Arrow Power settings/Steep spiral help

JordanD

Honorary Member
I finally started doing training in the Arrow for my CFI-A, and wow are my maneuvers a mess. Left steep turns I lose a ton of altitude, gain a ton of altitude when going right, and my steep spirals are really a mess. I can spiral over a general area, but forget about keeping a set distance around a certain point, it's hopeless. Any pointers? How far should I be from my point when I start the maneuver?

Also, does anyone have any power settings for maneuvers in the Arrow? It's an R-200 with the three bladed prop. My CFI had me trying to do 8's on pylons at cruise power and we were ridiculously fast, which screwed the whole maneuver for me.
 
I have always done steep spirals at idle @ best glide usually. You want the point close, really close. They are steep spirals so between 60-30deg of bank is what you are looking for.

As for the 8's on pylons I have always done them at a speed around maneuvering speed or close to it. Though the speed really does not matter if you choose the correct distance and critical Alt for your ground speed.
 
Very typical problems for transitioning to the right seat. It'll take some time for you to relearn the new sight picture, but it'll come. Steep spirals are always difficult from the right seat, as you shouldn't be able to see the point (if you are doing them correctly). IDK where you are, but in the midwest, we used to pick a prominent intersection, and use the roads as guides. For example you'd enter southbound just slightly to the right of the N-S road, then when over the E-W road immediately roll into a 60 degree bank (this will probably be the only point you'll actually see the intersection), then modulate the rollout to be at your shallowest bank angle as you recross the E-W road northbound. Hope that helps. It's easier to demonstrate than explain...
 
On Steep Turns from the right seat you attitude indicator will be below the horizon to the left and above to the right. Use the sight picture just as if you were in the left seat but adjust for the right seat, so it will kind of be a mirror image. Make it a visual maneuver without staring at the gauges.

Steep spirals, try using a visual reference straight ahead when you're abeam the reference for the roll in. When you come back around you can see where you are using that reference. If your using an Arrow II with the hershey bar wing, it glides like a brick, have plenty of altitude for 3 complete turns. Clearing the engine on the upwind side is a common practice.

8's on pylons. Think of it this way. A faster ground speed could mean quicker variations in pivitol altitude with strong winds. Don't buy into that crap of 3-5 seconds of straight and level flight between the pylons like the airplane flying handbook says, it won't happen. That would require you to have pylons that are basically on top of one another and a ridiculous bank angle to perform the maneuver.

Power settings? What altitudes are you flying at?

If it's near sea level I'd use about 17-18" MP and 2400 RPM

At higher altitudes maybe 20"MP - 2400 RPM
 
There are a bunch of podcasts by UND (University of North Dakota) on youtube covering the commercial maneuvers using an Arrow.
 
I've seen most of them, they aren't too bad. Would the power settings stay the same regardless of if we have the 3 blades prop? So far the only difference I know of is we don't have the red arc restriction on the tach.
 
I've seen most of them, they aren't too bad. Would the power settings stay the same regardless of if we have the 3 blades prop? So far the only difference I know of is we don't have the red arc restriction on the tach.
Pretty much the same.
 
I've seen most of them, they aren't too bad. Would the power settings stay the same regardless of if we have the 3 blades prop? So far the only difference I know of is we don't have the red arc restriction on the tach.

I think the videos are excellent. I even saved them on my computer to use during my CFI oral if I needed to. I would play those videos in my car using the ipod jack every day. If you combine reading and tabbing/highlighting your AIM/AFM/PHAK with listening to these videos, you can teach the maneuvers in your sleep to a cat.

I used 120 MIAS for 8s on pylons, which yields a pivotal altitude of 960'. I knew that in to the wind I would be slower, yielding a lower PA, and vice versa for downwind segments.

20" & 2400 worked in the 2 bladed Arrow I flew.

As others have suggested, make the steep turns 90% visual, only looking inside occasionally. You should be looking for traffic and heads outside as much as practical. I would place the oil door on the horizon for steep turns to the right, for example. Or, find a rivet on on the windshield and place that on the horizon. Also, make sure you add bank first, and not pitch.

Although you will need to compensate for the loss of the vertical component of lift, it is probably not as much as you think. Roll the bank in, bump up power 1-2", find the horizon, give it 3 racks of trim, and adjust as necessary.
 
Thanks. I've gotten them down pretty well. For whatever reason it seems like I need way less back pressure going left or else I climb, then I need a whole lot more back pressure to the right as soon as I hit 30 degrees. Not sure why te difference but its working well. 20/2200 has been working for me, but I'm not really sure about the prop limits. A lot of guys including my last DPE said it doesn't apply to the three bladed prop, but I'm having a hard time finding stuff to back this up. For me it seems like anything higher than 20/2200 you end up screaming around well above Va.
 
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