Where is your head?
 

First time poster long time lurker.

I have a question about something I can't seem to find anywhere on the web. I'm a fairly low time Canadian PPL pilot (98 hours, licensed at 45) who's flown at 6 different airports and 9 different instructors over the last 7 years.

While trying to do a checkout at my latest location the instructor said everything was great except where I put my head during landing. Specifically, when landing the C172/C152 I need to put my head against the left window to "look down the side of the aircraft".

I have never heard of this, my old instructors have never heard of this, my friends have never heard of this and apparently the internet as far as I can see have never heard of this. I have always rounded out keeping my body straight and looking as far down the runway as I can and as I flare I do lose sight of the end of the runway but use my peripheral vision to asses descent rate and being centered on the runway.

He is saying that my landings are unsafe, despite flying 25 hours PIC in the last 12 months at my last location and having 3 different instructors there including a instructor/flight examiner sign off on me. I've never damaged an aircraft during landings doing it the way I've been taught and yet he won't sign off on me renting because until I can land it with my head against the window I'm "unsafe". Has anyone else ever heard of this?

Friends who are flight instructors have said to talk to the CFI (Chief flight instructor not certified flight instructor) since they've never heard of it, and I'd just like another opinion to make sure my friends aren't trying to cover my poor technique.

Thanks

you dont show any evidence of poor technique.
you are being told a load of nonsense.
have some confidence there boy.

during my training a bazillion years ago now I had an instructor that insisted on low approaches to the runway ...to the point where I had to power on to climb up over the boundary fence on each approach and let down to the touchdown.
nobody could understand his take on the training and so he was awarded the DCM.
(dont come monday, you're sacked).

your guy seems to have developed a similar oddity.

focus away in the distance to judge height and use your peripheral vision to judge position. thats the way you do it.
if your landings are gentle things then you are doing it correctly.
if you keep on banging it on then he may be trying to give you a clue as to how to remedy a fault. ...but it seems an odd suggestion to put your head on the window.

In that case he probably would not sign me off either and I am an Instructor who has been flying 30+ years!

I will have to try the head against the window technique to see if I am missing something. I don't think I will do it with my son as I don't want him to try it, nor with the instructor as I don't want him to think I am bonkers.

Is it possible that you touch down in a crab and he is trying to think of creative ways to help you line up? Mandating the head against the window seems like an odd way to compensate but there is a lot I don't know.

I'm learning in a C172 in Canada and that isn't a technique I've heard off and god knows I've been through enough "techniques" trying to nail those elusive landings.

I'd want to know what is it that he considers "unsafe" about your landings.
Centreline? landing with side load on the gear? no flare and too bouncy? flaring too high?

Without that information anything else is pointless speculation. If he can't tell you then that IS a problem.

He said there isn't enough flare, but the landings aren't hard. What's the safety issue of not "flaring enough" if I'm not smacking it into the ground?

To me the only issue here would be if you are landing nose wheel first, or all three together, as long as when you land there is a positive interval (ideally a couple of seconds or more, but at least a positive one) between the mains and the nose touching that should be fine - but IMHO the head down the side is not the way to not cure this if that is the problem.

is he short? when doing my line training in the Islander years ago my then chief pilot suggested I move my booklet of airfield plates out of the space between the windshild and instrument panel to make it possible to see down the side in the flare. I couldn't work it out at the time as I am tall and could see over the top. I cannot see that this should be much of an issue in a 172 though, unless that is the reason then it is a total load of rubbish that he is telling you.

Where is your head?
 

I am short
Enough that I need 3 cushions ( 1 under and 2 behind)
I don't land this way
I look down the runway
Hard to make a judgement without being in the plane and I'm but a mere student but landing flat ( no flare) is the recipe for bouncing in my experience
You should be flaring consistently in each landing it is good technique
But if you are bothered then get another opinion

When the mains touch down the nose is in the air for about 2 seconds or so.

I'll talk to the CFI and see what he says, maybe it's an instructor ism, or a school ism.

It sounds as if the issue is not flaring enough. Landing a light aircraft flat is a bad thing and will certainly result in losing the nosewheel on a 152 eventually, slightly less of an issue on a 172.

To land you should arrive just above the runway at the correct speed as per POH and then close the throttle and slowly pull back on the column until the aircraft stops flying and touches down. If you have it right the yoke should be pretty much all the way back at that point and the nose fairly high

In the flare hold yoke back pressure till the stall warner is going off (should be same/similar attitude as on take-off) and once main wheels are down gently lower the nose. If really bumpy, ie bumpy grass strip or even on concrete/tarmac add a little power when main wheels are down to keep the nose off as long as possible.

Go to another airfield where the CFI is not bonkers. Could be a way to keep you there and acquire more money...or am I being cynical?

the problem is that you are landing with the aircraft in a poor attitude.
all aeroplanes need to be landed on the main wheels in a tail low attitude.

your landings are very close to a dangerous situation. you may hear a lot about taildraggers and "ground loops", and never suspect that you could have the problem in a tricycle aircraft. the reality is though that if you wheelbarrow it on in the landing, that is you land on the nose wheel first, you can be set up for the most violent of ground loops. violent enough to destroy the aircraft.

what you need to be doing is hold the aircraft off a little more. as the aircraft slows in the flare ease back the elevator more so that you land in a more nose up attitude. make nose up landings your habit and you will be a lot safer.
the way you are landing now all it takes is a gust, or the lull between gusts and you could bend an aeroplane.

dont feel special, most of us here have been through this ourselves.

The only time I've heard anyone talk about a head-to-one-side technique is in tail draggers. In some of these (e.g. Tiger Moth) it's the only way you can see ahead, during the hold-off, when 3-pointing it.

Is the instructor of an age where he might have learnt to fly in Tiger Moths? :E

OC619

No, if the nose is in the air for that long he is NOT landing it in a poor attitude, 2 seconds might not sound that long, but try counting out (one thousand and one, one thousand and two) when YOU are landing - I doubt that you will hold the nose off much longer than that (unless you have the speed too high).

I love learning new stuff, especially when it initially appears bonkers, could you perhaps encourage the instructor to come on here and explain the reasoning behind this technique?

Uh, I could try.

He said next flight he's going to tape A4 sheets across my view to force me to look out the side. Despite my initial reaction saying that's crazy dangerous, we'll see how that goes.

It just sucks to pay extra money for dual instruction after already being licensed.

surely that's a recipe for landing left wheel first? how many of us can hold the wings perfectly level while sticking our head all the way to one side?

For the flare i'm always looking at the far end of the runway, and then (if there is one) the fence, if i can see over the fence i'm too high!

Look to the end of the runway judge with your peripheral vision when to flare... its all about feeling, you'll know when you are too high or too fast, the trick is what to do about it!

but the instructor sounds a bit odd...... talk to the CFI especially if he is being painful in signing you off.

Hmm, Another quite dramatic sounding statement, are you sure, you are getting his point and not taking his words too literally?, , is he perhaps inferring that you are not using your peripheral vision?.

Have to say, 98 hours in 7 years, is not conducive to maintaining skills

This is known as the "Labrador" landing technique.

Not after the place - but after the dog, hanging its head out of the side of a moving car, ears flapping. For Pilot's its especially effective when wearing a leather flying helmet so it can flap in the wind like ears. :ugh:

On a more serious note....

Introducing this kind of random technique to someone who already holds a licence sounds very odd to me.

Your visual senses and equilibrioception (inner ear) senses are quite focused in the final moments of an approach. How much time passes between that initial sense (from visual and vestibular systems) of a wing lift from a gust and the physical correction with the yoke? Its miliseconds, and its instinctive. By the time your at 100 hours - as you are - you will trust your senses and automatically react accordingly.

If you havent been trained in this 'labrador' technique from the start then the last thing you want to be doing now is waving your head around on short finals, creating conflicting information to your senses.

Otherwise the next sensation you'll feel is likely to be the shudder of the 172 off the side of the runway and you wondering how you got there.



I would be really interested to hear this instructors logic!

Weird instructor.
 

Hi DSoup,

Don't do anything of the sort, DSoup, the man's a menace and I suggest you should not spend another Loony on flying with him.

Better still, move to another instructor/club/school at once and report him to both the Chief Flying Instructor of the establishment and to Transport Canada. Otherwise he'll go on teaching this rubbish to some poor ab-initio students who don't know any better and will follow his teaching until serious harm results.

BP.

Second Broomsticks post:ok:

third Broomstick's post.

Speak to CFI, or go to another club.

The problem is not just with you but think of all the other students that he is teaching, he aught to be questioned.
Maybe he is just winding you up?

I remember in that lovely book (whose name I have forgotten) where "the instructor lit a match in front of (my) nose during a difficult landing. I was to thank him 15 years later".

I personally had an instructor who used to offer me a wrapped sweet just as my hands and feet were dancing all over the place landing a microlight! Pretty cool guy though, one of the best if a bit unorthodox.

ernest k gann. Fate is the Hunter. he was describing the methods used to teach him for flying and landing in lightning.

Fate is the Hunter - that's the one.

I would recommend everyone to read it, its a 'pilots' book going back to the 'good ol' days'.

Thanks for the reminder, memory is not what it was:sad:

Interesting what different people take from the same text - I thought it was about helping to overcome fear and concentrate and focus on the essentials, putting distractions of any kind out of mind.

I'll have to go read it again, now!

FBW

I'm 95% sure I got his meaning, especially since he said he's going to tape up some paper blocking my view straight ahead, he'd do the look out on the next flight so I'd HAVE to lean over to land. Not sure how else to take it.

98 hours in 7 years when I was licensed at 17 and stopped flying because well...students are pretty poor. That's why I also flew about 25 hours in the last year.

Thanks for the advice everyone, I'll talk to the CFI and see where the misunderstanding is.

Fourth Broomstick's post. Nothing more to be said, IMHO.

'Wheelie'
 

I think its safe to say that it's been established that the FI's technique is certainly 'interesting' at best.

I would just second what one or two others have said about the nose wheel being in the air for around 2 seconds. That would seem to indicate to me that your nose is in a high enough nose up attitude. You can't leave it up there much longer as at some point you do obviously need all 3 down and to bring the aircraft to a halt as no doubt you're not always going to be landing on a long runway.

I was always told to 'wheelie' the C172 in and then hold off, bringing the control column back and letting it settle onto the runway. I can't see that you are doing anything wrong??

Just offering an alternative hypothesis.

That the instructor meant something different and was misunderstood by the OP.

G

Over the years I have met a few instructors who seem to have developed their own personal theories and whacky techniques. After gaining my PPL I did a check ride at a new club. I could land light aircraft perfectly well using the normal techniques but this instructor insisted on applying a hefty burst of power during the flare to 'soften the landing'. The resulting landings, even his demos, were always ugly. Even as a fairly new boy, I wasn't comfortable with this guy's instruction.

Instructors vary. Some are experts in their field, some have very little experience, and a few seem to have lost the plot. The chap in question in this thread seems likely to fall into the latter category. If you have doubts speak to another more senior instructor or the boss of the school/club about it.

Landing an aeroplane is like a lot of other activites..once you can do it, the more you think about it, the worse it gets!

Joking aside what you say is quite true which is why I don't really like these 'This is how you land' threads because everyone has their own ideas which involve the most intricate scenarios.

I can land perfectly well. Please don't ask me how though because I genuinely don't want to know. I don't even really think about it when I do it, I just do it. Obviously at one point I was trained how to do it. Being able to do it is good enough for me, I don't need to know all of the scientist stuff.

There was a thread on here not so long ago, I think it was on the subject of when to turn onto base leg or something like that. There were the most fantastic descriptions of angles and speeds; all sorts of wonderful things being bandied around.

I turn base leg when it looks about right. I haven't died yet.

Flying is only complicated if you wish it to be so.

As to the OP, your instructor sounds like a nutter, get another one.

I had a hard time learning to land properly. Started learning at age 50 in a glider at High Wycombe, then visiting my sister in Maryland, had an hour of circuits in a 152 on the Eastern Shore just over the Bay Bridge; wind perpetually cross. So was the instructor. Everytime I got near to touch, he had control.

So back to Booker, and dear old Dudley Steynor, who used to instruct in Tiger Moths during WWII. He said I was over controlling, and asked me to put my left hand on my right wrist, and that simple trick cured the problem.

Since then done approx 8,000 landings and havn't bent anything yet.

Lots on here about how to land - from my understanding the OP does not actually have a problem landing, though not having flown with him I cannot be 100% on this, just that the check instructor requires him to use a new technique that to most seems a bit strange. I would like to hear of any other problems the OP has with the way he lands that maybe the instructor is trying to sort, but from what has been said so far he lands OK.

Dsoup your instructor is clealy a :mad:

On my Practical at around 350 ft after a touch and go the CFI threw his note book across the cockpit screamed "we're all going to die" and cut the throttle... he kept screaming "where are we going!" until i screamed over him 'THERE" and pointed to the riverbed (which would have been nasty) in front of the plane, he them calmly said "good go'round" and advanced the throttle for me.. i knew i'd passed, the next landing was full stop and handshake

Good on you Kevin, and thank you, that was one of the best flights ! :ok:

Dsoup, reading this thread a few points spring to mind. Firstly, its not clear what fault your instructor is trying to correct, you might start by aking him to explain in greater detail what he thinks the problem is. Secondly, you mentioned 152 and 172, if you are swopping between these there is some chance you are landing too flat in the 172.

Thirdly, the guy deserves the benefit of the doubt a little longer yet, he is an instructor, and might just have a very good reason for what he is doing. At 97 hours you sill have a way to go on landing technique and actually its a good time to try and break bad habits before they become engrained. The comments about peripheral vision made earlier might be correct, or you may be staring at the aiming point too long and getting ground rush and flaring late. You may not be doing these things much and your landings may seem ok but this guy might be trying to remove faults and help you improve

Finally, if you can ask him about the problem and discuss it you might have some ideas yourself about how to solve it. If the paper bothers you tell him you are quite prepared to imagine it being there if it helps. Try working with him, and if that doesnt work out go to the cfi, or even consider flying with the cfi to see what he thinks.