Proper procedures for Main Gear Landing?

[Tailgate]

I've got the 3 point landing down to a passable level but I'm looking for procedures to land on the main gears and slowly drop the tail.. Flap settings, attitude, sink rate, speed reduction, and trim. I've bounced (porpoised) on almost every attempt and it rarely ends well for the AC. Any help would be appreciated.

Edited September 9, 2012 by Tailgate

[Double_D]

I've got the 3 point landing down to a passable level but I'm looking for procedures to land on the main gears and slowly drop the tail.. Flap settings, attitude, sink rate, speed reduction, and trim. I've bounced (porpoised) on almost every attempt and it rarely ends well for the AC. Any help would be appreciated.

 

 

As I come in, I start to nose up abit..gives a slower rate of decent..also...:thumbup:

[Weta43]

Personally - 30 degrees flaps, come in a bit faster than for a 3 wheeler ~ 130 mph or even a bit faster, fly it gently onto the ground and be prepared to give it a little bit of forward stick to hold it on the ground as the struts start to rebound.

Once you're on the ground back the power off and hold the tail up till below 100 mph...

 

If you want a bad habit cheat till you get the hang of it, put about 15% brakes on as you land prior to the wheels touching (apparenty a very bad habit IRL).

[Double_D]

[Tailgate]

Nice landing Air Wolf. I'm trying to do something different though, a wheel landing where I'm cruising down the runway on the mains keeping the tail up as long as possible. It's a real knife edge, too much forward stick and I prang the prop and not enough forward pressure will cause me to float and I usually end up in a 3 pointer. It's definitely a challenge for me.

[Tailgate]

Ok, this is one of my better attempts at a wheels landing, I've named it Bronco Billy, lol. Still got a long way to go.

 

 

8qaXR5ucrQ0

[Weta43]

Basically you have to practice, practice, practice..

 

Don't try landing at first - try coming in at 150mph and just slowly descending onto the runway at that speed till you can judge when you're about to touch down & can run along on two wheels at that speed, then lift back into the air - if you've got room do it multiple times as you go down the runway.

 

I guess there are dozens of vids of people doing wheelie landings on Youtube, and I don't know if videos will help - but here's one I made very early on in testing - there are graphical issues & other things but there's a flat landing at the end. You can skip to 5 minutes in to see the landing.

 

(was private but I guess it will play here...)

 

 

UULyDc8AiZ8

Edited September 10, 2012 by Weta43

[ICDO]

One of the mistakes I notice many people do is to lower the flaps before the gear. In the P51D and other WWII era warbirds the POH recommends that the gear should be lowered prior to the flaps. The flaps should only be used when you turn in for finals.

 

Gear and flaps cause massive drag and to compensate you need to run much more power. If you are landing with flaps and gear down from too far out then you will need a lot of power to keep speed up. You end up landing with too much power and that brings its own problems in the DCS P51.

 

Just an FYI :)

[ICDO]

Really:doh:

 

Then this pilot was wrong:doh:

Around .48 seconds you see him landing with flaps down..

 

And at 2.30 this must be wrong also...

 

LOL, read what I said, I didn't say not to use flaps on landing, that would be idiotic. I said so many people get the basic procedures wrong, they lower the flaps first, usually long before turning onto finals then they lower the gear. The P-51D POH recommends that the gear should be lowered 1st prior to turning on to finals, then the flaps are lowered when you are turning onto finals or have turned onto finals.

 

Landing flaps on the P-51 cause a lot of drag and if you lower them too far out you WILL need excess power to keep your landing speed manageable. If you are behind the power curve, low and slow with lots of power required just to stay in the air you are doing it wrong. It is not a good state to be in if you need to go around for some reason, or even worse if your engine quits.

 

I only brought this up because many of the images and videos shown of DCS P-51D landings show the full landing flaps long before the gear is lowered.

[VH-Rock]

Indeed, I always do gear first and then lower the flaps as you turn from base to final :)

[Tailgate]

Basically you have to practice, practice, practice..

 

Don't try landing at first - try coming in at 150mph and just slowly descending onto the runway at that speed till you can judge when you're about to touch down & can run along on two wheels at that speed, then lift back into the air - if you've got room do it multiple times as you go down the runway.

 

I guess there are dozens of vids of people doing wheelie landings on Youtube, and I don't know if videos will help - but here's one I made very early on in testing - there are graphical issues & other things but there's a flat landing at the end. You can skip to 5 minutes in to see the landing.

 

(was private but I guess it will play here...)

 

 

Now that's what I'm talking about. You make it look so easy. :) I think with practice I can dial it in but would you be able to post a track at some point? I'd like to see what's going on in the cockpit.

Edited September 9, 2012 by Tailgate

[Double_D]

LOL, read what I said, I didn't say not to use flaps on landing, that would be idiotic. I said so many people get the basic procedures wrong, they lower the flaps first, usually long before turning onto finals then they lower the gear. The P-51D POH recommends that the gear should be lowered 1st prior to turning on to finals, then the flaps are lowered when you are turning onto finals or have turned onto finals.

 

Landing flaps on the P-51 cause a lot of drag and if you lower them too far out you WILL need excess power to keep your landing speed manageable. If you are behind the power curve, low and slow with lots of power required just to stay in the air you are doing it wrong. It is not a good state to be in if you need to go around for some reason, or even worse if your engine quits.

 

I only brought this up because many of the images and videos shown of DCS P-51D landings show the full landing flaps long before the gear is lowered.

 

Just couldn't find any script on procedure's....but a very good friend of mine..here..pointed out the err's of my way..so you are correct sir!

 

My bad...:music_whistling:

[ICDO]

I think it is great that sims like DCS P-51D Mustang put us in a position where we have to use the proper procedures. Hopefully they will integrate the proper engine operations as well.

 

Here is the POH for the P-51D. It should help a lot with the operation of your P-51D. :)

 

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/43693296/P-51%20POH.pdf

 

Make sure to "right click" and "save as" to download.

[Tailgate]

Interesting, the manual suggests that 3 point landings are the norm and wheel landings are used only in adverse weather. It doesn't even go into any detail about wheel landings. It sounds like they are more for Airshows than SOP. Unfortunately the manual wasn't very helpful in that regard. On the other hand, the landing errors section is very helpful and the cause and effect of bouncing and ballooning describes my wheel landings accurately.

Edited September 9, 2012 by Tailgate

[ICDO]

Yes the 3 point landing was the recommended technique for tail draggers. Since you had the stick slightly back when landing the P-51D in a 3 point attitude it meant the tail wheel lock was already. This helped reduce the tendency for the aircraft to yaw or ground loop on the landing run.

 

As the POH suggests the main wheel 2 point landing was only recommended for increased visibility in adverse weather. My own experience in DCS is that 3 pointing is easier than 2 pointing because the plane settles easier and doesn't bounce as much.

Edited September 9, 2012 by ICDO

[Weta43]

3 point is much easier...

 

I'm running a different version to you (so if I make a track it might not play so well), & supposed to be testing :-) but I'll see if I can find a minute to make one - might be a couple of days though - by which time you'll have it nailed :)

Edited September 9, 2012 by Weta43

[Yo-Yo]

I've got the 3 point landing down to a passable level but I'm looking for procedures to land on the main gears and slowly drop the tail.. Flap settings, attitude, sink rate, speed reduction, and trim. I've bounced (porpoised) on almost every attempt and it rarely ends well for the AC. Any help would be appreciated.

This is the technics that can help at first. Then you can vary it a little.

Gear down, flaps full.

Steady approach at 130 mph, after a first flaring you must have not more 100 fpm. Then will be the key part of successful landing: you must push the stick a little just after a touchdown or even few centimetres before it.

There are two ways to do it right: trained feel of altitude or you must watch the plane behaviour. Then it touches down you will see that it changes attitude itself. Push the stick to nail it to the ground.

 

Then as it rolls at two points hold the stick and slowly begin to reduce power. Watch the direction and keep it using rudder pedal as you do at TO. Hold the stick and pull it to lock the tailwheel only after the tail is on ground. Now you are home and dry.

[159th_Viper]

I'm trying to do something different though, a wheel landing where I'm cruising down the runway on the mains keeping the tail up as long as possible.

 

Something like this?

 

Ygx8r4ULRBA

[cichlidfan]

Something like this?

 

 

Showoff. :P

 

Actually, that looked more like flying really, really low for the first half. :D

[Weta43]

Something like this?

 

I think I snipped you a page ago :)

http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=1547725&postcount=7

[159th_Viper]

I think I snipped you a page ago :)

http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=1547725&postcount=7

 

 

Oops :doh:

 

I must really not post before my first coffee :D

[Tailgate]

This one's an improvement over my first try, slight bounce but I didn't balloon this time.

 

ud-rzsaDxWM

 

 

I think turning off the 4 m/s headwind helped this time and I think I was landing slow before. With wind off , the F2 view still shows I'm on the slow side at 110 at TD, while my AS indicator shows 130 at TD, not sure what the discrepancy is about. I'll have to test it further.

[159th_Viper]

Keep your descent rate equal to or above the following pic and you'll be fine, with no need to jam the stick forward to make her stick.

 

 

Any more and she'll bounce.

[Weta43]

OK - rushed off & made a track (& video of the landing)

Just took the first attempt, so it's not super flash & I was having trouble with the TIR, so there's a bit of messing around at the start...

 

As I said different version we're testing, so might not re-play OK, but :

 

3YXnH43D6c0

10-09-2012 P-51 landing.trk

Edited September 10, 2012 by Weta43
Vid embedded

[159th_Viper]

 

(A question for you - What do you wrap around a url to get the youtube vid into the frame ? if I use the embed option there I just get the text here ?)

 

 

 

Only use the numbers of the youtube url after the v= and then wrap that in youtube brackets.

 

Example as per your vid above (minus spaces):

 

[ youtube]3YXnH43D6c0[/ youtube]