Today I went down to the field just to practice taking off and landing. I found out last week that I was having some throttle control issues upon takeoff (obviously didn't want to look down, but I wasn't giving the plane enough throttle. Still getting used to thumb positions!)

Anyway, it was really gusty, with winds in every direction. I've learned that it is important to land with some power in windy conditions, so that's what I did. Then the wind died down to almost nothing, and I continued to come in with power.

AMAZING!!! You have so much more control of the plane with a little throttle - I was able to wag my tail around as needed, gain altitude or raise the nose, and actually flew my plane down to the ground! What an awesome feeling! I was able to do some touch-an-go's after that, too, since I had so much more control, and wasn't really performing a controlled crash into the runway like us newbies start off doing.

Keep practicing those landings. Of all the things you can do while flying, landing is probably the most important. Second to that is the take off. So, touch-and-go's are a logical way to practice both. Keep up the good work!!

CGr

Takeoffs are optional!

Landings are NOT!

Depending upon the airplane carrying power above an idle throttle is a good idea. You can always bring the power back to idle once your a foot or so above the ground. Essentially flying the bird to ground which has a lot of advantages mostly more control.

I spend more time doing touch and gos then anything. I just enjoy them. Sure I do other things like loops, rolls, flying inverted, etc but I try to make a pattern out of it. Take off, do some acrobatics on the way back to the runway, do a touch and go, repeat. Of course I don't do as many touch and gos if others are flying, just out of courtesy, but I am usually the only one at the field.

Sounds like you are progressing nicely. Great job!

Hi gaRCfield
A safe way to look "down" on your radio while flying is to hold it up, perhaps so it is jut behind your plane. You can continue to move it so it tracks your plane while you quickly glance at your radio to check something. Practice so you are comfortable with this before your need to do it.

I discovered this myself a few weeks ago. I land just like Steve said. I few clicks above idle (or more depending on wind) he plane is still slow and losing altitude. Then when I have it about a foot oof the ground drop to idle and ease up a tad. It touches down like a feather....well not every time . But i dont look like a rookie anymore on landings..and more important I feel more relaxed and the landings are more fun.

What Villa said. Don't look down. Hold the radio up. ;-)

If you ever get into biplanes you'll find half throttle is where landings occur. Some models, notably warbirds and clean low-wings, will need to land a bit "hot". One reason they're not the best trainers. It's tough on the gear to "splat and plant" a fast landing.

Nothing like "greasing one in" with a smooth kiss.

I has a cheapie .50 size Chinese engine and I got pretty good at yelling "DEAD STICK" and winging over into dives towards the airfield. (Set the club record: 24 consecutive deadsticks). Even in a deadstick speed is your friend. Better to keep the nose down and land someplace creative than try to "ooch" out up elevator and stall out.

AAAGGHHH YES! Nothing feels so good as POWER! You did well in that you learned something and YOU learned it all by yourself using some common thinking and working it out for yourself. My money says you are going to experiment even more and your learning curve will be going straight up. Excellent!

Some things you may want to think about as you progress on. If you fly some normal sport model, try this: Let's say you're flying the typical .40-.60 + size airplane. Use a long diameter low pitch prop. Then use a shorter high pitch prop. For example, many years ago my first experiments found that a Laser 200 type model with a ST .60 would fly an excellent pattern with a 11, or 11.5 d. 7-7.5 pitch prop. Passes were fast for the time period but landings had to be idled back a couple 100 feet to land in front of yourself. Straight-up was OK but not anything to write home about.
Now install a 12-5 and things changed. Passes much slower but very controllable. Straight-Up 50% better. Then fly the approach using throttle as an airplane should be flown, you can continue right into the roundout, chop and you're on usually 3 point.
Check with the 3D folks. They have those prop. things pretty well nailed down. .40-.46 engine about same with 9-7 / 10-6 and then a 11-4 or so.

Now once you get this all right to the finest point, then get a Q-500 Racer, or a Quarter .40 Racer. Landing dead stick all the time and with a slick slippery machine. Landing is a whole 'nother game. [sm=idea.gif]

So much to learn, so little time, but AIN'T IT FUN!!!!!???

Good show there, Mr. gaRCfield. best of luck to you.

I got confused; first it sounded like you switched to a bigger prop with less pitch, then I thought you said to go to a shorter prop with more pitch? I've been thinking about changing props for when I get my low-wing sport plane flying (Nexstar right now, 11x5, 46AX) was thinking of flying the Pulse with a 12x4 with the 46AX to start. Are you saying I should go the other way?

Thanks for the Kudos. It's amazing what I get out of flying alone, not worrying what my trainer is thinking! I wonder what he'd say when I tell him I want to cut the dihedral out of my trainer!

I have had models that went from a tiger to a *****cat on landing with as slight a change as a 11X6 to an 11X5. It's like downshifting. Lowering the pitch is like going to a lower gear. It's easer to park in first gear at 10 mph (12x4) than in third at 50 mph (10x6). Lower pitch gives better low end torque but less speed.

When you change the pitch 1" change the diameter in the opposite direction. (i.e. swap a 10 X 6 for an 11 x 5).

And try APC or ProZinger. My two favorites.

OH NO! You are doing A-OK just as you are doing. I was only adding background info. for you to use as you experiment with different set-ups. Some models have very different flight characteristics with slight changes in props. Others don't have so much change and it's fun just to play around and see what happens. YOU make it do what YOU want.
Basically an engine operates well in some particular RPM range. For an engine that is happy in the 11-13000 RPM range, with an average sport airframe, Long dia. low pitch props will produce more lugging power but less speed. Fast on acceleration, but slow in cruise. Rather like driving in 2nd gear.
OTOH, a shorter diameter prop operating in the same RPM range with higher pitch is in Hi-Gear. Slow to start off, but faster in cruise.

With the way you are going, he might very well offer you a knife.

Landing under power really is just landing with a bit of elevator. The power isn't the trick, the elevator is the trick. Almost every plane can do both. Not every pilot can do both with almost every airplane.

Safe landing really requires the pilot pay attention to the airplane's AOA. Keep the speed adequate, but mostly it's all about AOA. The pilot has to keep the airplane from getting too much AOA and too slow. Nowhere does it say the pilot has to land with any specific elevator deflection. So pull a bit of deflection and click the throttle up a bit to bring the speed back that the elevator trim just cost ya'. And what happens? The airplane often winds up with a nice steady, slightly nose up, shallow rate of descent.

It's easier to hit a landing spot with a shallow rate of descent than with almost no descent. And when the angle of descent can very easily be controlled with a little throttle work, it's even easier to hit that spot. If you're going to come in short, a couple of clicks more throttle angles that descent out longer. Hold the elevator steady and work the descent angle with the throttle.

Lot's of flyers setup their radios with a landing trim setting on one of the switches. It often does nothing more than throw a few clicks of elevator trim on. The trim amount is whatever gives you the landing speed that works best for a shallow rate of descent.

I am one of those fliers. I have trim set up for an appropriate approach speed and use the throttle for descent most of the time. Heck, my right hand barely moves on final approaches unless I'm slipping it in with a crosswind. People sometimes remark that I'm good at landing, but it's not really me - it's all about good setup prior to flying the approach.

For better landings and slower speeds, a heavy tail is better than a heavy nose, right? If the landing area is short and i want to cut out some speed, i must be 1-2 metres higher than ground from a 100 metres distance of the landing area, and slowly slowly give an elevator up, and the same time the throttle is fully closed.

Tail heavy is never a good condition. Some 3D flyers have the CG at the aft end of the recommended range, but this doesn't constitute a tail heavy condition. A properly balanced plane (neutral) will be very sensitive to elevator input, which can make landings harder to control. Also the plane may not clearly tell you when the wing is stalled, and the plane may enter a spin when it tip stalls first. A slightly nose heavy plane will tend to drop the nose in a stall and increase airspeed which is a good thing. Yes you will have to hold a small amount of up elevator to keep the nose pitched up, but that is also a good thing.

I train my students to get the plane in a position where its slightly nose up (with elevator) and descending (establish that attitude when the plane is on the base leg. This puts the plane in the perfect attitude for touchdown, and prevents bouncing, particularly with tricycle gear planes. They then control the altitude with throttle, and the speed with elevator. If you want to slow the plane down, add more elevator. If you want to pull the plane up to the glide path, add some throttle.

Brad

Depends on what you mean by better. And whether or not the elevator throw is tuned to the CG location. And whether or not 1 or 2mph slower is realistically worthwhile.

But it is true that the more nose heavy the less effective the elevator becomes. And at some point, the elevator runs out of ability to both carry the imbalance and effectively respond to your input. And that might affect the quality of landings.

So, a balanced airplane is better?

Pitch stability, as in restoring pitch disturbances, is really established by how big and far back the horizontal tail is. At least the "safe" aspect of pitch stability is established that way. The CG is a major player, but as long as it's kept within it's safe range, it really only tunes how fast the designed in pitch stability restores the pitch axis. And it's safe range is established by how big and far back the tail is. And that doesn't change.

There are really two aspects of this pitch stability versus CG issue. One is how effectively and quickly the tail restores your established pitch. The CG tunes that. The other part of the issue is how the CG movement affects the effectiveness of the elevator.

People often think that moving the CG forward or backward affects the safety and sensitivity of the airplane. It does that only in that it requires adjusting the elevator throw to keep up with it's change in effectiveness. For us to continue to safely steer the sucker, we need to keep the response to the stick movement within bounds for what we've learned to handle.

Sensitive is what we feel in the stick. And if we change the CG after becoming accustomed to the stick response before the CG change, we fly unsafely after the CG change if we don't understand what's about to happen. The airplane won't be less safe, but we will be. Truth is, the airplane will be more efficient. There will be less induced drag for the same change in pitch. The elevator moves less to get the same AOA change. Less drag produced. Less speed lost. But not less safe as far as the airplane is concerned. Unfortunately, we often don't know to move the stick less. And when we move it the expected amount and the airplane SUDDENLY moves more, we think it's become less safe. We've become less safe. It hasn't. So adjust the elevator throw and you've got your comfort back. And the airplane is just as safe as always AND a tiny bit more efficient.

Before you can understand the effectiveness of the horizontal stabilizer you need to know exactly what the stabilizer does. To put it simply, the horizontal stabilizer provides a down force to the back of the airplane to keep the nose up. This is why stalling the even just the horizontal stabilizer will put the airplane in an uncontrollable dive. The further aft you put the CG the more effective the stabilizer. The further forward the less effective. This is why a severely tail heavy aircraft will pitch up no matter how much down elevator you add. In that case, you must throttle down to reduce the flow of air over the surface, thereby reducing its effectiveness. That's also why a very nose heavy aircraft needs to gain a lot of airspeed before the pilot is able to rotate off the runway.

The recommended C.G. is where the manufacturer feels the prospective buyer will have the most success and at the same time, they will like the characteristics of the plane.

A slightly nose heavy plane may need more "throws" to get the same amount of pitch movement as one that is not. (see Da Rock's and Nathan's comments ).

However a slightly nose heavy plane can also be easier to land. It depends in large part on the plane.

My Skybolt seems to be nose heavy to me, at the recommended C.G. IMHO for best in flight performance it needs to be much futher back than where the manual recommends for this plane.

However offsetting that, is that EVERY landing I make with this plane, I "grease" it in to a beautiful 3 point landing. Even in winds the plane makes me look GOOD.... so I'm tempted to leave it as is.

A tail heavy plane can be dangerous.

Yeah, i can imagine tail heavy plane landing. It will be hursh and it will need a lot of area to land properly. The nose heavy will help you land in shorter distances. But not overdo it, right? It's bad for a 3D plane.

3D planes tend to purposely have their C.G. set further back.

This let's them perform high alpha maneouvers such as hovering and harriers with more ease.

With a 3D plane such as your UCD, you want small "stepping" of the servo for maximum fine control during landings.

However this contradicts the manual's recommendation of long servo arms for maximum surface movement.

So what you do is instead, set the servo linkages up for maximum mechanical advantage, (1" arms or less) which gives you "finer" control, then offset this by setting the endpoints for maximum travel on the servo itself.

You would be attempting to make the servo "turn" further to it's extremes to get the same amount of motion out of the control surface.

I didn't understand your word "stepping". How the servo will help me on landing? I can buy an ultra torque servo and that's it, if i want more torque.

Having done a bit of LOMAC flight simulation, if I remember right you control your altitude with the throttle. You setup your glide path and if you're in danger of overshooting the landing strip you ease off the throttle and vice-versa. The elevator should only be used for initially setting up your glide path, after that you only use the rudder and throttle.

I guess having a large scale plane with flaps makes this a lot easier to do [sm=angel_smile.gif]

This is not a question of torque.

Servos move in discreet increments or "steps".

Each "step" causes a small movement of the control surface.

If the horn is long ( as suggested ) that small movement causes a relatively big change in deflection.

This can make a 3D plane hard to land, or at worst difficult to land properly.

By changing the linkages for maximum mechanical advantage, the "steps" produce LESS movement of the control surface.

So when you barely move the stick, the surface moves only a tiny almost imperceptable bit.

This has NOTHING to do with expo and torque.