, rather than a partly vertical one. Don't let the noasewheel touch though!

After thousands of hours, pilots still will get scary landings. All kinds of factors, (which your instructor will mostly be preventing right now), will begin to affect certain landings, and make them memorable. Look forward to those few, where you're on, but you could not feel it at all. In 6000 hours I've had a dozen or so of them, where I actually rolled the ailerons a little to confirm that I was on, 'cuase I had not felt it at all! Landing in an inch of loose snow on a smooth runway can imporve this affect!

Welcome to aviation, you'll never stop learning!

[ronniehuang]

My instructor has played a *huge* part in my successful landings so far. I haven't really had to just exactly when to flare just yet. There is surprisingly calm voice to my right that says "Not yet... not yet... not yet..... now."

I've already hit some "interesting" weather conditions(well... interesting enough for me). In this warm weather I've hit thermals on the way in. Its a little disconcerting to discover that you have stopped decending when you've just trimmed for it (on the base leg here) to do so just seconds earlier. While this might not be such a big deal for the experience pilot, it does make a 6 hour old student on his first circuit panic a bit when they find themselves a 100 feet high than they expected and not what was in his notes of the power and altitudes for his plane for circuit patterns at the airport. Yes I did freeze and yes the instructor took over at that point but he did hand back control to me for the final.

[Jan Olieslagers]

Do you ever lose that feeling, which seems to be an equal mix of fear, excitement and dread,You shouldn't. The moment you start flying by sheer routine, you will be more of a danger - to yourself AND to others - than you need be. On top of that you'll be missing the essential excitement. Flying is too expensive! Enjoy every drip of adrenaline!

[flyinkiwi]

Ronnie, coping with "interesting conditions" is part of landing an aircraft. You'll find that no two landings are alike, and often you'll screw up a good approach with a bad landing if you are not paying enough attention to the conditions at any given moment. Has your instructor mentioned the concept of "being ahead of the plane" to you? In essence its the state of mind where you easily anticipate what the aircraft is doing and react accordingly. It's the reason that when your instructor demonstrates an approach and landing the plane behaves like its on rails. With time and practice you'll be able to do it too.

Trust me, I was precisely where you are right now not too long ago.