Flare technique A319/320/321

[FM_A320]

Hello,

I tend to fly a huge amount of aicrafts, A319/320/321. I generally fly very well the last part of the approach keeping my aiming point stable and steady in the windscreen. At 50’ I cross the threshold with the correct rate, flown visually.
Then it start the issue. When I look a bit further (either at the runway end or a bit closer say 3/4) I have the feeling of sinking, even if nothing has changed. Probably I become a bit ground shy and start pulling a bit. Little pulls. The plane gains energy and then when I flare it basically stop descending and with idle thrust it then sinks and touches firm.
many captains tell me to wait until 30’ and then do a single flare but if I’m a bit heavy I struggle to wait until then and touch firm…
Did you ever had the same problem? I have around 500hrs on type… Can you share some advice?

[321XLR]

The FCOM recommends flare begin at approximately 30 feet. I typically add 2 knots to VAPP also. I "unhook" the thrust levers out of the Climb Detent at 40-ish feet and walk them back, and try to hit idle detent simultaneous to the first "Retard" call

[UV]

Originally Posted by FM_A320

Probably I become a bit ground shy and start pulling a bit. Little pulls. The plane gains energy and then when I flare it basically stop descending and with idle thrust it then sinks and touches firm.

I used to fly an executive jet and we had the same problem with the final part of the landing. Not sure the same thing would apply to your larger aircraft but this is how we dealt with it.

If one flared a little too much there would be a firm touchdown. This was because of the swept wing and the main wheels being fairly far back.

So near the ground that final touch of flare would raise the nose but at the same time lower the main wheels firmly onto the ground.

The answer was to check slightly forward instead of persevering with the flare. This would reduce lift, whilst slightly lowering the nose but at the same time “raise” the main wheels and stop them descending firmly onto the ground.

Whether the same applies to your Airbus or not I don’t know!

[AerocatS2A]

At 100 to 200 feet, pick your visual aim point and make it stay in the same spot on the windscreen.

At 50 feet, do nothing.

At 30 feet, hold your nerve, do nothing.

At 20 feet, gentle flare, eyes down the runway.

Thrust to idle somewhere between 30 and 10 feet depending on the energy of the aircraft.

[321XLR]

I basically tell myself that "this is an autoland, just done via a human (me)"

if you watch a full autoland, you will see what needs to be done. Also the landing is rather firm.

Just duplicate the autoland.

what AerocatS2A said above is basically exactly what you need to do

the once change I will say is I personally am "on the Flight Director" until 100 feet, then 50/50 flight director and visual until 50 feet, after 50 feet, all visual, outside.

[maui]

30ft Don't overflare, (assuming you have it in the slot at 50 feet and on speed), about an extra 2degrees ANU getting rid of the thrust simultaneously, is all that is needed, then hold it steady. Gound effect will cushion you and tend to push the nose down. Just resist it, don't push or pull. IMHO.
No time on type but this worked for me on B727,DC9, MD80, 777. All the same but people like to complicate things.

Maui

[FlightDetent]

FM_A320 just avoid people with too vibrant ideas of their own.

I typically add 2 knots to VAPP also. I "unhook" the thrust levers out of the Climb Detent at 40-ish feet and walk them back, and try to hit idle detent simultaneous to the first "Retard" call

proficiency will come with more exposure, don't worry.

maui

[FM_A320]

Thank you very much to all of you for the replies. The learning point (most important) is to don’t rely much on my visual feeling and avoid flaring before 30’ and then resist to pull to much. Probably I get scared of hitting firm or even worse rotating while hitting that I either shallow the rate too early or “jerk” the stick If I delay flare until 30’….

[Jwscud]

Originally Posted by AerocatS2A

At 100 to 200 feet, pick your visual aim point and make it stay in the same spot on the windscreen.

At 50 feet, do nothing.

At 30 feet, hold your nerve, do nothing.

At 20 feet, gentle flare, eyes down the runway.

Thrust to idle somewhere between 30 and 10 feet depending on the energy of the aircraft.

With apologies to Aerocat, this is NOT the FCTM technique and if practiced in a heavy 321 will lead to a hard landing or your colleague taking control.

What you are describing is all part of building up your experience and understanding - you must already have developed a safe and repeatable technique to be released to the line. Ask your colleagues in the other seat for feedback after your sector as they will have a better sense of what you are doing than we can have from your descriptions.

if you are having confidence issues surrounding your landings, speak to a company training captain.

[IRRenewal]

When you hear the Captain take a sharp intake of breath you know you've left it too late.

Your question relates to an airbus. There will be as many opinions on here as there are airbus pilots on here. Nothing ever seems straightforward in an airbus.

[321XLR]

Originally Posted by FlightDetent

FM_A320 just avoid people with too vibrant ideas of their own.

proficiency will come with more exposure, don't worry.

maui

great post, thanks

[giggitygiggity]

Avoiding people with too vibrant ideas probably one of the only useful bits of advice in this thread. Follow the technique dictated by your training department until you've established a workable routine, but it should be minor tweaks of the standard technique.

The FCTM says 'when best adapted, the pilot will RAPIDLY retard all thrust levers', none of this unhooking and walking them closed nonsense. VAPP should be adjusted according to external conditions, margin on VLS and experience. Adding 2kts arbitrarily is just extending the landing roll with poor technique.

Stop inventing this rubbish and certainly stop passing it on to others as advice as it won't be consistently repeatable, you're not flying a cessna any more.

[CVividasku]

Originally Posted by UV

I used to fly an executive jet and we had the same problem with the final part of the landing. Not sure the same thing would apply to your larger aircraft but this is how we dealt with it.

If one flared a little too much there would be a firm touchdown. This was because of the swept wing and the main wheels being fairly far back.

So near the ground that final touch of flare would raise the nose but at the same time lower the main wheels firmly onto the ground.

The answer was to check slightly forward instead of persevering with the flare. This would reduce lift, whilst slightly lowering the nose but at the same time “raise” the main wheels and stop them descending firmly onto the ground.

Whether the same applies to your Airbus or not I don’t know!

That's where there is a subtlety.
Actually, pushing down increases lift. At first.
First, it increases lift on the tailplane.
Then, the airplane tilts down.
Then, lift decreases.
However, if you push a little bit very late, the combined effect of the increased lift and the wheels raising will be able, sometimes, if done right and with a bit of luck, to make for an extra smooth landing.

However I would not recommend this technique. It will only work if the airplane is already very close to the ground.

The best technique I found is to flare at the correct height. 40ft is definetely too high except maybe for a high slope on 321.
Real flare height should be 20ft for 320/319 if done with a "rather high" pitch up rate.
Flare height of 30ft corresponds to a smaller pitch rate, one that I personally do not like so much.

So, given the fact that you like to flare high, I would advise you to flare very slowly at first just to reassure you, but to perform the real flare later. For example you could slow the descent from a 3° angle to a 2° angle very progressively from 35/30ft to 20, then flare for real at 20ft, but still a gentle flare since your slope would be reduced.

[FM_A320]

Thank you for all the great inputs.
In your opinion is it correct approaching 50’ looking towards the far end (or at least further down the runway)?
Some captains told me to keep looking at the 2 big fat markers until I start the flare (so approx 30/20 ft). Others approaching the threshold and latest by 50’ to look away….

[CVividasku]

Do what works best for you, the usual advice is to look far down the runway from the start of the flare.

Please also note the following : the FCTM height is 30ft, then they go on to listing all sorts of conditions when the flare height should differ.
First of all, obviously if your mass is lower, all little buses having the same wing, it will make for a slower speed hence lower descent rate. Then, the wing being the same, for the same amount of pitch up you will get the same amount of lift. So you will get a stronger flare with a lighter aircraft.
This explains why the height may vary as much as from 20ft for a light 319 to 40ft for a heavy 321 (maybe coupled with the differences in flare speed as well)
(Airbus try to make you believe that all planes from the family handle the same, from 318 to 321, and land the same with the same technique, however that is just plain wrong.)
Also, this flare height is a bit early (except 321) also to help TRI's monitor the situation. Since they don't have a moving control column to effectively monitor the FO's actions, at least they can have a split second to react if they don't see anything at 30ft.

At the end of the day, a slow flare from higher can very well make the same result as a fast flare from lower (that is, touchdown distance and vertical speed at impact). It's up to you to get a technique that works all the time and to know how to adapt it to specific conditions.
Same goes for thrust. Even though airbus recommends using auto thrust, you can very well use thrust to require less flare and conversely.

Please also note that the flare height, for the same flare "force" (g-load actually) changes with the square of the vertical speed.
So vertical speed is really your main parameter.
Note that if you have an unstable final descent, you may touchdown very hard if you flare the same as usual with just 200 or 300 more fpm just prior to flare. Just to have an idea, if the standard technique is 20ft height (no margin) for 700fpm, then having 1000fpm at 50ft will require to pull at 40ft. Here you can see the true relevance of the "sink rate" callout.
If you're on a 4° slope instead of 3°, with the correct vertical speed, you should pull at 35ft instead of 20.
Conversely if you pull slowly from 40ft, you reduce your vertical speed. If you reduce it to, say, 400fpm, you now only need 7ft to stop your descent. So that's an excellent way of floating above the runway at 10ft and then having to descend again.

[Mr Good Cat]

The FCTM tells you exactly how to perform the landing. Why anybody insists on doing it differently, I have no idea, because you aren't covering yourself legally should any issues arise...

The guidance is:

Ensure you are stable at the correct parameters prior to the flare.
Look well ahead of aircraft to assess rate of descent in flare
At about 30 feet apply positive back-pressure (which may be released as necessary but do not apply forward stick) - typically an increment of 4 degrees of pitch
At 20 feet RETARD call reminds you to close thrust levers (as conditions dictate), which are rapidly retarded to be at IDLE detent by touchdown
Be ready to compensate for pitch down moment
Do not float or extend flare for smooth touchdown - fly aircraft on to runway in touchdown zone. Then fly the nosewheel on.

You are not looking for a smooth touchdown, you are looking for a touchdown at the right point on the runway at the right speed. If you get out of this habit, one day you'll forget to do it correctly when you really need it, such as a short wet runway with a stronger than expected tailwind.

Just do what it says in the book and you can't go wrong.

[172_driver]

I am a newbie on A320 (but not on jetliners). My technique at the moment is to break the rate of descent at some 30-40 ft so I don't crash land, the rest I am less concerned about. Finessing the landing will come with experience. Keep working on it!

[PENKO]

I will just say that the 'look at the end of the runway' advice will not always work on some runways due to terrain slope, nor will it work for all pilots. Other than that, with your level of experience, i.e. you have already been trained to FCOM standard, in time you will start to get a feel for the subtle differences between each variant, weight, wind condition.

[AerocatS2A]

Originally Posted by Mr Good Cat

The FCTM tells you exactly how to perform the landing. Why anybody insists on doing it differently, I have no idea, because you aren't covering yourself legally should any issues arise...

The guidance is:

Ensure you are stable at the correct parameters prior to the flare.
Look well ahead of aircraft to assess rate of descent in flare
At about 30 feet apply positive back-pressure (which may be released as necessary but do not apply forward stick) - typically an increment of 4 degrees of pitch
At 20 feet RETARD call reminds you to close thrust levers (as conditions dictate), which are rapidly retarded to be at IDLE detent by touchdown
Be ready to compensate for pitch down moment
Do not float or extend flare for smooth touchdown - fly aircraft on to runway in touchdown zone. Then fly the nosewheel on.

You are not looking for a smooth touchdown, you are looking for a touchdown at the right point on the runway at the right speed. If you get out of this habit, one day you'll forget to do it correctly when you really need it, such as a short wet runway with a stronger than expected tailwind.

Just do what it says in the book and you can't go wrong.

There's a lot of leeway in the FCTM, as there should be. Landing is a feel/judgement manoeuvre, not a robot manoeuvre. Even in what you've written there are words like "about", "as conditions dictate", and "typically". The FCTM provides guidance but does not dictate that you must do A, B, C to land. And that's why you get questions from people asking for other's input on how they have evolved the FCTM's guidance to something that works for them.

[Mr Good Cat]

Originally Posted by AerocatS2A

There's a lot of leeway in the FCTM, as there should be. Landing is a feel/judgement manoeuvre, not a robot manoeuvre. Even in what you've written there are words like "about", "as conditions dictate", and "typically". The FCTM provides guidance but does not dictate that you must do A, B, C to land. And that's why you get questions from people asking for other's input on how they have evolved the FCTM's guidance to something that works for them.

My response was aimed at some of the replies, not the question, which of course is reasonable. Suggestions such as to ‘unhook the thrust levers at 40 feet before the flare’ will get the original poster in a lot of trouble should things go wrong and he/she followed such advice.