Student Landings

[iamgregh]

Hello all, I am a Student Pilot at about 50 hours here ready to do my Night XC and then move on to my Stage II check and then Solo XC.
I am flying the Liberty XL-2 that is owned by the USAF Aero Club here in Okinawa Japan. I love this plane!
But when landing I am having some issues of rudder control in a crosswind, for example when I am on final and just about to flare I feel like I need to step on the left rudder to get the airplane straight, but my Instructor is always telling me "Right Rudder, Right Rudder" and of course he is usually correct. I am not sure what I am doing wrong that my perspective is skewed to "think" I need left rudder. I have many landing under my belt at this point but this I feel like I don't know what I am doing wrong at this point. Any tips would be appreciated.

 

[Jeanie]

Parallax causes trouble with the perceived straightness of the plane. Next time you are sitting in the plane look from your centerline to the glare shield to the edge of the cowling and make a note of the rivets/screws that are right in front of you and use that extended view to know what's straight. Folks often look at the spinner and make incorrect adjustments because of that.

Also, remember your slow flight practice? More right rudder needed... That's the landing situation too unless the wind is from the right.

Just look out front and see what's correct. Fly over the rwy. Have the CFI do the throttle and yoke you practice rudder work with large changes decreasing to smaller ones till he tells you your straight.

 

[asechrest]

You may be thinking too much about the process, instead of the desired result. You want the longitudinal axis of the airplane to be aligned with your direction of flight/rollout. When landing, your best indicator that a correction is needed is the orientation of the nose.

So step one, make sure you know which side of the rudder to step on to make the nose do what you want. If the nose is angling left, you step on the right rudder. And vice versa. Drill this into your brain. You can do this while chair flying.

Step two, when you're landing, make the nose of the plane do what you want it to do. Keep your feet active on the rudder pedals and ready to correct.

I tend to get tunnel vision when learning something new in the airplane. I'll focus on the process instead of the desired result. Inevitably, when I'm finally successful at doing the thing I've learned, I'm no longer thinking about the process, but simply making the airplane do what I want.

 

[saracelica]

XL2 is a tough airplane to land. Our flying club use to have one but it was designated only for certificated pilots. I think it has alot more float then a Warrior/Cessna has. (I know not helpful)

 

[iamgregh]

Thank you for all the helpfull replies, I think Jeanie and asechrest nailed it on the head, and have given me some good things to focus on. and saracelica you are right about the XL-2, however all my hours are in this bird and I am feeling pretty good about it though the learning curve was steep, and still learning obviously We actually have two of Liberty's in the club and a couple 172's too.

 

[eetrojan]

Hello all, I am a Student Pilot at about 50 hours here ready to do my Night XC and then move on to my Stage II check and then Solo XC.
I am flying the Liberty XL-2 that is owned by the USAF Aero Club here in Okinawa Japan. I love this plane!
But when landing I am having some issues of rudder control in a crosswind, for example when I am on final and just about to flare I feel like I need to step on the left rudder to get the airplane straight, but my Instructor is always telling me "Right Rudder, Right Rudder" and of course he is usually correct. I am not sure what I am doing wrong that my perspective is skewed to "think" I need left rudder. I have many landing under my belt at this point but this I feel like I don't know what I am doing wrong at this point. Any tips would be appreciated.

Hi. I’m a student that is right about where you are and I have also been having some rudder control issues.

I was doing great with soft field takeoffs when, after taking a week off, I found myself yawing the plane WAY over to the right before the mains lift. I believe this starts because I am prematurely applying too much right rudder when the nose wheel first lifts and the plane yaws a little bit nose right. At that point, of course, I should simply apply a little left rudder (or at least a little less right rudder), to steer the nose back to the left.

However, when I’m under stress, I have this little brain freeze. This reptilian part of my brain switches into what I call “shopping cart mode.” I believe that I react to the nose right situation, when under stress, by pressing on the right rudder to push it back to the left, as if I were steering a shopping cart down the aisle. Of course, that results in even more right yaw and a freaked out instructor.

Instead of fixing it, I make it worse.

I think I beat this out of my head. Perhaps you share this mental issue, or perhaps I’m just a freak.

If so, eliminate the shopping cart mode from your thought process.

 

[ScottK]

Hello all, I am a Student Pilot at about 50 hours here ready to do my Night XC and then move on to my Stage II check and then Solo XC.
I am flying the Liberty XL-2 that is owned by the USAF Aero Club here in Okinawa Japan. I love this plane!
But when landing I am having some issues of rudder control in a crosswind, for example when I am on final and just about to flare I feel like I need to step on the left rudder to get the airplane straight, but my Instructor is always telling me "Right Rudder, Right Rudder" and of course he is usually correct. I am not sure what I am doing wrong that my perspective is skewed to "think" I need left rudder. I have many landing under my belt at this point but this I feel like I don't know what I am doing wrong at this point. Any tips would be appreciated.

I was having the same problem after switching planes during training. I would think I was straight, but I would land with the nose just a bit to the left all the time. After a particularly bad day of landings, I went out the next morning before my lesson and pulled the plane out on the ramp. I lined up the nose with the edge of the hangar across from me. Then I sat in the plane and realized my sight line was off. For the plane to be straight, I had to see the nose just slightly right of twelve o clock. We went out that day and I had some of the best landings to that point.

Good luck! And don't worry about it, you'll get it. Just keep working at it.

 

[MAKG1]

Good idea.

Something I liked to do to when I was in training was to pull the plane out onto the taxiway centerline, and line it up carefully using the towbar. Then get in the plane and see what the sight picture looked like. In a similar vein, I made it a game at the end of a lesson (solo or dual) to try to shut the engine down with the nosegear directly on the centerline stripe. The skill is quite similar to what you do with landing. It only really works on a straight taxiway, and it works best if your sightlines are far away.

It meant a lot of pushing around, but it helped quite a bit.

 

[zaitcev]

Some airplanes with curving plastic cowls create deceptive centerline picture, so one must use whatever is available inside. In CTLS, it is the line between the rudder pedals. In GX with small pre-Skyview Dynon, the left inside edge of the screen is the centerline.

 

[ferrari-tech]

I had the exact same problem with the rudder control on landing (Flying a C172).
I was using the rudder correctly right up to the flare point and then backing off. It took me a while to figure what I was doing wrong, but basically I was treating the rudder control like aileron control, ie turn to roll into the turn but then relax to neutral to maintain. so with the rudder what would happen is the nose would be straight and then I would relax the rudder to neutral and the plane would yaw or drift.
My instructor told me that once I have the nose straight with the center line and direction of travel, to keep my feet where they are, and just make small adjustments from there as needed. He described it as locking the rudder pedals once straight. Worked like a charm, of course my feet are still moving like an Irish tap dancer but we are staying straight all the way down. You will get it and it will feel magic.