Great Example of When to Go Around

My fifth attempt to get into T74 one afternoon looked very similar to that one, but I managed to stop about 50' before the numbers. That was a bad day. Could not set up a low enough approach for the life of me. Learned a lot that day.
 
IF the conditions or the runway are anything other than good the FIRST thing that goes out of window is a smooth touchdown. Short runway, contaminated runway, strong crosswinds, low vis, fatigue.. just put it on and look for the smooth touchdown another day.
 
Orange Anchor said:
IF the conditions or the runway are anything other than good the FIRST thing that goes out of window is a smooth touchdown. Short runway, contaminated runway, strong crosswinds, low vis, fatigue.. just put it on and look for the smooth touchdown another day.
Click to expand...

Yep yep yep! What he said.

Come in, plant it, get on the brakes, and pull clear. No sense in doing something stupid that's going to break an airplane.

This brings up another pet peeve of mine. There are a plethora of CFIs out there who condition their students from day one to "BE EASY ON THE BRAKES!!! NO YOU DON'T NEED TO USE SO MUCH BRAKE WE'RE ON A 5000' RUNWAY!!!! WHAT THE HELL!?" I disagree, tell them to be gentle, to not lock them up, and to be ready to let off of them, but I know of some guys who are dammed near afraid to use the brakes and will do everything within their power to keep from using them. Taxi is one thing, there is typically no good reason to use the brakes during taxi except for sharp turns, that said I know of some guys who are in turbine equipment who say, "NEVER USE THE BRAKES, THAT'S WHAT YOU HAVE BETA FOR." Sure that works on 5000' strips, but when you're going in someplace short, and potentially contaminated that sort of logic may or may not work. Now, you don't want to shimmy the nose wheel like our buddy in the video did, but brakes are cheap, skidding an airplane off of the end of a runway is not.
 
Breaks cost money, beta is free. So are speed brakes, thrust reversers and "aerodynamic braking". ...sorta. (Save it...I know)

If the owner can't afford a set of brakes when the time comes, they can't afford the plane. Get the weight off of the wing and onto the tires and get the brakes on. I always hated riding with guys that would wait until the last 1500' of a runway with the nose up in the air and then slam on the brakes.

....what happens when the brakes quit and you didn't know it until it was too late? Or you didn't see that patch of ice or water? I don't need to be crawling out of a burning aircraft and finding my way around the approach lights because you wanted to save brakes.

-mini
 
minitour said:
Breaks cost money, beta is free. So are speed brakes, thrust reversers and "aerodynamic braking". ...sorta. (Save it...I know)

If the owner can't afford a set of brakes when the time comes, they can't afford the plane. Get the weight off of the wing and onto the tires and get the brakes on. I always hated riding with guys that would wait until the last 1500' of a runway with the nose up in the air and then slam on the brakes.

....what happens when the brakes quit and you didn't know it until it was too late? Or you didn't see that patch of ice or water? I don't need to be crawling out of a burning aircraft and finding my way around the approach lights because you wanted to save brakes.

-mini
Click to expand...

My opinion exactly. Especially the last paragraph. That's why I typically run every approach as a short and soft approach.
 
Generally speaking in training aircraft (say a 172 or Piper Warrior) are brake pads REALLY that expensive? I'm not willing to go off the end of a runway because a CFI or FBO wants to save some money on brake disks down the road....
 
ppragman said:
Yep yep yep! What he said.

Come in, plant it, get on the brakes, and pull clear. No sense in doing something stupid that's going to break an airplane. .
Click to expand...

Don't know why it works but it does. "I am going to clear at taxiway blah-blah." it sets the expectation and decreases the tendency to drift into that zoned-out moment where you are eating up runway looking for a smooth touchdown.
 
Orange Anchor said:
Don't know why it works but it does. "I am going to clear at taxiway blah-blah." it sets the expectation and decreases the tendency to drift into that zoned-out moment where you are eating up runway looking for a smooth touchdown.
Click to expand...

Exactly, if I'm not slow enough to clear at taxiway X then I'm going to add max power and go around. Period. That's a really good thing to think about.
 
The CFI is just repeating the owner of the school saying "Stay off the brakes, those cost money." The brakes are cheap, the bald spots on the tires from students locking them up are not.

I had a student panic, lock the brakes and wear down a nice bald spot on the tire. Brand new tire, the boss was rightfully angry.

I have had the talk several times with my boss about how I teach short field landings. I have my students brake to a full stop. If they (primary) can not come to a stop before the thousand foot marker then we keep trying.

When they get it right we head over to the next airport and land on the 2200 foot runway. It is fun watching their faces when they go from a 10,000 x 100 foot runway to a 2,200 x 40 foot runway for the first time.

It has been over a year and I still get crap for that tire.
 
ppragman said:
This brings up another pet peeve of mine. There are a plethora of CFIs out there who condition their students from day one to "BE EASY ON THE BRAKES!!! NO YOU DON'T NEED TO USE SO MUCH BRAKE WE'RE ON A 5000' RUNWAY!!!! WHAT THE HELL!?" I disagree, tell them to be gentle, to not lock them up, and to be ready to let off of them, but I know of some guys who are dammed near afraid to use the brakes and will do everything within their power to keep from using them. Taxi is one thing, there is typically no good reason to use the brakes during taxi except for sharp turns, that said I know of some guys who are in turbine equipment who say, "NEVER USE THE BRAKES, THAT'S WHAT YOU HAVE BETA FOR." Sure that works on 5000' strips, but when you're going in someplace short, and potentially contaminated that sort of logic may or may not work. Now, you don't want to shimmy the nose wheel like our buddy in the video did, but brakes are cheap, skidding an airplane off of the end of a runway is not.
Click to expand...

Now, your statements confuse me.

If we have a long runway, why would I let my students stand on the brakes? If we have a short runway, of course we're going to brake firmly. It's not a fear of using the brakes, or fear of the cost. It's being gentle to the aircraft, and only using the brakes when they actually deserve to be used.

I'm not one to say 'don't touch the brakes' during rollout, but if it's another 2000 feet to the next taxiway, I damned sure don't want to be coming to a near full stop yet either.

I don't think our friend in this video had a problem with braking. His problem was floating. That looked like plenty of runway available had he flown a properly stabilized approach to the approach end of the runway.
 
That's an interesting airport to land at. That runway is at the top of a mountain that was leveled off and back in the late 70's there was a landslide that took away about 700 ft of runway. You can see as he was coming to a stop he was starting to favor the left side of the runway, to his right is about a 300ft drop off. 15, the runway he was landing on has quite a down slope and you can float quite a ways as the runway falls away underneath you. Unless the winds mandate otherwise, I would prefer to land 33 and depart 15.
 
His approach speed was way too high! He should have slowed to 110mph once he began the flare. :insane:
 
Rudabega said:
The CFI is just repeating the owner of the school saying "Stay off the brakes, those cost money." The brakes are cheap, the bald spots on the tires from students locking them up are not.

I had a student panic, lock the brakes and wear down a nice bald spot on the tire. Brand new tire, the boss was rightfully angry.

I have had the talk several times with my boss about how I teach short field landings. I have my students brake to a full stop. If they (primary) can not come to a stop before the thousand foot marker then we keep trying.

When they get it right we head over to the next airport and land on the 2200 foot runway. It is fun watching their faces when they go from a 10,000 x 100 foot runway to a 2,200 x 40 foot runway for the first time.

It has been over a year and I still get crap for that tire.
Click to expand...

That is why I am glad that I learned to fly at an airport with a runway 2400x37
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top