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Progress Report
I took a vacation day today for the express purpose of spending the entire day at the field. Unfortunately thunderstorms moved in this afternoon and I had to pack up shop a bit early.
I've completely stripped off all the "training" equipment that came with the Nexstar (the airbrake flaps and thingamajigs on the wing tips) and have disconnected the AFS system. I did notice that I had to retrim the elevator significantly post removal of the flaps. Per the advice posted here in various forms, I spent pretty much the entire morning doing touch and go landings. I probably went through about 1/2 gallon of fuel doing touch and goes! I'm still not "greasing" every landing, and there was a crosswind that occasionally gave me some fits, but all in all I had a pretty succesful morning. I did get tired of going out to the middle of the field to retrieve my plane when I had a not so good landing, and began paying particularly close attention to when I would flare the Nexstar. One other adjustment I made was I didn't hesitate to abort the landing and bring it in for another try, whereas in previous attempts, I would simply force the landing which invariably meant the prop struck the ground, the engine would stop and I had to go out and retrieve the Nexstar. Call me lazy, but it is much nicer to drive her back than to carry her back. Quick question. I'm not sure if this is a trim issue or normal, but when I try to do rudder turns the wing tends to drop into the turn quite a bit. In fact, a spectator could probably not tell the difference between one of my rudder turns or an ailearon turn. I even programmed a rudder/aileraon mix into my radio and even with many adjustments, I still could not get the Nexstar to do a flat rudder turn. Am I missing something? Joe |
RE: Progress Report
Not missing a thing. Dropping of the wing is normal in a rudder turn. If it didn't drop something would be unusual, especially in a Nexstar or other trainer. No shame in going around, good to know when it is needed. NOBODY greases every landing that I know of. Some are better than others of course. :D When vacation is scheduled, rain is also usually scheduled for me also. Is wing tip "thingamajigs" a new tech term? Their purpose was to make the center section of the wing stall before the tips and therefore reduce spin tendencies. Supposed to make the nose drop straight ahead when the center stalls. Many planes have a little "washout" built into the wing for the same reason or have other devices added (full scale and models). I don't like carrying mine more than I have to either.
Glad you are getting the hang of it, keep practicing the takeoffs and landings. |
RE: Progress Report
I'm not sure it's possible to do a flat turn with a trainer. Trainers have so much dihedral that the rudder will roll the plane. One of our club instructors was flying my trainer for a couple of minutes to become familiar with it and when he slammed full rudder it did a full roll very similar to an aileron roll.
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RE: Progress Report
ORIGINAL: MountaineerFan36 I took a vacation day today for the express purpose of spending the entire day at the field. Unfortunately thunderstorms moved in this afternoon and I had to pack up shop a bit early. I've completely stripped off all the "training" equipment that came with the Nexstar (the airbrake flaps and thingamajigs on the wing tips) and have disconnected the AFS system. I did notice that I had to retrim the elevator significantly post removal of the flaps. Per the advice posted here in various forms, I spent pretty much the entire morning doing touch and go landings. I probably went through about 1/2 gallon of fuel doing touch and goes! I'm still not "greasing" every landing, and there was a crosswind that occasionally gave me some fits, but all in all I had a pretty succesful morning. I did get tired of going out to the middle of the field to retrieve my plane when I had a not so good landing, and began paying particularly close attention to when I would flare the Nexstar. One other adjustment I made was I didn't hesitate to abort the landing and bring it in for another try, whereas in previous attempts, I would simply force the landing which invariably meant the prop struck the ground, the engine would stop and I had to go out and retrieve the Nexstar. Call me lazy, but it is much nicer to drive her back than to carry her back. Quick question. I'm not sure if this is a trim issue or normal, but when I try to do rudder turns the wing tends to drop into the turn quite a bit. In fact, a spectator could probably not tell the difference between one of my rudder turns or an ailearon turn. I even programmed a rudder/aileraon mix into my radio and even with many adjustments, I still could not get the Nexstar to do a flat rudder turn. Am I missing something? Joe |
RE: Progress Report
Rolling when using the rudder is called roll-coupling. It happens - some planes do it worse than others-some barely do it. You have to correct with a little opposite aileron to the rudder motion to level the wings out and hold it steady. So left rudder - right aileron as an example. |
RE: Progress Report
Found the problem with the mixing on the radio. I had the slave channel set at +100%. So when I hit left rudder (master) the slave channel (aileron) also went left. I set the slave channel at -100% and walla, I got a right aileron with a left rudder and vice versa. I should be able to trim out to a more exact trim level once I get a chance to fly tomorrow.
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RE: Progress Report
Mountaineer ---- Try using throttle management for your touch and go's. It's surprising what just a click or so one way or the other will make in your approaches. ENJOY!!!! Red
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RE: Progress Report
Mountaineer,
For landings, I choose to do full stop and then turn around and take off again. This way i get the habbit of steering on the ground. |
RE: Progress Report
Joe,
Sounds like your well on the way to figuring the whole thing out. I thought that perhaps I was the only one selfish enough to take a vacation day from work just to tool around at the field. Good Luck and Happy Landings..... How bout them 'eers Regards Mike |
RE: Progress Report
Joe,
Nice work. Just keep at it! :D Dennis- |
RE: Progress Report
Mike:
lets goooooo Mountaineers. WVU class of '96. Joe |
RE: Progress Report
I was able to do flat turns with my NexSTAR but I didn't have any mixing programmed in (airtronics RD6000 replacement for the original Futaba 4 ch.. the airtronics is a basic computer radio). Anyway, a little left ailerion with right rudder did the trick.
Funny thing, though, I have not flown the NexSTAR since last summer after I solo'ed. I believe if I tried to fly it now, I would have to relearn!! ha.. As Red said above, throttle management is something that really helps on approaches and landings. The old trick of going to idle on final and coasting in works with the trainers but once you move up to something with little or no dihedral, you really need to learn to fly those buggers right to the ground, although some are more forgiving than others. But, nicer and smoother landings prevail when you learn those few clicks one way or the other during final. Best of luck!! Dick. |
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