Tailwheel training books, videos.

RalphInCA

RalphInCA

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RalphInCA
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I have just begun training in our flying clubs new CubCrafters Sport Cub S2.

Any suggestions on books or videos I can get to help with the training?
 
You won't learn a lot from a book. If you have a good instructor fly with him more than just getting the endorsement. Once you get your sign off go fly on those days with a good gusty crosswind with the instructor at first and then practice on days like that. After you have a few more hours under your belt get a couple of hours flying from the back seat with an instructor of course. That will really teach you how to use your senses to fly the airplane. Don
 
yakdriver said:
You won't learn a lot from a book. If you have a good instructor fly with him more than just getting the endorsement. Once you get your sign off go fly on those days with a good gusty crosswind with the instructor at first and then practice on days like that. After you have a few more hours under your belt get a couple of hours flying from the back seat with an instructor of course. That will really teach you how to use your senses to fly the airplane. Don
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Very true. Can't learn to fly from a book. Got to fly.

But, when I cannot fly I like to have something I can read. Or watch.
 
Think of it as soloing all over again.


I learned from scratch in a taildragger, only have owned taildraggers and given a ton of dual ab initio (first solo - CPL) in taildraggers, never used any books or videos for myself or my students.

This is one thing where the comfort level and proficiency is VERY tied to your CFI, a inexperienced CFI can wing it and still turn out a good 172/PA28/SR22/diamond pilot, NOT so in tailwheel. Issue is quite a few lower tailwheel time and hobby tailwheel CFIs out there.




Few tips.

Taxi on a large ramp, including a low speed ground loop, so you know what it feels like and more importantly know what it feels like leading up to it in a safe setting.

Stalls, power on, off, falling leaf and spins, power on and off, induce and recover on a heading.

Keep your back relaxed, you should be able to feel if the plane is coordinated without staring at a ball.


Start off with low passes letting the mains get lower and lower till your mains are inches off the runway, soon they will starting to chirp, add power to get them back off the deck, chirp, add power, etc, keep your eyes on the infinity point (a good CFI will know the second you don't).

Once you can chirp them a few time down the runway, with good directional control, pull the power and do your first two point, keep flying the plane to that infinity point, and once the tail wants to come down let it down, KEEP FLYING TO THE INFINITY POINT, the ride ain't over yet.

DO NOT, "put the stick forward", just keep flying to the infinity point, may seem like the same action, but it's a VERY diffrent thought process.

DO NOT, "dance on the rudder", have "happy feet" or anything of that horse chit, the smaller rudder movements you NEED to make the more you're becoming one with the plane, remember every action has a equal or greater reaction, put in lots of right rudder and you're going to end up needing lots of left rudder, rinse and repeat.

Stay off the damn brakes

Three points are taught after 2 points, 2 points teach you where your airplanes legs are.

The approach speed of a 2 point and a three point are exactly the same.

Now start learning 3 points, don't slam the tailwheel, just got to remember the sight picture for ground ops.

Now start working on precision landings, put her on the piano keys every time, on short final your CFI should be telling you 2 or 3 point, this shouldn't make a difference to you now.

Now power off 2 and 3 points.

Now cross winds

Now tail wind landings.

Now short fields, you graduated to being allowed to touch the brakes.


The ideal landing for most is a tail low 2 point.

NEVER try to hold the tail up longer than it wants to stay up.

Did I mention EYES AT THE INFINITY POINT!



Since you're flying a backcountry plane, get 70 or so hours under your belt and then hook up with a good backcountry pilot and or CFI and start learning about stuff like the MAF landing, low level survey, dragging a potiential landing spot, start working on your backcountry work and progress SLOWLY to the more sporty stuff.


Enjoy.
 
James331 said:
Think of it as soloing all over again.


I learned from scratch in a taildragger, only have owned taildraggers and given a ton of dual ab initio (first solo - CPL) in taildraggers, never used any books or videos for myself or my students.

This is one thing where the comfort level and proficiency is VERY tied to your CFI, a inexperienced CFI can wing it and still turn out a good 172/PA28/SR22/diamond pilot, NOT so in tailwheel. Issue is quite a few lower tailwheel time and hobby tailwheel CFIs out there.




Few tips.

Taxi on a large ramp, including a low speed ground loop, so you know what it feels like and more importantly know what it feels like leading up to it in a safe setting.

Stalls, power on, off, falling leaf and spins, power on and off, induce and recover on a heading.

Keep your back relaxed, you should be able to feel if the plane is coordinated without staring at a ball.


Start off with low passes letting the mains get lower and lower till your mains are inches off the runway, soon they will starting to chirp, add power to get them back off the deck, chirp, add power, etc, keep your eyes on the infinity point (a good CFI will know the second you don't).

Once you can chirp them a few time down the runway, with good directional control, pull the power and do your first two point, keep flying the plane to that infinity point, and once the tail wants to come down let it down, KEEP FLYING TO THE INFINITY POINT, the ride ain't over yet.

DO NOT, "put the stick forward", just keep flying to the infinity point, may seem like the same action, but it's a VERY diffrent thought process.

DO NOT, "dance on the rudder", have "happy feet" or anything of that horse chit, the smaller rudder movements you NEED to make the more you're becoming one with the plane, remember every action has a equal or greater reaction, put in lots of right rudder and you're going to end up needing lots of left rudder, rinse and repeat.

Stay off the damn brakes

Three points are taught after 2 points, 2 points teach you where your airplanes legs are.

The approach speed of a 2 point and a three point are exactly the same.

Now start learning 3 points, don't slam the tailwheel, just got to remember the sight picture for ground ops.

Now start working on precision landings, put her on the piano keys every time, on short final your CFI should be telling you 2 or 3 point, this shouldn't make a difference to you now.

Now power off 2 and 3 points.

Now cross winds

Now tail wind landings.

Now short fields, you graduated to being allowed to touch the brakes.


The ideal landing for most is a tail low 2 point.

NEVER try to hold the tail up longer than it wants to stay up.

Did I mention EYES AT THE INFINITY POINT!



Since you're flying a backcountry plane, get 70 or so hours under your belt and then hook up with a good backcountry pilot and or CFI and start learning about stuff like the MAF landing, low level survey, dragging a potiential landing spot, start working on your backcountry work and progress SLOWLY to the more sporty stuff.


Enjoy.
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Excellent. Thanks!

I'm going to print this out.

Chances are my instructor knows all this, he's been instructing in tailwheel for a very long time, but it will be a good reference.
 
dillardrg said:
Here is a handout I give my students;

http://www.advancedtailwheeltraining.com/tailwheel_basics
Click to expand...

This is how you teach folks?

Always moving the rudder to be "proactive"

FULL stall landings, as in fully stalling the plane in a 3 point?

2 point landings are not normal?

Power off 2 points have little/no place?

Adding forward pressure to "keep the wheels on the ground"?


What about sight picture?

Do you teach heavy taildraggers to land in a fully stalled 3 point?
 
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James331 said:
This is how you teach folks?

Always moving the rudder to be "proactive"

FULL stall landings, as in fully stalling the plane in a 3 point?

2 point landings are not normal?

Power off 2 points have little/no place?

Adding forward pressure to "keep the wheels on the ground"?


What about sight picture?

Do you teach heavy taildraggers to land in a fully stalled 3 point?
Click to expand...
Aside from the 'always moving the rudder' BS, it probably isn't terrible advice as long as you consider he is only training in a Citabria.
 
I am a high time tailwheel pilot in over 40 types. I am a three point guy although I do a lot of wheel landings just to keep in practice. If in a crosswind I almost always three point wing low on the upwind main and tailwheel. When learning it is good to be light on the rudder but not moving it it back and forth tailwagging. Power off wheel landings work well and over the fence speed is the same as a three point. The tail low wheelie works great and only requires a slight amount of forward pressure as the wheels touch holding it in the tail low attitude. As for sight picture looking down at the infinity point is pretty worthless in something like the N3N in my Avitar. I learned tailwheel in a Great Lakes so learned right off the bat to look out the sides and use peripheral vision to judge height and direction. Try looking out to infinity in the back seat of a T-6 with a new guy in front. The biggest thing to learn is how to feel what the airplane is doing or about to do so it only takes a slight correction to keep things straight. Ig you have to wait and see the nose swing before you correct you are behind the airplane. There are many ways to fly a tailwheel and some work better than others on different airplanes. To be well rounded you need to learn all of the tricks and you need an instructor that will take you out on the days when the wind is gusty and sh*tty. Don
 
Fearless Tower said:
Aside from the 'always moving the rudder' BS, it probably isn't terrible advice as long as you consider he is only training in a Citabria.
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Yeah, but it's still bad ground work to lay with someone.

Could you imagine fully stalling your 18 onto its tailwheel on landing?


yakdriver said:
I am a high time tailwheel pilot in over 40 types. I am a three point guy although I do a lot of wheel landings just to keep in practice. If in a crosswind I almost always three point wing low on the upwind main and tailwheel. When learning it is good to be light on the rudder but not moving it it back and forth tailwagging. Power off wheel landings work well and over the fence speed is the same as a three point. The tail low wheelie works great and only requires a slight amount of forward pressure as the wheels touch holding it in the tail low attitude. As for sight picture looking down at the infinity point is pretty worthless in something like the N3N in my Avitar. I learned tailwheel in a Great Lakes so learned right off the bat to look out the sides and use peripheral vision to judge height and direction. Try looking out to infinity in the back seat of a T-6 with a new guy in front. The biggest thing to learn is how to feel what the airplane is doing or about to do so it only takes a slight correction to keep things straight. Ig you have to wait and see the nose swing before you correct you are behind the airplane. There are many ways to fly a tailwheel and some work better than others on different airplanes. To be well rounded you need to learn all of the tricks and you need an instructor that will take you out on the days when the wind is gusty and sh*tty. Don
Click to expand...

Tail low wheelie for the win! I'd do it power off, energy management! Works great in nearly everything from a 7AC to a 185 to a AG Cat
 
I have about 900 hours of tailwheel time split between a 7KCAB Citabria, a Pitts S2A, and a Maule MX7-180C. Learning to fly a taildragger well takes time and they are less forgiving of flawed technique than their nose dragging cousins. I had some great pilots for instructors, but they were lousy teachers. I found mindless repetition of actions they dictated without fully understanding the "why" of the directions was not working for me. I needed both the technical understanding of the why combined with the maneuvering drills before I got the hang of things. The book "The Complete Taildragger" by Harvey Ploured helped a lot with the "why". If you have thorough and competent instructors that show you what to do and help you understand why you are doing it, you might not need reference books. I needed both to become safe and competent. Having learned both the how and the why, I am enjoying my third taildragger and I smile broadly each time I take to the skies. Now my favorite niche in the flying world is backcountry flying. Each time I take my Maule off the beaten path and land off airport, I'm glad I took the time to get a solid foundation in flying conventional gear aircraft. You should do what works best for you to get that solid grounding.
 
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Always keep the stick back? What about taxiing in a tailwind? As the tail is raised, the angle to the wind gets greater and there is MORE leverage. The idea that one should "ALWAYS have the stick BACK" and teaching it as a knee jerk reaction to the nose coming down is not a good idea. It depends. You have to think about what you are doing. "Keep it straight!". Thats a good one. I can still hear my instructor say "you can bounce it, you can come in fast, you can wheel it on, you can 3 point it, but whatever you do, KEEP IT STRAIGHT!" That was the last piece of advice he gave me. And it has served me well.
 
yakdriver said:
You won't learn a lot from a book. If you have a good instructor fly with him more than just getting the endorsement. Once you get your sign off go fly on those days with a good gusty crosswind with the instructor at first and then practice on days like that. After you have a few more hours under your belt get a couple of hours flying from the back seat with an instructor of course. That will really teach you how to use your senses to fly the airplane. Don
Click to expand...

+1. I read the books and watched the videos mentioned but nothing did the trick like 20 hours of dual with an excellent tailwheel instructor in all conditions. It didn't come easy to me and it took me a while to learn the control feel, sight picture and muscle memory I needed to land well consistently. But it was sure worth it in the end and I wish I would have done it 30 years ago!
 
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