35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

I have an older Carden kit that has the old style plug-in wings.
The plane weighs just less than 28lbs......I have a DA 100 on it....
The rudder servos and the elevator servos are all mounted in the back of the fuse next to the tail. I have "C.G." set to where it is just a tad nose heavy....Meaning it just starts to fall forward on "CG" machine....Balanced almost perfect.....My problem is this:
When coming in for a landing the approach looks fabulous. Slows down nice and easy. When it comes in nice and flat and when it just starts toget ready and touch down i feed a little up in it and it will balloon up....Then its in a complete stall....I power up and then land it that way....Usually not a good landing...bounces pretty hard.....My air speed appears to be fine....Also when coming i try slowing even farther down then it looks agin real good...then when it is about 3 ft off the ground it just falls out of the sky....Ive tried fast landings and slow....The "window" of opportunity is very small and it sucks....I was just wondering if this is just a typical cap ???? Some of my friends are saying that it is.....We also noticed at the Joe NAll fly-in that noone landed a cap in a 3 point landing...Tail first....Basically a complete stall....They wer all landing fairly fast....Is this the reason !??!??
I am totally confused on this airplane....I hate to get rid of this plane, but i will before I screw up big time....It flies fabulous.....3D's nice......flies inverted great....Nice knife edge loops....nice waterfalls......It just "SUCKS" landing the damn thing.....Any info will/is much appreciated...


THANKS


TIM ADAMS..

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Are you using any expo on the elevator? It kinda sounds to me like there is too much elevator travel even with a small amount od stick. Can you fly slow at say 10 feet and give a small amount of elevator without ballooning? (simulate a landing at 10 feet)

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

I AM RUNNING ALMOST 80% OF EXPONENTIAL....AND ON LOW RATES.....LOW RATE IS ABOUT 12-15 DEGREE ANGLES....HIGH RATE IS UP TO 30 DEGREES.....I USE LOW RATE ELEVATOR AND HIGH ON AIRLERONS....WHICH NEVER HAVE TO HARDLY USE AIRLERONS....IT COMES IN FLAT AS A BOARD......

THANKS...

TIM

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Try adding a little bit of spoileron on landing. The constant down pressure of the ailerons may well make it stick down

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Try a lot less expo. It sounds like when you add just that little extra up elevator, the expo is kicking in and the elevator deflects too far up. 30% expo would make the plane much easier to fly.

CAP landing technique
 

this sounds a lot like my Lanier Cap (28% scale). Elevator authority with this plane is huge (elevators are very big--bigger than an edge or extra) and its common to see final landing approaches get ruined by "ballooning" at the very end. I'd suggest the following:

1. I found that controlling descent on final with small "blips" of throttle was much more effective than using elevator. I got the same "ballooning" effect with my plane using just elevator inputs. If you have a triple rate capability on your transmitter, you might want to set up a smaller elevator throw just for landings.
2. you might want to experiment with expo----80% sounds like a lot to me. Most folks I know are using 20 to 30%. With the expo you're using, it might "mask" the initial inputs too much and deceive you into using more input than you really intended to use (and cause the ballooning).
3. I like the spoileron idea. Didn't try it on mine, wish I had (no longer have the plane).
4. might want to check your engine incidences. Don't know about the Carden recommendations, but most Cap pilots I know have got 1-2% downthrust in their set ups.

My observation is that this plane just lands faster than an Extra or Edge. I haven't seen anybody bring theirs in at a crawl pace--everybody seems to bring theirs in fairly quick. I really like the looks of the CAP in the air---and love the way it performs at cruise speeds. I've found landings are an adventure---no 2 seem to be alike.

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Its a Cap. They all drop there rear when you get real slow. This is why they 3-D so well. I've flown several different kinds and they all do it. If you have them tail heavy they are worse. You might want to try more nose weight. You don't have to have a tail heavy airplane to 3-d well. The Carden flys very well but it is hard to land. A down elevator mix with low throttle will help your problem also. I tried the flaperion trick and didn't like it. The down elevator mix will help your down lines from pulling out by them selfs also. A little Imac trick that has two purposes with the Cap. Hope this helps. Jason Danhakl
Team Futaba

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Interesting...

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Jason hit the nail on the head.Ballooning is very common for most Caps.Most likely it's a little tail heavy.The best way would be to take the rudder servos out from the tail & switch to a pull-pull.That should do it.A quik way to find out -just simply add some lead temporarily in front & see what happens.

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Now that everyone has placed their guesses, I can tell you the real answer. This particular plane is TAIL HEAVY. My buddy HT owned it and had the same problem. Had a DA-100 in the nose. Ballooned like crazy on landing. Added 3 lbs of steel to the nose. Plane then flew and landed great. If you don't like adding weight, put the rudder servos on pull-pull. But, you'll still need at least a pound of nose weight even with the servos moved forward.

Hey Ed, you beat me to the post. This was HT's Teal Cap.

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Make sure you only have the minimum elevator travel you need to just barely stall/snap the plane on low rates. If you aren't using half stick just to turn around the end of the field you probably want to reduce travel.

This is a "feature" of CAPs as far as I can tell. When I first flew mine (80" Lanier) it was tailheavy. It flew fine and did 3-d great - but I actually had to hold forward stick on final and flared by releasing elevator back to center. wierd!

After that, I added a pound of lead over the engine and it then behaved like yours is - it would come down the chute to landing and then if just the tiniest bit too agressive on elevator it would balloon down the runway. If not agressinve enough it would plow in - Splat!.

I was still getting used to setting up for a short landing, then letting it "float" to where it would touch down on the runway when the engine died 20 feet high on a touch 'n go. Shorty after that, the plane died too. :mad:

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Yikes!....small world.
If I remember corectly,I think the batteries can be moved up further up front-that should help.
Hey Tim,get a DIE HARD & stick in in there. :D

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Diablo....Who is HT?
just curious......i thought about adding weight......
didnt want to take time and convert to pull-pull.....because i am having a 35% edge being built now....i just went and got this plane to get use to flying larger scale before flying my new one.....
so far it has been bad experience......hate to even think the edge would behave like this....i will have almost 4,000.00 in my new edge......

EJB.....DIe Hard.....HUH.......I think the DA100 has enough power to pull it....ha.h.a.hahaha.......


If it wasnt for this engine i would have destroyed plane long before now.....It pulls it out of any situation....(so far anyways !!!).......

thanks for input guys.......I will add weight to it this week just to see if it helps......all my batteries are right behind the fire wall now.......i will throw some bb's in one of those wraps you use to wrap quartes in......then ill tie them to the fire wall.....dont want to use real quarters......no need any more money in plane hitting ground.... :D

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

HT is Hyper Tom, our local excitable boy (talks a mile a minute). EJB has built quite a few planes for HT over the last few years, but didn't build this Cap.
If you add the nose weight, the plane will fly super and still have great vertical with a DA-100. No BS.

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

I ADDED RIGHT AT 19 oz's JUST BEHIND THE FIREWALL.....
THE PLANE HANDLES 200% BETTER.....FLEW ALL WEEKEND WITH NO PROBLEMS.....NEDDS MAYBE SOME MORE......THINK I AM JUST GOING TO DO AWAY WITHMY SMALL HIGH CAPCITY PACKS AND PUT IN SOME SUB C 3OOOmah PACKS....MIGHT AS WELL MAKE THE EXTRA WEIGHT PAY FOR ITSELF.....HUH.??!!..

TIM ;)

Balooning
 

One thing that affects planes on landing is called Ground Effect. It is the compressing of air below the wing when you are within one wingspans distance from the ground. Some planes don't like to land through it and will float like crazy until their speed bleeds off enough to sink through it.

If your plane is that tail heavy you should be able to detect it in its' flight characteristics. Silly Question #1 Did you balance it where the manufacturer recommends? Might try that approach if all else fails.

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

I knew it wasn't as simple as the plane itself......I LOVE CAPS and while they do have different characteristics, none of them are so bad to make someone give up on the plane.

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

IT NEVER FLEW WITH CHARACTERISTIC OF BEING TAIL HEAVY....WITH IT TRIMMED OUT.....WHEN FLYING INVERTED IT STILL CAME DOWN....IT DIDNT CLIMB....WHICH IS WHAT TAIL HEAVY WOULD HAVE CAUSED IT TO DO.......


THANKS...TIM

Ok, I surrender
 

Didn't want to start an argument but there are many things that could cause it to come down when inverted, wing and stab incidence, elevator trim, wing airfoil, balance, speed.

This was just a suggestion on something to check on.

Good Flying and sunshine on you.

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

When the engine is pulling at anything over 1/4 throttle, the engine thrust, drag, and incidence can mask a tail heavy condition. So when you chop throttle while landing, the attitude of the plane is controlled mainly by CG and elevator. Easiest to diagnose a tailheavy plane with the power off......it balloons up.

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

JIM.....NAH....NO ARGUEMENT HERE ....NOT AT ALL....ALL OF YOUR GUYS SUGGESTIONS MAKE PERFECTLY GOOD SENSE....I UNDERSTAND EACH AND EVERYONE'S POINT OF VIEW.....

DIABLO...YOUR SUGGESTION IS ALSO VERY CLEAR....HAHAHA BUT I'M NOT READY TO DEADSTICK THIS THING IN YET.!!>...HAHAAHA....
OR ARE YOU JUST REFERING TO VERY LOW IDLE WITH NO THRUST......????......THANKS GUYS.....

TIM

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

I'm just talking about a normal low idle for landing. Low thrust and low airspeed.

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

with theplane sitting on the ground and after you thought you had it trimmed for level flight, did you ever look at the elevators to see what angle they were at in relation to the centerline of the fuse? This would have probably have told you what you needed to know

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Alch Burner, I've got a question for you:

When you fly from left to right (1/2 to 3/4 throttle) then chop to throttle to idle - does it balloon then?

If so, you have the same problem I had with a Lanier Cap - too much down thrust in engine. Down thrust will pull your plane down, so you have to give a slight up adjustment with elevator trim. Then when you cut the engine, plane balloons. You'll see the most dramatic effect when landing.

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

CAPTAIN......WITH MY CENTRAL HOBBIES GAUGE......THE ELEVATORS ARE LESS THAN A DEGREE UP......THIS IS WHY IT FALLS SLIGHTLY AT INVERTED FLIGHT......IT TRIMS NICELY.....THIS IS WHY I WAS CURIOUS WHY IT IS ACTING THE EAY IT DOES....

AFTCG......WHEN I CUT THROTTLE IT STAYS IN NORMAL FLIGHT PATH....NO PRBOLEMS THERE AT ALL....THANKS FOR SUGGESTION.....

TIM

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Burner, I had the same balloning problem with my H-9 Cap. Its the nature of all Caps. Its taken me a year to really nail the landings on this plane. I still manage to go-around about 1 to every three landing attempts. I have found that flying final approach with a little power and slight down elevator pressure helps. I am usually hot on landing but it definately helps. Shoot to set a landing attitude with a lttile bit of power while coming down final approach at about 15-20 feet and 50 yards from touchdown. To do this, back off power a click or two at a time as you are coming down final. You'll find that the Cap will "settle" into its landing attitude. Now ,once you are in the landing attitude HOLD that power setting until you are a foot off the ground. Dont let it get to slow on you. Now ever so slowly come back to idle. TRY NOT TO FLARE or slam the power to idle. She will ballon every time! Try this technique with your Carden. It has helped with my H-9 100%. Now I land three point everytime.

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Klbass:
Your plane would land a whole lot better if you added some nose weight. I've got 350+ flights on a H9 Cap......mine doesn't do what you describe.

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Well while we're on the subject of landings I'll add some more. I am flying a 35% Edge and noticed that the best landings were accomplished with the least elevator imput. I remembered reading in MAN about a Bearcat test where the fellow said to trim for landings just like the real planes. With flight modes on radio's this is a piece of cake, just mix in a little elevator trim at a time until she switches over to autoland :D

Cap Landings
 

I found that the rate of decent on final was a critical issue with my H9 cap. The CG was neutral to slightly tail heavy. I would make sure that the base wasn't to far from the field and would keep 4-5 clicks of throttle on until over the field. The entire time to this point, the glide slope was nose down. Once over the field, throttle management and release of forward stick would allow the Cap to settle in for a nice landing.

35% Carden Cap Landing Characteristics !?!?
 

Diablo, yes you are right it will land much better with more nose weight. I fly the Cap with a aft CG. I am just offering up what works for my plane. However, even when I flew the Cap with a forward CG the plane still had the tendency to balloon fairly easily.