Plus you still have reverse thrust available. You'll eat up a little more runway, but not that much.
Newer light plane POH's like the Cirrus family now have a third category of Abnormal Procedures besides Normal and Emergency Procedures. They categorize a flap failure as Abnormal, rather than Emergency, and I like that categorization.
Thanks Brent! I like doing that one also.
As regards declaring an emergency, I agree, but please remember the context of this discussion -- a Private Pilot who was never trained on no-flap operations before solo or before PP practical test, and the regulations regarding those activities (61.87 and 61.107), not the issue of whether you declare an emergency for a no-flap approach resulting from a flap malfunction. I'm quite certain Flight Standards would consider it a regulatory violation, not "common sense," for an instructor not to train Student Pilots flying flap-equipped airplanes on no-flap approaches/landings before endorsing that Student for solo or the PP practical test simply because the regulations only require training in normal and emergency procedures, not "abnormal" procedures. In fact, I think they'd consider the instructor involved to be bloody stupid, but that's just my personal opinion.
I'll take that bet. You sign someone off for solo in, say, a Cessna 150, and endorse them for the practical test in the same type without ever having given them any training in no-flap approaches and landings, and then let me point that out to your supervising FSDO. I'll bet $1000 against your CFI ticket you get in trouble.
Thanks Nate, good list.
SO you cant flare at those speeds in those aircraft? No argument that you shouldn't land on the nose gear, but that is a common approach speed.
I did read the N model POH and it says Flaps down its 44 and flaps up its 50. So what?
I can't explain why they do that, and wouldn't even begin to try. But based on everything in the AFH, PTS, and POH for every certified production airplane I know with flaps, a no-flap approach and landing is an abnormal procedure.
I never said otherwise. What I said is that signing off a trainee for solo/PP practical test in a flapped airplane without doing no-flap approaches and landings was a violation of 61.87 and 61.107, and I'll stand by that.
What did those GA airplanes do for years that didn't have flaps installed??
Yeah, kind'a like the the fighter pilot who called for landing priority because his single-engine jet fighter was running "a bit peaked." ATC told the fighter jock that he was number two behind a B-52 that had one engine shut down. "Ahhhh," the fighter pilot remarked, "The dreaded seven-engine approach."
So you are now telling us it's impossible to land a small GA airplane on a short/soft field without flaps??
Better yet, if you are flying on to a "mountain" strip in your C-150 and the flaps fail, you now have an emergency? Who do you declare this emergency too? And you are there without any options??? Are you planning a no option flight into a strip where it's so short that a couple of knot speed difference on approach will either be successful or a crash? Really?
And I've investigated accidents where the airplane was destroyed but yet was in fine working condition right up to the accident. In a C-172 as pointed out earlier there is less than a 10 knot difference between full flap and zero flap. Are you still trying to contend that that much speed difference is that critical? If so it falls under "pilot error".
If you consider a 40% increase "negligible," I'm with you. If not, you might want to recompute your data. Nevertheless, I agree that flaps locked up constitutes an "abnormal," not "emergency" situation, although I still think the FAA would say that training in that "abnormal" situation is required by 61.87(d)(11) (at least as an "equipment malfunction" if not as an "emergency procedure") before solo and by 61.107(b)(1) before the practical test.
A plane whose landing approach speed is about 10 knots faster without flaps than with. Do the math -- about 40% more energy to lose on touchdown, and a flatter approach path which extends the obstacle clearance distance. Landing distance in a typical flap-equipped light single is extended about 40% -- really.
I speak poorly of any CFI who fails to do the regulatory minimum before sending a trainee solo. I'm sure we've all heard the line about "if the min wasn't good enough, it wouldn't be the min," but if less than the min was good enough, the min would be lower, and the regulatory minimum for solo includes flapless landings. If you doubt me, I'll happily make the same bet with you that Wayne declined to accept.
So, about 35% -- I was pretty close.
Even closer to 40%.
