Carrier landings

[GTFreeFlyer]

8 hours ago, Thundersmoke said:

I’ve soaked up a lot of your shared knowledge as I’ve gone through the Mustang, Thunderbolt, Spitfire, and now the Corsair throughout my warbird journey this year.  
 

But this advice had such an immediate and dramatically positive impact on my Corsair approaches I just wanted to reach out and say thanks.   This very much makes it feel like a proper analogue of a Tomcat where you can semi-maintain on-speed AoA, albeit with some additional wiggles and wobbles.

But dispensing with the attempt of dipping the nose and flaring, etc. has stopped me from bouncing over the wires and made good traps very reliable.
 

Cheers and thanks!

Love this.  Cheers!

[DrDetroit]

10 hours ago, GTFreeFlyer said:

Love this.  Cheers!

 

Yes, your instruction really helped me as well.  Now I'm consistently landing on the deck, almost never boltering. 

Thanks for taking the time to write it all out for us!

Good day!

DrDetroit

[_Hoss]

On 8/4/2025 at 12:11 PM, GTFreeFlyer said:

Gear and flaps fully down, trim to 10 deg elevator pitch on the downwind.  That should put you right at 90-100 knots.  Maintain climb rate with throttle. Your goal is to touch the elevator stick almost never.  Throttle inputs all the way down to the deck.  At 90 knots your plane is at the right attitude to catch a wire.  No flare needed.  I’ve watched the same training videos as you where it talks about dropping the nose and then flaring.  This approach is dangerous unless you are quick to act on the rudder pedals.  I never use this technique.  I just fly it down at a stable 90 knots until hitting the deck and it works great.  Correct technique or not, I would have to assume that the real pilots only cared about the end result… “Did I catch that wire?”

10⁰ down or up trim.... lol