Good Pilot/Bad Pilot

[Pulse 0]

Jumpers seem to get all worked up about the stall-horn going off. But that's just part of flying to a degree. If you're hearing a little 'beep' as we often do, it's got a loooonnng way to go before the actual stall.

Also, awhile back someone said a good pilot knows how to operate a GPS? If you ask me, a good pilot doesn't need the GPS.

"Any language where the unassuming word fly signifies an annoying insect, a means of travel, and a critical part of a gentleman's apparel is clearly asking to be mangled."

[LearningTOfly 0]

The reasoning behind the 'upwind wheel first' is...

A pilot who touches down with the upwind wheel first exhibits three things: (in no particular order) -a keen situational awareness; a firm understanding of aircraft control; and finally, proof that they are 'ahead' of the airplane- which is a very good thing.

...a lot of guys just plunk'er on and ride it out... it works most of the time, but it sure is ugly... ... ...In general, passive is not a good thing to be in an airplane.

[Erroll 49]

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The reasoning behind the 'upwind wheel first' is...

A pilot who touches down with the upwind wheel first exhibits three things: (in no particular order) -a keen situational awareness; a firm understanding of aircraft control; and finally, proof that they are 'ahead' of the airplane- which is a very good thing.

What are the benefits of touching down like that?

[udder 0]

I will comment saying that I am certain our pilot is a good pilot. Something about 15 000 hours that is very comforting. And the fact that I think he could put the caravan through the Red Bull Air Race course

"In one way or the other, I'm a bad brother. Word to the motherf**ker." Eazy-E

[DBCOOPER 1]

It means that the plane is being flown properly for the conditions.The upwind wing is lowered to counter the drift and the nose is held straight on centerline with the rudder.As the plane looses lift the wheels are aligned with the direction of travel.Its like landing a parachute in a crosswind.If done correctly you will plane out straight ahead vs drifting to the downwind side as you flare.

Replying to: Re: Stall On Jump Run Emergency Procedure? by billvon

If the plane is unrecoverable then exiting is a very very good idea.

[velvetjo 0]

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The reasoning behind the 'upwind wheel first' is...

A pilot who touches down with the upwind wheel first exhibits three things: (in no particular order) -a keen situational awareness; a firm understanding of aircraft control; and finally, proof that they are 'ahead' of the airplane- which is a very good thing.

What are the benefits of touching down like that?

Benefits include:

1 - Does not torque gear sideways if done properly. Landing with mains level in a crosswind will put side forces on the gear unless drift is timed perfectly to stop at the runway centerline (not likely for most of us mortals).

2 - Keeping the upwind gear low means that the upwind wing is low. Once the upwind wheel contacts, the crosswind will help get the downwind wheel down while pinning the upwind wheel to the runway. This reduces tire wear, eliminates most of the gear fatigue due to side forces, and reduces the chance of ground looping due to a gust. Gear level landings would neutralize this benefit, and upwind gear up landings would put you at a significant disadvantage.

3 - It's fun to ride a landing in on one wheel.
The effects are even more pronounced in tailwheel aircraft, which tend to be much more sensitive to the forces involved. This whole concept is pretty basic to crosswind landings, although some tricycle gear aircraft tolerate sloppy technique enough to make it matter less on the basis of any single landing. The cumulative effect of side forces on the gear will eventually cause problems though.

Lance

[billvon 2,395]

>What are the benefits of touching down like that?

When a plane flies in still air, the direction it points is the direction it goes. When there's a crosswind, the airplane's nose has to point slightly into the wind to keep a given course. In other words, the airplane is no longer facing the direction it's going - the nose is skewed slightly off its course. This is normal, and called crabbing.

When a small aircraft is on approach, and there's a crosswind, it crabs to maintain its course. (If it just pointed its nose directly at the runway, the crosswind would blow it off course.) Again, this is normal.

If that aircraft just landed like this, it would land going a little bit sideways. Some aircraft (like 747's) are designed to land like this - they have wheels that caster in the direction the plane is going, so they can effectively land going a little bit sideways. But light aircraft generally don't have castering wheels. To deal with this, pilots transition from a crab to a slip before touching the runway. A slip is a manuever where one wing is dropped but the plane does not turn; this is accomplished by opposite inputs with aileron and rudder. In a slip, the wing's lift pulls the aircraft in the direction the plane is banked, so if you bank into the wind, it will compensate for a crosswind.

Once the plane is in a slip, it can be landed going straight ahead. Since it's in a bank, one wheel (the upwind wheel) will touch down first. (That's why a 747 can't land like this; the outboard engine would drag on the ground if it banked during landing.)

Landing like this requires coordinated input of aileron (to bank the wing) rudder (to prevent the plane from turning) and elevator (to flare.) It's not hard to learn; I'm not a particulary experienced pilot, and that's how I land. If you don't transition to a slip before touching down, the tires will do some screeching/jittering as they try to absorb the sideways motion of the aircraft, and that's not good for the tires or the landing gear. In strong crosswinds you can actually ground loop (flip the plane) if you try to land in a crab.

BTW the reason the whole approach isn't flown in a slip is because it's annoying to fly that way, and it's quite inefficient. (That fact is used by pilots who find themselves too high on approach; a slip lets them lose altitude more quickly due to its inefficiency.)

[LearningTOfly 0]

...what they said...

Thanks guys


Blue skies

[billvon 2,395]

>Its like landing a parachute in a crosswind.If done correctly you will
>plane out straight ahead vs drifting to the downwind side as you flare.

I think landing a parachute in a crosswind is more like landing a 747 in a crosswind - the wing has to be level during the flare. You can't slip it. Indeed, good crosswind technique with a parachute involves _increasing_ the crab angle as you flare, so you're always into the wind. Doing that on a light aircraft would have you drifting onto taxiways.

[brianfry713 0]

Responding to some of the old posts:
FAR 91.17 Alcohol or drugs.
(a) No person may act or attempt to act as a crewmember of a civil aircraft—
(1) Within 8 hours after the consumption of any alcoholic beverage;
(2) While under the influence of alcohol;
(3) While using any drug that affects the person's faculties in any way contrary to safety; or
(4) While having an alcohol concentration of 0.04 or greater in a blood or breath specimen. Alcohol concentration means grams of alcohol per deciliter of blood or grams of alcohol per 210 liters of breath.

FAR Sec. 105.7 Use of alcohol and drugs
No person may conduct a parachute operation, and no pilot in command of an aircraft may allow a person to conduct a parachute operation from that aircraft, if that person is or appears to be under the influence of--
(a) Alcohol, or
(b) Any drug that affects that person's faculties in any way contrary to safety.


As long as the pilot didn't get drunk, they won't be at .04 BAC after 8 hours. Use one of those charts to figure out your BAC after 8 hours according to weight and how much you drank. A few beers the night before isn't going to affect most people the next day.

[kallend 1,623]

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Responding to some of the old posts:
FAR 91.17 Alcohol or drugs.
(a) No person may act or attempt to act as a crewmember of a civil aircraft—
(1) Within 8 hours after the consumption of any alcoholic beverage;
(2) While under the influence of alcohol;
(3) While using any drug that affects the person's faculties in any way contrary to safety; or
(4) While having an alcohol concentration of 0.04 or greater in a blood or breath specimen. Alcohol concentration means grams of alcohol per deciliter of blood or grams of alcohol per 210 liters of breath.

FAR Sec. 105.7 Use of alcohol and drugs
No person may conduct a parachute operation, and no pilot in command of an aircraft may allow a person to conduct a parachute operation from that aircraft, if that person is or appears to be under the influence of--
(a) Alcohol, or
(b) Any drug that affects that person's faculties in any way contrary to safety.


As long as the pilot didn't get drunk, they won't be at .04 BAC after 8 hours. Use one of those charts to figure out your BAC after 8 hours according to weight and how much you drank. A few beers the night before isn't going to affect most people the next day.

...But the eight-hour rule does not take into account the possible effects long after metabolization.
Hangover has indeed been shown to cause performance impairment in aviation tasks. A 1979 NTSB article reported that hangovers produced significant performance impairment for pilots: ". . . . Common but serious procedural errors were preset into a flight simulator. Pilots were then asked to perform standard checklists, an instrument takeoff, enroute flight, and approach and landing. Each pilot conducted three such flights: the first before any alcohol ingestion, the second after reaching BAC of 0.10 and third 14 hours later. The study found that 10 percent of the pilots failed to detect and correct at least one of the errors during the first flight. At BAC levels of .10, 89 percent of the pilots were unable to detect and correct all of the errors. In the 'hangover' condition, 68 percent of the pilots failed to make the appropriate correction. This study concluded that, even in ground-based simulators, the effects of hangover produced significant performance deterioration."6

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[Erroll 49]

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...what they said...

Thanks guys

I'm obviously not a pilot, hence the question. Thanks for the informative replies.