Trimming and getting to on speed for landing

[Kalasnkova74]

5 minutes ago, r4y30n said:

I dunno… The USAF versions tended to have different wheels and tires, at a minimum, were the struts actually identical across all branches? Either way, I think your Air Force squadron mates will give you a dressing down for plonking it into the field lol.

Yup, starting with Jester. 

On that note, has anyone got him to actively compliment their landings? Best I’ve managed is silence. 

[DucS2r]

 Very happy to see this thread after struggling with landing in the F4. Jester has used every phrase in his scripts to complain about my landings and finally told me to “learn how to land.” Good advice, I’ll try again tonight. 

[=475FG= Dawger]

1 hour ago, Kalasnkova74 said:

Yup, starting with Jester. 

On that note, has anyone got him to actively compliment their landings? Best I’ve managed is silence. 

Yes, but I consider him an idiot and his opinions worthless. Fuel would be more useful. 

[Baldrick33]

3 hours ago, freehand said:

I just land it like a war bird.

 

My first landing Jester said “are we down yet?”, or something like that.

I then read how I was supposed to land and he complained about his back, the next one about retiring on disability and so it went on! 

[monkie]

The best comments coming from him also were from the most unstable approaches, ignore him he's an idiot.

[Baldrick33]

15 minutes ago, monkie said:

The best comments coming from him also were from the most unstable approaches, ignore him he's an idiot.

For a quick go I took off, swung it around to land in the opposite direction to that which I just took off from, ignored the instruments and fluked a smooth landing. “Textbook” he said. I was feeling quite smug until I read your comment…

[freehand]

5 minutes ago, Baldrick33 said:

For a quick go I took off, swung it around to land in the opposite direction to that which I just took off from, ignored the instruments and fluked a smooth landing. “Textbook” he said. I was feeling quite smug until I read your comment…

Peoples comments are irrelevant to be honest  as long as your having fun he does tend to swear a lot lol. 

[G.J.S]

3 hours ago, r4y30n said:

I dunno… The USAF versions tended to have different wheels and tires, at a minimum, were the struts actually identical across all branches? Either way, I think your Air Force squadron mates will give you a dressing down for plonking it into the field lol.

Tire size and pressures differed for sure. The gear legs were basically identical regardless of which letter followed the “F-4”. But it’s a naval airframe, designed with the strength that was required for naval ops. The ‘no flare’ technique was useful for scrubbing away a few knots on touchdown instantly, which was a boost. 

[monkie]

One technique that has helped me a bit is not to try to trim the aircraft for the AOA and then expect to fly hands off except with power for your rate of descent. I might trim for the AOA or just a bit below that pitch and then work the stick manually making small adjustments to pitch in order to not get too slow or too high of a nose up angle as power changes are made. You still have to work the pitch, the trim is a bit too coarse to fly without adujustments like in some of the other aircraft. 

Sometimes I think it's considered bad form to not have the aircraft trimed off hands off all of the time and that isn't exactly true. On final I find myself having to hold a bit of nose down force (Non FFB) and making fine adjustments from that allowing the nose to rise slightly to get on AOA but still having that fine control with small stick movements. 

[Victory205]

56 minutes ago, monkie said:

One technique that has helped me a bit is not to try to trim the aircraft for the AOA and then expect to fly hands off except with power for your rate of descent. I might trim for the AOA or just a bit below that pitch and then work the stick manually making small adjustments to pitch in order to not get too slow or too high of a nose up angle as power changes are made. You still have to work the pitch, the trim is a bit too coarse to fly without adujustments like in some of the other aircraft. 

Sometimes I think it's considered bad form to not have the aircraft trimed off hands off all of the time and that isn't exactly true. On final I find myself having to hold a bit of nose down force (Non FFB) and making fine adjustments from that allowing the nose to rise slightly to get on AOA but still having that fine control with small stick movements. 

Many pilots like to fly with a little nose down trim, requiring a very light pull while hand flying. It’s a common technique during formation flight to get rid of the deadband around the neutral point in pitch.

It’s difficult to convey how one of these jets handles, but they require constant, coordinated trim, power and control inputs. You are never not “flying” the aircraft, especially in pitch. Throw in things like cg changes with fuel burn, coupled with normal atmospheric conditions of realistic turbulence and shear interactions, and no one would be worried about being unable to achieve hands off trim.

[markturner1960]

Confirming what you guys are saying, the manual says fly it fast around the turn then only worry about getting on speed on final. I think this is the way! More practice now! Great discussion, thanks!

[G.J.S]

I’ve been thinking on this for a little while now, with some of the issues some are having.
If @IronMike may be able to say, does this iteration of F-4 have BLC?, if so then this may have a bearing on some people having trouble landing, and it would likely be when retarding the throttle somewhat on the approach - BLC cuts out, causing a rapid drop in altitude when it’s not required. 
I believe that all USAF model ‘E’ had BLC up to around Block 50, but may be wrong.

BLC drop was a thing on FGR.2, can’t see why the ‘E’ would differ?

[Raven (Elysian Angel)]

2 hours ago, G.J.S said:

does this iteration of F-4 have BLC?

As far I as understand, yes it does.

*edit* I stand corrected, thanks Victory!

Edited June 1, 2024 by Raven (Elysian Angel)

[Victory205]

Our F-4E doesn’t have BLC. 

[Kalasnkova74]

1 hour ago, Victory205 said:

Our F-4E doesn’t have BLC. 

Correct.

1 hour ago, G.J.S said:

I’ve been thinking on this for a little while now, with some of the issues some are having.
If @IronMike may be able to say, does this iteration of F-4 have BLC?, if so then this may have a bearing on some people having trouble landing, and it would likely be when retarding the throttle somewhat on the approach - BLC cuts out, causing a rapid drop in altitude when it’s not required. 
I believe that all USAF model ‘E’ had BLC up to around Block 50, but may be wrong.

BLC drop was a thing on FGR.2, can’t see why the ‘E’ would differ?

They did, until they didn’t. 
Background: the US Navy F-4 Phantom IIs used a boundary layer control system that blew air over the leading edge wing slats. Much like the F-104, this system used compressor bleed air to enhance low speed control of the aircraft. 
 

 

Land based F-4Es retained this system upon introduction in the late 1960s. Because of this, certain F-4E manuals still reference this system. 


 

In 1972, a project researching wing slats for the in-development F-15 yielded benefits for the F-4. Thus, the “Agile Eagle” wing slats project was applied to the Phantom II. Starting in 1972, leading edge slats were fitted to improve low speed handling: this change addressed USAF issues with bomb-laden F-4s entering buffet and spins once they turned to drop ordnance.  The leading edge slat system replaced the boundary layer control system.

The leading edge slats are essentially “standard equipment” on F-4Es now, including the version produced for DCS. Different operators converted to slat wings at different timescales as early block F-4Es (before block 48 IIRC) were pulled in and retrofitted for slats. The Japanese Air Self Defense Force reviewed conversion and opted to decline slat wing upgrades, so their F-4Es were the last fleet to retain the boundary layer wing. 

[cellinsky]

Coming from the Mig 21 and the warbirds, I had not one bad landing until now. F4 is very similar in behavior to me when it comes to landings. I keep the power up to keep sinkrate low or even nil on final turn. Airspeed around 200 Knots regardless of weight or configuration. Then I keep my eyes on the threshold the whole way down. I work the throttle and AoA and keep the power up as needed to prevent excessiv sinkrate. I clearly see or allmost feel in ths bird when Im sinking to much. Over the runaway i dont chop the throttle before the maingear touches the runaway. Chute out and noseweehl down. I never fly the tone or any numbers. Works for me.

Edited June 1, 2024 by cellinsky

[Convoy]

Flying the Tomcat 95% of the time during my DCS career. The Phantom was some getting used to. I did about 15 touch and go's tonight, and made a bit of a breakthrough. Instead of setting trim and riding it down to the ground like you would the Tomcat, the earlier advice of setting trim a bit lower, and hand flying it onto the runway worked wonders for me. I set trim to 15 units,flying 180 kts on the downwind, rolled into the groove with the rudders and used pitch to control my AOA made Jester VERY happy. Got a lot of nice compliments. Thank you very much for the advice guys. 

[Raisuli]

On 5/30/2024 at 11:51 AM, Kalasnkova74 said:

Yup, starting with Jester. 

On that note, has anyone got him to actively compliment their landings? Best I’ve managed is silence. 

I've heard every snarky comment for bad landings a few times.  Once, quite by accident, I got "Text book landing!  Nice!".

[raven80]

On 5/30/2024 at 7:51 PM, Kalasnkova74 said:

Yup, starting with Jester. 

On that note, has anyone got him to actively compliment their landings? Best I’ve managed is silence. 

So far his best coomnent about my landigs was "we were bad asses and now we are hard asses" or something like that...

 

[Raisuli]

1 hour ago, raven80 said:

So far his best coomnent about my landigs was "we were bad asses and now we are hard asses" or something like that...

 

He did say he's 'lost that lovin' feeling...forever' after what I thought was a reasonable landing.  The secret seems to be keeping your foot on the gas until the wheels are centimeters from pavement.  I've gotten spoiled by things that fly on their own and cut power way, way too soon.  I've gotten a 'nice landing' or something like that and a couple other compliments since I started flying it right to the ground.  Am I doing it 'right'?  Probably not.

It's a beast.  I like it.  Might even get used to Jester some day.

[=475FG= Dawger]

2 hours ago, Raisuli said:

He did say he's 'lost that lovin' feeling...forever' after what I thought was a reasonable landing.  The secret seems to be keeping your foot on the gas until the wheels are centimeters from pavement.  I've gotten spoiled by things that fly on their own and cut power way, way too soon.  I've gotten a 'nice landing' or something like that and a couple other compliments since I started flying it right to the ground.  Am I doing it 'right'?  Probably not.

It's a beast.  I like it.  Might even get used to Jester some day.

As the old saw goes, it’s a great landing if you can use the airplane again. 

In DCS, a good landing will suffice unless you want to rearm and refuel instead of respawn  

 

[Raisuli]

7 hours ago, =475FG= Dawger said:

As the old saw goes, it’s a great landing if you can use the airplane again. 

In DCS, a good landing will suffice unless you want to rearm and refuel instead of respawn  

 

I just got accused of making out with concrete.  "Man, you just kissed the runway!  Nice!".  As mush as Jester is annoying that was oddly satisfying at the same time.

That and apparently my landings are improving.  Strangely it seems practice helps...