alfadog
Final Approach
Mention of Stick and Rudder in another thread made me think of this:
Recently, I found my old copy of Stick and Rudder (given to me in 1977) and started reading it. I skipped around a bit but was drawn to the chapter on landing. Much of it relates to conventional gear aircraft although Langewiesche also discusses those new-fangled nosewheel jobs which, BTW, he approves of.
Anyway, what I found especially interesting was his discussion of the wheel landing. My tw instructor, whom I greatly benefited from in other areas, was very weak on teaching wheel landings and we did very few of them. So I was left to figure it out on my own, which I tackled with gusto
And I got pretty OK at them but my technique was tentative. Langewiesche recommends a much more assertive wheel landing. He wants you to pick a spot, drive the airplane down on that spot and don't be shy with the forward stick.
So last weekend I went over to X51 with the Luscombe and worked on that with a nice 12G15 direct crosswind on 9/27 turf. Worked out pretty well, too. I put it down on the upwind wheel with a degree of firmness I had not used before and held it down with forward stick, eventually letting the downwind wheel and the tail come down.
But I was using a fair bit of runway with the extra speed of the wheel landing and lack of headwind so braking practice was in order. Down on one wheel, second main wheel down, now work the heels over the brakes without screwing up the rudder control too badly, brake fairly hard while working the stick to keep the ship level (gotta call her a "ship" now - LOL).
Lots of fun
Recently, I found my old copy of Stick and Rudder (given to me in 1977) and started reading it. I skipped around a bit but was drawn to the chapter on landing. Much of it relates to conventional gear aircraft although Langewiesche also discusses those new-fangled nosewheel jobs which, BTW, he approves of.
Anyway, what I found especially interesting was his discussion of the wheel landing. My tw instructor, whom I greatly benefited from in other areas, was very weak on teaching wheel landings and we did very few of them. So I was left to figure it out on my own, which I tackled with gusto
And I got pretty OK at them but my technique was tentative. Langewiesche recommends a much more assertive wheel landing. He wants you to pick a spot, drive the airplane down on that spot and don't be shy with the forward stick.
So last weekend I went over to X51 with the Luscombe and worked on that with a nice 12G15 direct crosswind on 9/27 turf. Worked out pretty well, too. I put it down on the upwind wheel with a degree of firmness I had not used before and held it down with forward stick, eventually letting the downwind wheel and the tail come down.
But I was using a fair bit of runway with the extra speed of the wheel landing and lack of headwind so braking practice was in order. Down on one wheel, second main wheel down, now work the heels over the brakes without screwing up the rudder control too badly, brake fairly hard while working the stick to keep the ship level (gotta call her a "ship" now - LOL).
Lots of fun
Last edited: