Flat approaches & landings - wth?

Maybe someone good at using the NTSB accident report search box could at least figure an appropriate search string and see if there are a spike of incidents in the category 'landed short due to engine failure on final and plenty of fuel aboard'. I never could get their search thingy to work.
 
saddletramp said:
Today I was out at my small airport tinkering on my 182. There were several airplanes that either landed or were shooting touch & go's. I made an interesting observation. Most of the pilots made shallow approaches carrying power & landed fairly flat. Why?

Okay, maybe I'm old school but what happens if that power plant up front quits being a power plant? Stay high & make the runway without the engine...right?

I teach & usually make rather steep approaches. On short final, I'm power off, flaps as needed, but attempt to make the runway without throttle. I also carry enough airspeed to make a nice flare & attempt to touch down, nose high, with the stall warner chirping. I thought touching down at minimum airspeed was important. It saves runway & brakes. Isn't that normal?

What is it with all these pilots landing flat & producing power on final?

I don't get it.
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Does your field have a PAPI/VASI? Perhaps they're flying that? Maybe they were just committing errors and that's why they were out doing touch and goes. I just recently went out and did a flight dedicated to touch and goes in my friend's new '65 Mooney, and man did I have some flat finals. (The saving grace being that if you chop power on a flat final in a Mooney it just sort of keeps going on the same glidepath at the same speed)



I realize I'm not going to change anybody's mind here, but for the sake of the side argument...I carry power all the way until a handful of seconds before the roundout usually. That said, I can also make the field from anywhere in the pattern. ::gasp:: Both can be done? You can keep some power in and still follow a profile that will allow an engine out landing in most light aircraft. I do this partly as a habit from flying heavy planes that pretty much don't fly so much as fall without power on in the landing configuration, but also because passengers hate slips and space shuttle approaches. If you remove the slip from the toolbox, and cut it to idle at the abeam, then you have no ability to correct for a high final. You just land long. If you keep a few hundred RPM as your baseline, then you're not dragging it in, but you also have the ability to bring it back down to glide path if you find yourself high.
 
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FastEddieB said:
Yesterday a fellow posted a video to the AOPA forum on Facebook that made me cringe:

https://www.facebook.com/johnathon.tully/posts/10154776784496329

I've resisted making a comment so far, but I see these as not so much landings, as just driving the plane onto the runway. Though the last two were at least headed in the right direction with the mains touching slightly first.

Poor nosegear!
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No wonder that nose gear shimmies, that nose gear must be saying, ouch don't hurt me again,
 
flyingron said:
You'll find that engine failures (other than fuel exhaustion) are an extremely rare event on approach to landing accidents to begin with.
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I disagree with that. I'll wager that an engine failure is closely followed by an approach to land 100% of the time. No one has ever gotten stuck up there... :D It's all semantics and reading things how you want to read them. Interpretation is a kick in the shorts, ain't it?
 
Lachlan said:
I disagree with that. I'll wager that an engine failure is closely followed by an approach to land 100% of the time. No one has ever gotten stuck up there... :D It's all semantics and reading things how you want to read them. Interpretation is a kick in the shorts, ain't it?
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Bear in mind there is a class of pilots who try to hold onto altitude* in a manner that they can glide safely to a landing from anywhere in the pattern if the engine fails. I know I try to and tried to instill it into my students.

The key is that when these pilots do have engine failures, they don't show up on NTSB or any other form of report. They just glide in for an uneventful landing. Which makes it difficult to compare outcomes with engine failures that occur lower or farther from the airport which may show up in accident reports.


*Altitude above you is just one of the three most useless thing to a pilot!
 
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Pilots land differently. And different planes land differently. Some pilots wheel land their taildraggers. Others don't. Some people think that anything different than what they do is wrong. Others don't think that way.

Me, I try it every which way I can come up with. If there is a way I havent tried, I want to try it.

So long as the landing is safe. Good to go.

Every landing is a little bit different.
 
It all depends on what I'm flying. In the Citabria, I chop the power abeam touchdown and glide it all the way around. In the twin, you have at least some power on until the numbers.
 
FastEddieB said:
Bear in mind there is a class of pilots who try to hold onto altitude* in a manner that they can glide safely to a landing from anywhere in the pattern if the engine fails. I know I try to and tried to instill it into my students.

The key is that when these pilots do have engine failures, they don't show up on NTSB or any other form of report. They just glide in for an uneventful landing. Which makes it difficult to compare outcomes with engine failures that occur lower or farther from the airport which may show up in accident reports.


*Altitude above you is just one of the three most useless thing to a pilot!
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Lemme guess: the other two are 1.) a fart in the wind, and 2.) internet advice?

You might be fast, Eddie, but when it comes to sensing humor you're pretty slow. ;)
 
Goofy said:
Why so much fear of an engine quitting on final? How often has that happened? Other than when people select an empty tank.
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Someone here related a story of pilots in airports that had high elevations having engines quit I think because they set to full rich (being used to lower elevations) out of habit. They needed leaner mixture at that elevation.

I think it makes sense to fly so you are not dependant on the engine in case. I mean "how often" isn't really the best criteria when "just once in ten thousand times" if you are flying low in that one time?

My experience with combustion engines in general tells me that it is often with changes that an engine can quit. The is a three in hangar talk now of someone experiencing that, I don't think he found the cause yet but if I remember it was happening at landing.
I've had beater cars, and other motors that died at idle, or lower settings, but seemingly ok at higher throttle settings. I don't have any idea how frequent it happens in planes, but it seems like a good idea to keep options open as the SOP. Doesn't it?
 
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LongRoadBob said:
Someone here related a story of pilots in airports that had high elevations having engines quit I think because they set to full rich (being used to lower elevations) out of habit. They needed leaner mixture at that elevation.

I think it makes sense to fly so you are not dependant on the engine in case. I mean "how often" isn't really the best criteria when "just once in ten thousand times" if you are flying low in that one time?

My experience with combustion engines in general tells me that it is often with changes that an engine can quit. The is a three in hangar talk now of someone experiencing that, I don't think he found the cause yet but if I remember it was happening at landing.
I've had beater cars, and other motors that died at idle, or lower settings, but seemingly ok at higher throttle settings. I don't have any idea how frequent it happens in planes, but it seems like a good idea to keep options open as the SOP. Doesn't it?
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You test your idle at run-up, right?

If it won't idle, it's not safe for flight.

Oil starvation failures happen when throttle is reduced, but the most common engine failure is running out of fuel.

The problem with the "always make the runway" argument is that overrun and loss of control accidents are a lot more common, and you're removing a tool to avoid that.
 
MAKG1 said:
You test your idle at run-up, right?

If it won't idle, it's not safe for flight.

Oil starvation failures happen when throttle is reduced, but the most common engine failure is running out of fuel.

The problem with the "always make the runway" argument is that overrun and loss of control accidents are a lot more common, and you're removing a tool to avoid that.
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Is this a problem with always make the runway, or not understanding energy management and slips?
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
Maybe someone good at using the NTSB accident report search box could at least figure an appropriate search string and see if there are a spike of incidents in the category 'landed short due to engine failure on final and plenty of fuel aboard'. I never could get their search thingy to work.
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Maybe, but my real point isn't about whether the engine is more likely to fail in a tight vs wide pattern.

We need to stop the mantra of 'you need to keep your pattern tight because your engine might fail' just as much as stopping the idea that some CFI's do of flying jumbo jet patterns because they might go to the airlines someday. Both can be problematic when you focus your technique on the wrong reasons.

What we need to teach is to fly a traffic pattern that is appropriate for the airplane you fly at the airport you are flying. That is somewhere in between extremes and it may not always be the same.

I see too many pilots out there flying ridiculously tight patterns with steep approach angles and they come in blasting over the threshold with so much extra speed that they float halfway down the runway before touching down. Sure they were close enough in case of an engine failure, but are they really being safer? Not really. Focus on speed control and develop a traffic pattern that works with the flow of traffic at any given airport. If all you do is super tight patterns, it is going to screw you when you travel to a class D airport and get told to extend the downwind. What are you going to do? Tell Tower "unable'?
 
Dan Thomas said:
That nosegear hasn't long to live before some major expense will be incurred. All the torque link stuff must be getting pretty sloppy. And with that touchdown technique he's not far from doing this:

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I love that video. I never thought you could collapse the nose gear on a PA28, but that video proved me wrong!
 
FastEddieB said:
Yesterday a fellow posted a video to the AOPA forum on Facebook that made me cringe:

https://www.facebook.com/johnathon.tully/posts/10154776784496329

I've resisted making a comment so far, but I see these as not so much landings, as just driving the plane onto the runway. Though the last two were at least headed in the right direction with the mains touching slightly first.

Poor nosegear!
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Oof, those first 3 landings though. I like where he adds power on a glide-in landing when he's still 75ft AGL crossing the fence.
 
labbadabba said:
Oof, those first 3 landings though. I like where he adds power on a glide-in landing when he's still 75ft AGL crossing the fence.
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Some Cherokees (particularly the old Hershey bar ones) require power all the way to the field. But yeah, ADDING power like that where he did, that was just a bad idea.

I've always been taught to go around on the first PIO hop like that. I actually had a situation at KSAV where after a flight where everyone in the plane wanted to get out due to the bumps and winds getting there I had to go around due to PIO. I came in WAY too hot because I was trying to rush it and ended up doing it all over again anyway.
 
MAKG1 said:
Oil starvation failures happen when throttle is reduced, but the most common engine failure is running out of fuel.
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Mine happened when at cruise power.

Besides, if the prop is still windmilling, you're probably still got reasonable oil pressure.
 
FastEddieB said:
Exactly.

Staying high enough to make the runway and having the skill to land your plane at a precise point on the runway are hardly mutually exclusive skills.
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Who said they were mutually exclusive? I'm going to insist you not put words in my mouth.

If you insist on having the throttle at idle, you do not have the throttle at your disposal as a tool for managing energy. Unless you have reverse thrust. You don't in that Sky Arrow, right?
 
MAKG1 said:
I'm going to insist you not put words in my mouth.
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Ditto.

If you insist on having the throttle at idle, you do not have the throttle at your disposal as a tool for managing energy.
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I did not say all patterns have to be power off. Only that I find it a worthy goal to stay close enough to the airport that if the engine dies you're not forced into an off-airport landing.
 
Fearless Tower said:
I see too many pilots out there flying ridiculously tight patterns with steep approach angles and they come in blasting over the threshold with so much extra speed that they float halfway down the runway before touching down.
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You're looking at pilots flying poorly and extrapolating to confirm your preconceived notion.

Pilots who approach with "so much extra speed" are just as likely to do so from a wider pattern with a shallower final. I still don't see how the two things - pattern size and speed carried into the flare - relate at all.
 
FastEddieB said:
I did not say all patterns have to be power off. Only that I find it a worthy goal to stay close enough to the airport that if the engine dies you're not forced into an off-airport landing.
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How can you do that at partial power on final?

Without that power, you will be short.
 
FastEddieB said:
You're looking at pilots flying poorly and extrapolating to confirm your preconceived notion.

Pilots who approach with "so much extra speed" are just as likely to do so from a wider pattern with a shallower final. I still don't see how the two things - pattern size and speed carried into the flare - relate at all.
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There is no preconceived notion. I'm talking about people who specifically take one concept and abuse it without looking at the bigger picture. That doesn't mean that everyone who flies a tight pattern is doing that. I don't have a problem with tight patterns and I fly a very tight pattern in my biplane. I have a problem with some pilots who use the 'engine failure' excuse to fly poorly.
 
MAKG1 said:
How can you do that at partial power on final?

Without that power, you will be short.
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Ideally, stay high enough and increase flaps incrementally enough that one could glide to the field at any point if the engine stops. My habit is to stay high enough on final that even with full flaps I use small amounts of forward slip to "fine tune" my landing spot.

And all of these are simply goals - sometimes they work out perfectly, often not.
 
Passenger comfort.

I favor the "high and steep" technique. Had a non-pilot passenger make a comment once.. . "Wow, little steep ain't it?". If a non-pilot thinks it steep...

The sight picture, the feel of a steep approach, especially in a cross wind might be a little exciting for passengers. The 3deg slope thing has the advantage of seeming slower, shallower, less exciting.

I realize that isn't a technical reason for either.
 
Caramon13 said:
Some Cherokees (particularly the old Hershey bar ones) require power all the way to the field.
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You don't typically see Cherokee 6's flying power off, but the 4 cylinders? Easy. I have flown full flap power off approaches in Hershey bar Cherokee 180's no problem, so not sure why you say it can't be done unless YOU are simply uncomfortable with the power off descent rate...which is really not that high compared to many other airplanes that you can also easily land power off. If your experience is limited to dragging Cessnas in on 3-degree approaches, you might be a tad uncomfortable the first time you get in a Hershey bar Cherokee and try a power off, full flap landing. But more pilots should break out of the very narrow comfort range they developed as as result of primary training techniques designed for beginner student pilots. Experienced, licensed pilots need to move beyond this lowest-common-denominator level of skill.
 
Mistake Not... said:
Passenger comfort.

I favor the "high and steep" technique. Had a non-pilot passenger make a comment once.. . "Wow, little steep ain't it?". If a non-pilot thinks it steep...

The sight picture, the feel of a steep approach, especially in a cross wind might be a little exciting for passengers. The 3deg slope thing has the advantage of seeming slower, shallower, less exciting.

I realize that isn't a technical reason for either.
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That's when you say

"You're right!"

And through it into a aggressive slip
 
FastEddieB said:
Sure. My point was simply that Cherokees do not "require power all the way to the field".

Not that one could not fly in such a way as to use power all the way to the field.
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RoscoeT said:
You don't typically see Cherokee 6's flying power off, but the 4 cylinders? Easy. I have flown full flap power off approaches in Hershey bar Cherokee 180's no problem, so not sure why you say it can't be done unless YOU are simply uncomfortable with the power off descent rate...which is really not that high compared to many other airplanes that you can also easily land power off. If your experience is limited to dragging Cessnas in on 3-degree approaches, you might be a tad uncomfortable the first time you get in a Hershey bar Cherokee and try a power off, full flap landing. But more pilots should break out of the very narrow comfort range they developed as as result of primary training techniques designed for beginner student pilots. Experienced, licensed pilots need to move beyond this lowest-common-denominator level of skill.
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I promise I'll stop speaking in absolutes..one of these days, for sure. :p
 
When I was training, I learned to fly to pass a test. After I got my ticket, I learned to fly to be safe and give my passengers a comfortable ride. Now, I regularly practice all methods, and practice all emergency procedures on a regular basis.

My landings are usually carrying power all the way to the flare, and my landings are generally smooth and flat, making my wife very happy. (And they are usually on a 3 degree glide slope.) But if the situation dictated a different approach, I could do it without difficulty. THAT is what being an aviator is all about, IMHO.
 
Fearless Tower said:
Ah yes, the classic internet comeback: 'I haven't seen it, therefore it doesn't exist'
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Crossing the threshold too fast is a common problem. Most people who do so are NOT making power-off approaches.
 
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