Ok, i´m currently flying a jamara air trainer 2 with a 52 engine in it.

Most days, on landind I end up rolling the full length of the runway, it just dont wanna stop! twice today I overshot....

Is it sensible to put some washers on either side of the front wheel and give them a little squeeze to hold the wheel as a "fixed force" break idea??

I'm not sure what type of washers you might be referring to, but I have had good results using thin slices of fuel line in the manner you described.

as in put over the wire like a sock?

Use a small piece of fuel tubing between the wheel collar and the wheel. You can adjust the tension of the "brake" by pushing your wheel collar in towards the wheel and squeezing the tubing. See diagram.

Ken

Some hardware stores have boxes of speriality hardware like starwasher and "C" clips and they also have spring washers. They are of thin spring steel and have a slight "C" shape to them. I have made them from a old broken tape measure.

If your engine comes down to a reasonable idle and you have not inadvertantly set the idle trim to high then try the next larger diameter (one inch) propellor with reduced pitch (one inch).

Using fuel line or grommets squeezed aginst the nosewheel between some washers or something alway work great for a flight or two then it or a plastic wheel will just burn up.

Another little trick is to reflex the airlerons if they are strip type ailerons. On a single servo aileron set up you can just adjust the clevis on the pushrods out a little so the trailing edge of the ailerons are both just slightly up at the trailing edge from the wings trailing edge. You may find this helpful in making a controled approach a little easier without affecting the rest of the flight envelope all that much.

And finally learn how to slow an airplane for the appoach rather than just a dive to the runway. Sometimes just slowing down and trimming a little up before the approach will help here.

John

well, if you wanna make it nose over , go ahead.

Practice flying the model at a Slower speed. Have you tested the model's stall speed ?
Maybe you can set the idel lower.

You can also change the pitch of the prop.

I prefer to add slight down trim, it's easier for me to apply slight pressure in pulling posistion or it's easier for me to pull instead of push.
It's mostly habits..but it achive the samething. I add more AOA if I need to slow the model down a little bit.
But I make my decend further away from the runway and level off...The rest is just throttle managment and flairing.
I also walk towards the model as it's decending. I get a better visual to maksure it'll clear the fence.lol
Plus if I over shoot...I'll have plenty of runway or field to spare.

Plus I fly the model at a slower speed a couple times around the field before landing approches.
This will give my brain time to adjust to the slower speed.

If just cut the throttle after full speed and try to land...the model will look like it slowed down a bit...but it's still traveling faster than my brain's perception.
It's the samething when you exit the freeway onto surface streets.

Good tips.
Having the CG set as far back as you are comfortable with can help, also. It effectively gives the wing more useable lift.

combattpig

I can not see how moving the CG back would change the landing roll.

IMHO it would be inadviseable for a beginner to experiment with moving the CG back as the change to flight characteristics can be pretty dramatic.

By moving back the CG you can get the plane to make slower approaches. If you hit the runway at a slower speed, then naturally your roll distance will decrease. It has been my experience that most guys never explore the planes' CG range and some unwittingly will fly the plane slightly nose heavy. The aft CG location can be sought out intelligently, this advice doesn't have to be autotomically condemned as some sort of evil mojo.

In fact, your approach technique can change to shorter and steeper, instead of long, low ones.

Exploiting the backside of the "J" curve? Careful, they will discover that up is now down faster.

Hmm, while I agree on the slower speed practice I would humbly point out that I have been using the fuel tubing beak on the nose wheel ever since I began in this hobby the first time around some 6 years ago. Never once did I nose over due to this break.

On a tail dragger you would likely see a nose over problem, but I don't think his was a tail dragger.

I would think metal washers of any kind would eat away at the plastic wheels so I would avoid em. (Im new and inexperienced but this seems logical to me)

All this assumes that he is landing on a paved runway. Grass runways, of course, will slow it down right away. Landing speed, no matter what field, though, will be a key factor.

after posting and thinking about this last night, I tried to put all into practice today.

spent a while flying around at height looking for the "slowest" (use-able) speed and getting used to it...

I also did many touch-n-go´s with one PERFECT landing right at the start of the runway..
the finals were with zero motor, motor trimmed very low and not too fast.
I rolled the entire lenght of the runway.

Yes it is a tarmac runway.
the grass strips arent really an option as here in spain its so dry that the ground is full of rocks, not nice runway at all.... tarmac or nothing.

EVERY time I end up rolling off the runway and only stop when I hit the dirt "wasteland" at the end.

I´ll try your fuel tube Idea for next session and see how It goes, maybe on one at first and 3 if no change.

Change to a one inch larger diameter propellor with one inch less pitch. Example: if you are using a 10x6 then try an 11x5. When you do this you are increasing the propellor blade swept area, more drag at idle and easier to control your approach.

The fuel line gig on the axle will work for a landing or two but soon melt away and you are right back where you started.

John

Yup as he said, what you are experiencing is symptomatic of running a larger than recommended engine on a plane.

If you stick with the recommended props, the extra/excess thrust causes the plane to be pulled along the runway.

Since the plane already has velocity at landing, it doesn't slow down.

The fix is as John said, a lower pitched wider prop.

Even at fairly low idle my Funtana would take too much runway to slow down, that is until I changed to a 16x4W prop which did the trick.

not to be argumentive, but I usually find that if I increase the diameter by one inch, I usually have to decrease the pitch by two inches.
So an 11X6, or a 12X4.
Your mileage may vary...