Charlie P.

One observation. Trainers have very weak and bendy gear - to absorb abuse. After a few splats the main gear is splayed out, the nose, with the spring & generally stiffer wire, less so. This gives the wing positive incedence when the wheels are touching. Enough so, quite often, that the plane has a tendency to want to lift off again. Take the time to set the plane on a table and make sure the wing has a bit of negative incedence, or the flat bottom of the wing is at least parallel with the table.

In the past I have rigged 12# pike leaders or weed trimmer line across my wire gear to stiffen them up.

aerowoof

there are a few things to do to lose altitude if you think tyou are going to overshoot on a dead stick.some s turns or a side slip.

opjose

Thanks, but I was looking for suggestions on dealing with the plane when it hits or is about to hit the weeds/grass.

Usually when I'm into the meadow, it's too late for "S" turns or to return to the runway.

I also cannot see the plane land. I just continue to fly it until I believe it has touched down.

Usually the only damage is to the gear, and the plane when the gear hits it.



A few people have suggested using nylon gear bolts.

When I've tried them I've been very concerned that they would not hold up to even normal landings.
When I attempt to tighten them down, they will strip or break quite easily.

da Rock

Nylon bolts work good, but they're like anything in our hobby, you have to develop a feel for them. Most of my 40 and 60 size airplanes have either 1/4-24s or 10-32s. If only two bolts hold the gear, then the big ones are used. If 3 or more bolts, then the "little ones".

I've never had one strip or break when tightening. That might be where the "feel" comes in. There is no value to tightening past about an eighth or quarter turn after they're snug. And if they strip or pop then, you got bad bolts.

The trick to using them is to drill and tap the plywood that was holding the blindnuts for the metal bolts. If the plywood isn't thick enough, glue in some basswood to get thickness.

The beauty of nylon is that they don't need lock washers and don't walk out if they get the least bit loose. They don't actually have any tendency to get loose like some metal ones do.

I use them for wing hold downs too. Beauty there is they aren't so easy to lose and they're so much easier to tighten and they're more than strong enough. They almost always fit the holes in the wings with a slight friction fit and that's good enough to keep them there in storage. And if they were to fall out, they'd be easy to find, even in tall grass.

bruce88123

Actually, that would be 1/4x20 screws, coarse thread is the standard plastic/nylon screw sold.
example:
http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin...?&I=LXE097&P=7

Jim Thomerson

The formula for greased landings on hard surface is to have the place where the rubber hits the runway at an angle of 15 degrees in front of vertical as measured from the CG. This is for tail draggers. For grass the wheels will need to be a little bit more forward or the airplane will tip over when it stops. For trike gear, have the nose sitting down a hair when at rest and have the rear wheels not far back of the CG. All the practice won't help much if your landing gear is in the wrong place.

opjose

So you don't advise screwing the nylon bolts into the blindnuts?

Thanks.

opjose

We were talking about holding the GEAR in place with nylon bolts, not the wings.

da Rock

I knock out the original blind nuts obviously. And threading the wood to take whatever nylon size I think suits the gear has so many positives that I don't bother using metal blind nuts for those nylon bolts.

Threading the wood is extremely easy. It's more than adequately strong. It grips the nylon bolts perfectly. There is no additional weight. Matter of fact, since I am replacing metal bolts and metal nuts with a couple of nylon bolts, there is a weight savings.

I also retrofit the wing bolts with nylon for all those reasons as well as a couple more. And don't use blind nuts there either. And nylon wing bolts are so much easier to use than metal, it's no contest. I taper the ends of the wing bolts and they find their holes by themselves.

Which reminds me............. I've flown my newest plane enough to know it's a definite keeper. And all my keepers get the nylon wing bolt retrofit. And I got nothing to do tonight so......... Think I'll go down and give her better wing bolts. see ya.........

da Rock

Those would work for anything. They'd hold gear just as good if they were called something else. However, Lowes Home Improvement has good ones that have shorter heads that're cheaper. And work well for either gear or wings or anything.

bobzilla

My Feedback: (63)

This works well, except for the LongEZ canard plane! Which you want a slight up tilt..but then the carnard works completely backwards of a tail dragger..

aircruiser

I don't have enough time to read through this whole thread.

But here's what I do.

1/4 throttle until it is time to touchdown.

When you are about to touch down, cut throttle.

bruce88123

Same bolts can be used for both.

Charlie P.

All you can hope to do is bleed off as much airspeed as possible and fly it until it stops. That is, you're running out of airspeed and altitude so you have to keep the ideas coming. You seem to be obsessed with this grass field, and it may be that you are focusing on that and not other alternatives. Seriously, think outside the grass field.

Depends a lot on the model, too. Some snap to the side suddenly when stalled, others just nose down. If you have a draggy biplane or an overpowered brick, you're SOL. You have to keep up airspeed. The price you pay for usually flying on the prop and not the wings. Keep the gear up and try to lay the tailwheel in first. The tall grass will tend to flip you, so give full up elevator at the moment of "impact". For a light wing loaded plane try to stall it just as the weeds grab it. Bring it in as shallow as possible and ride the elevator as long as you can stretch it. "Crabbng" is a good trick, too (side-slipping, as mentioned earlier). Give it rudder and correct with opposite aileron to keep her level. This is very hard to judge and do unless the model is coming at you or going away from you (at least for me). It brings you in steaper from the added drags on the control surfaces.

Avoid corn. Cornstalks are tougher than balsa (watched a 1/4 scale SBJ disintegrate when it hit a wall of corn). Full sized planes avoid corn when ditching.

Practice deadsticks in ideal conditions. Kill the throttle when lined up but high at the end of the runway and use a little rudder to spiral gently down, then bring her in. Only way to learn how your plane handles without power is to fly it without power.

opjose

Lol... it's a square shaped field, so you are telling me to think outside the box...


Yeah my Funtana "floats" in. My problem is that when it plane crests the edge of the field I have NO VIEW of it, so I just hold up elevator, tying to maintain the same glide slope.

If I could see it, I could do exactly as you've stated and let it stall just over the grass, and LET it flip over, which would not rip out the gear.


Hmmm... I wonder if this may slow it down enough to avoid gear damage. A little less forward velocity is all that I need.


At this point I'm a dead stick "expert".

Last week I deadsticked an Ultimate w/o Aileron controls as well from quite a distance out.

My only problem is that adjacent field that I cannot see into which is why I obsess over it.

Once a plane disappears I'm literally flying blind.

Charlie P.

Well, we're down to:

1.) adding a bigger fuel tank or a timer on your radio/wrist.

b.) standing on a ladder or picnic table so you can see where it lands.

III.) tuning up the engine well enough so it doesn't konk out.

four.) filling in the low spot so it is level with the rest of the field.

funf.) fly where you don't have to land in the grass spots if the engine konks.

Jim Thomerson

I have had control line airplanes for which my best landing technique was to shut my eyes when the airplane got down to about three feet off the ground.

opjose

Well that WOULD solve my problem with this one plane...

#$%&(@ Evolution 2 stroke engines.....

da Rock

Get PCM radio equipment, set the failsafe options, and when the airplane is out of sight, turn off the radio. OR............

Do what a lot of us do. When you see that you're not in a position to land the airplane where you can see it land, setup the attitude you want it to land in and hold that as long as you feel necessary after it goes out of sight. We fly over corn for a lot of the summer and that works. You almost never see the landing when it's out in the corn because the corn near the field is taller than we are.

da Rock

BTW, we got a couple of experts who ignore the fact that almost every airplane that goes down in the corn is unhurt, no matter how it goes in, and who've attempted to put their off field dead sticks down into the farmroad that's out there through the corn. A couple of times they've succeeded. They've always damaged their airplanes enough that the flying day was ended for that airplane that day. Once I know of, one of them missed the road and caught the corn. No damage at all. And later that day he successfully landed in the road. And took the airplane home to repair.

Liberator

The ears a pretty rough on ya as well.