I don't believe that the DJ 737 pilots are any better or worse than the QF 737 pilots.

I suspect that the QF pilots suffer from flying both the classic and the NG - when I flew both the classic and the NG, there seemed to be real, though small, differences in where each type hit the tar - the NG doesn't land as nicely as the classic in my experience though.

It may well have been in my head, though the voices that I hear tell me that the differences are real!

That all being said I didn't see anywhere in TBT's post that said anything about Virgin pilots landing long, or short, or outside the touchdown zone. It seems that a lot of people assume that if a touchdown is smooth then they have landed long - all except their own greasers of course!

TBT - as a Virgin pilot - though not one that has been to Launy for a couple of weeks - thanks for the kind words!

Have a happy new year!

Oops, you are absolutely right Messiah. The 777 indeed has no centre gear just the six wheel bogie wing gears. What I meant to say was the A340. Also you are correct in saying the DC10-10 did not have a centre gear but the -30 and MD11 has it. Still doesn't change the fact that the 747 has two body gears which are either side of centre, just inboard and aft of the wing gears.

Who invited the plastic jacket brigade.

The B747 is an easy aircraft to land because it was designed that way. In fact it is easier to land than a C172. When Boeing first proposed the construction of this type, they determined that pilots would average 2.6 landings per month; a figure that is probably less than what an average private pilot would do. Thus, the requirement to be vice-less when the machine is landed was found.

I personally found that the best way to land the B747 was by formula: when on slope, commence power reduction and flare when the end of the first center-line after the piano keys disappears under the glaresheild(ensure correct seat height adjustment!!). Touchdown being signalled soley by the aft movement of the speedbrake was a reward in itself.

The huge inertia of the 74 is a factor along with wing area and landing gear configuration which makes the type easy to land. Further, the gear is VERY robust in its engineering and it is designed to be landed in a x-wind without kicking off the crab angle. This, however is somthing that I could never bring myself to do and I always kicked it straigh prior to touchdown. Landing one wing low is not recommended as the pod will scape t about 4 degrees.

The B767 is a Pr!ck of a thing to land. The bogies hanging low at the front cause the wheels to 'stub the toes' when landing. Although I fly with some guys who can pull off a greaser on the 76. I cannot. My touchdowns are ok, but are all the same. At least I always touchdown in the same spot.

I would hasten to say that it would be a worry for a company's pilots to develop an attitude that it is ok to float down a RWY past the touch down zone in pursuit of a smooth landing. Accident history is replete with the misfortunes of those who hold this view and it is a practice that is to be discouraged in any instance. At many carriers, landinfg long is a fail item on a check ride.

Not ever having the pleasure (nor ever will have) of being in command of any of the aforementioned heavies is a matter of regret for myself.
But I always will be thankful to the unknown crew of a QF aircraft on which I was a passenger from YBTL to YPAD via YSSY (I think) back during the Easter Holidays of 1992.
I had just been discharged from Townsville Base Hospital six weeks after making a complete mess of myself in an a/c accident in PNG doing amongst other things, breaking my back.
Anyway, all landings were such greasers that I was extremely thankful to the cabin staff when finally disembarking at Adelaide. No-one who has not suffered such a spinal injury can imagine what the pain endured can be like. I nearly screamed in pain a few times on the taxi ride to the airport but the landings were so smooth I can still remember the relief I felt once we were down.
Whoever the flight crew were on that day, Thank you!:ok:

You only live twice. Once when
you're born. Once when
you've looked death in the face.

VB, Fast on final, slow to depart = PIA and loss of airport capacity

Missy,

Virgin do the same speed as QF up to 10000 ft on departure so how do you figure it equals a loss of airport capacity?

Above 10000' it should not make any difference to the departure rates.

Firstly, VB and QF DO NOT fly the same speeds to 10,000ft.

Secondly, VB use more runway than QF fpr the same sectors. You can claim more passengers, more freight, heavier passengers, whatever, but the derated departures mean that the aircraft uses more runway to get airborne which means that the attainment of an ATC separation standard takes more time which then in turn leads to a loss of airport capacity.

Does anyone else have visuals of Missy sitting at the end of the runway with scanner in one hand and radar gun in the other???

"Well well well that DJ a/c was flying at 0.00009462 of a knot slower than the preceding QF aircraft.... naughty naughty not freeing up runway quick enough"

:hmm:

Well Missy,

Hate to burst your bubble, BUT both QF and DJ fly at 250 kts below 10000', the only difference that I can see would be DJ do noise abatement takeoff's everywhere - ie V2 to V2+20 up to 3000' agl then clean up.

As for the minor differences between the amount of runway used by Virgin vs QANTAS you must be joking if you think that this reduces airport capacity.

If you seriously think that these differences limit airport capacity I want what you are on because it is good ****!

Are you the turkey that does SMC in Sydney are you - that would explain the strange ideas

Thanks for validating my assertion that QF and DJ DO NOT fly the SAME speeds.

I see it every day, DJ use more runway which can mean one departure in a gap rather than 2. More often than not DJ is simply made #2.

Bollocks! :eek:
Two 737's operating between two ports, over a similar trip distance are going to use take-off distances that would be indiscernably different from an observer's point of view............unless one a/c is doing a full power FL10/FL15 short fielder, and the other a max derate FL0/FL1 take-off.

Out of YSSY, where you purportedly work, missy, ALL take-offs must be noise abatement, so speeds below 10,000 will be almost IDENTICAL.

Methinks you're more than a tad biased towards the Red Rat!

So what you are saying that the period between the QF 1000' clean up and the DJ 3000' clean up - when the aircraft is climbing at 2500-4000 ft per minute - is restricting capacity at Australia's airports - that must be an important 30-45 seconds!

And you are also saying that by using de-rated take-off's the Virgin aircraft use more runway and also restrict airport capacity.

Yep - you are that tosser on Sydney SMC!

If you seriously think that these differences are restricting airport capacity you need to get out more - if you really believe this and you are a controller it explains the sometimes crappy service we get from Sydney ATC.

So does this mean that Q do not do derated take-offs in their 737's? Just curious.

OK, since we've digressed onto climb speeds, what is the DJ deal?

At QF we do V2+15-20 until 1000' above airfield and then accelerate to min clean until 3000' AGL. After that it's 250 below 10'000 unless ATC clears us higher whichi in most circumstances on the 767 means about 320 knots/.81 (depending on predicted shear and other known or forseen factors). If clelared high speed and appropriate, what is the general DJ rule of thumb?

As for this KM:

Yes and no. Yes in that the procedure I discussed above is an ICAO B departure (or whatever the new term is) and so technically is still a noise abatement departure. On the other hand, ICAO A is more commonly seen as THE noise abatement departure due to minimising the noise completely. I don't know about other airlines procedures but we're only required to use ICAO A on RWY 34 departures!

TM,yes QF certainly DO do assumed temp take-offs whenever possible.
So apart from the different clean up height I don't quite see what Missy is on about regarding the amount of runway used vs VB?

:rolleyes:

Virgin have, since the beginning, done noise abatement takeoff's where the aircraft is climbed at V2 to V2+20 (typically V2 +15) until 3000' agl then cleaned up - all engines operating before the pedants arc up!

Once clean we climb at 250 KIAS unless speed restrictions are cancelled.

Above 10 and in the case of speed cancellation, the climb speed is predicated on ECON. We have different cost indices for each city pair - and each engine/airframe/winglet and lease term combination.

Typically these cost indices are quite low, with subsequent effect of having climb indicated speeds anywhere from 280 to 320 depending on the airframe, weight, winds etc.

Indicated Mach numbers are in the order of M.78-.79 depending upon cruising level and of course the cost index.

Decent is at a standard ECON into 300 KIAS/250 below 10000'.

There are many schools of thought about whether or not this is a good way of doing things - but regardless of our individual thoughts, those that make the rules say this is how they want it done.

No doubt when the inevitable regime change happens (everybody eventually retires - no rumours here!) things will be looked at again, however until then this is how we do it....

Bear in mind that there are NO published profiles anymore - in years gone by AIP had a table of speeds for each type and company, but that has been removed long ago, so there are no regulatory requirements that dictate speeds to be flown, or indeed if we need to tell anyone what speed we are flying (and don't get me started on that dopey notam).

Dehavillanddriver, let me know when your next in SYdney and I'll show you places on the aerodrome that you have only seen on a map or you have seen when you've been sent round!

Well Done Missy,

You have just confirmed to the world that Sydney Tower has at least 1 totally unprofessional controller.

With quotes like these...

and

Are you the controller that moaned about the flight numbers 245 and 542? Made a huge song and dance about it.

If you did a serious analysis of the takeoff distances - and consequentially the time spent on the runway - you would find that if there is any difference at all, it will be in the order of 3-5 seconds, which if that is the margins you are operating to you don't seem to have to worry about separation assurance.

Did you realise that a fair number of the -700's have 20k engines, where as the 800's have 24 and 26k engines (which we derate to 22 and 24k respectively).

Interesting comment on the non-use of profile speeds as per AIP.
ATC use (and technically have to know) the speeds from the same sheet (published in ATC's own manuals).

An example:

AIRCRAFT TYPE# CLIAS #CRUISE#PROFILE to 30 NM#MIN to 30 NM#MIN 30-15NM#MIN 15 NM -FNL#MX

A320 #290 - 320# M.78 #300 #230 #210 #170 #M.80 # 340
A4 (Skyhawk) 300 M.72 M.72 300 250 180 M.78 / 450
A748 145 180 220 160 140 110 220
B707 (RAAF) 320 M.81 300 250 210 170 M.85 / 350
B712 310 M.80 310 250 230 210 M.80 / 320
B722 290 - 320 M.80 300 230 210 170 M.85 / 350
B733/4 (Virgin) 290 - 320 M.76 300 230 220 170 M.80 / 320
B737/8 (Virgin) 280 - 330 M.80 300 220 200 170 M.82 / 340
B733/4 (Qantas) 300 M.75 300 230 230 150 M.78 / 320
B738 (Qantas) 300 M.78 300 230 230 150 M.78 / 300
B742/3 (Qantas) 300 - 340 M.85 300 250 230 170 M.86 / 340
B744 (Qantas) 320 - 350 M.86 300 250 230 170 M.87 / 350
B762 (Qantas) 300 M.80 320 230 230 150 M.86 / 340
B763 (Qantas) 300 M.80 300 230 230 150 M.86 / 340

So, it would be nice to know if we are using duff data.

As far as who goes number 2 from an arrival point of view, it makes no difference.

If the plane in front slows earlier than anticipated (for a huge possible number of reasons - most I just couldn't care about) then the one following has to be slowed or moved etc. That our job.

I see little consistency among aircraft types or operators so it is pretty academic. One operator on one aircraft can have a difference over 40NM to touchdown of 2 minutes. THAT is significant. So we just make it work. (and THAT is why you may get slowed earlier than you want - fight it out in the crewroom!)