Power off 180's

Cool, should be a great time! If the trim holds pitch well, I would then recommend to try trimming for a lower airspeed and fight off the forward presure to let it settle through as you flare....just don't flare to high! Or a progressive pitch up trim adjustment a few knots ahead as you flare, as you really should trim for the airspeed you are flying. But again, eyes outside, with 70 hours you should have a sight picture for +/- 5 and a decent seat of the pants feel. Have fun and be safe! Let us know what you find out...
 
Tricky but the most useful out of all the commercial maneuvers. It's all about the base leg. if your too high make it square or extended out. Too low or slight then turn a tighter circle for the runway. Only use first notch of flaps if any. Slip if you are very high. pitch up a little if you are slightly high, this will slow you down and increase descent rate but don't get too slow. Aim well before your point. Use the last 2 notch of flaps in the roundout if you need the extra lift to avoid being short.
 
Better set today, I think I found a good set of landmarks to base my turn on at KGRR. Holding gear to short final and using a pump or two of flaps to extend the float a bit if short. Was nailing the numbers tonight, but wind was 3kts.

Tried a gear down pattern and that just was awful. Only made it 300ft past the threshold.

More practice right before my ride at noon.

Thanks for all the advice ;).
 
Good to hear if that is working for you for the ride. Keep working on it after to substitute landmarks for energy management ques. Those landmarks are simply physical position markers relative to your position along the maneuver to base how well you are managing that energy. Now, if those landmarks go away, are you still going to be able to accomplish the maneuver?

Also...

DPE: Why did you wait to put the gear down?
Jskibo: For in an actual power off landing, I want to make the final decision to lower the gear based on terrain conditions.

Have fun, let us know how it goes!
 
Have fun with the ride!

I'll watch for you, at least while you're practicing. I'm scheduled out at 10:30 in a blue and yellow striped Lear

1248075859.jpg .
 
jskibo said:
Did that one come in tonight?

Use 8R when you depart so I can keep with my Short approaches :)

Can't practice too much, 100LL is $1.70 cheaper at Oceana Co
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I think it came in earlier today.
We usually depart off from 17 if the winds allow, so we'll stay out of your way.

Pass your ride tomorrow and I'll buy you a beer. Or two.
Beer.gif
 
Well hope it isn't an omen, but I lost my plotter between leaving my office and getting home today. Not in the stack of papers, not in the car.
 
I tried this maneuver in the Arrow IV and came up short with gear already down. I'll try bringing it down on base or short final.
 
jspeed87 said:
I tried this maneuver in the Arrow IV and came up short with gear already down. I'll try bringing it down on base or short final.
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You just need to turn sooner. I've done it in the Arrow before and you just need to get the turn going and monitor your progress. It's a visual maneuver, visually monitor your glide path rather than trying to fly some pre-set profile.

It may also be that you are simply flying your patterns too wide.
 
I had at least 500 hrs as a commercial glider pilot before getting my power ratings, so the power-off 180 was always easy. I've had to do three so far: SEL Comm, CFI, Pt.135 (Caravan). Here are some suggestions. 1. Know your aiming marker. It's usually about 200' before your touchdown point. See where it sits on your canopy and watch it closely. If it's going down the canopy you're going long, if it's going up the canopy you're short.
2. Don't touch the flaps unless you need them to extend your float on short final or in ground effect. In other words, the flaps are your backup if you end up a bit short.
3. If you're high, slip.
They key is aiming point and maintaining whatever your app. speed is. The aiming marker will only be valid if you maintain a steady speed and stable attitude. Trim for hands-off at best glide, plus one-half the headwind.
On my comm ride in an Arrow I was short, so I just waited till we got in ground effect, and pulled in one notch. We were still a bit short so I put in the second notch and it touched down on right on the money.
A week or two later a student/applicant pulled the flaps up in the flare and put the gear through the wings.....
 
jskibo said:
I do appreciate all the input so far!
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Just a few more thoughts about dead stick landings - I've done over 400 of them.

It is ultimately an energy management exercise. There are three ways an airplane can store energy. Fuel in the tanks, altitude, and airspeed. Fuel is normally what you would use to control descent, with the throttle, but that isn't an option with a power off 180. Altitude and airspeed are the only sources of energy.

"Trim for best glide" is typically taught for power off landings, but there is a piece missing there. If you fly an approach exactly at best glide and hit the spot you intend, it means that you had exactly the correct amount of energy (altitude and airspeed) when you started the maneuver. But what if there is a headwind, or too much control movement, or you misjudged something? It doesn't leave much margin for error. To reliably hit the same spot on the runway, you will need to have excess energy, and dissipate it in a controlled manner. So you will need to be always higher and possibly faster than normal.

While there are two sources of energy, you have a few tools to dissipate energy. Putting the boards out (some Mooneys), slipping, increasing airspeed, and adding flaps gear (drag) are those tools. Flaps are problematic, as you can't remove or adjust them quickly, but they are effective. The gear needs to be down anyway, and unless you know that you need to drop the wheels late, you may as well do it immediately. That leaves airspeed and yaw as the two primary things you can control. Being fast will steepen your descent, but it leaves you with excess energy to deal with, so you need to plan for that. 1.4 Vso is typical for a power out landing, and I wouldn't want to be any faster than 1.5 Vso. Slipping is the most effective way to control descent angle. You can add and remove it quickly, it is effective, and doesn't leave you with extra energy near the ground.

How I personally fly/teach this:
  1. Turn for the numbers and drop gear, airspeed 1.4Vso
  2. Judge descent rate. You should be high.
  3. Add enough flaps that you are roughly on the descent angle you want, but on the high side of it.
  4. Slip as necessary to make the sight picture like you want. Plan a point 200' early or so to have room to bleed off speed.
Good luck!
This is probably the most important maneuver, in my opinion, on the commercial checkride. In a piston single, it is a life-or-death skill being able to park the plane anywhere you want, with no power and at the lowest possible airspeed.
 
More thoughts from another pilot with a few hundred dead stick landings that likes to transfer glider flying to airplanes -

A rule of thumb that I use and teach is to put in about a half-rudder deflection slip abeam the touch down point at a speed a few knots faster than best glide. Once configured like this with the gear down just fly the power-off 180 to 200' short of the touchdown point adjusting the constant bank/turn radius and the amount of slip to make it happen. This way you can control the amount of energy relative to the TD point with distance from the runway AND the amount of altitude/speed all without touching the flaps. Adding a few extra knots helps to get through any wind shear or turbulence that you might hit in the base to final area, and will help you penetrate any headwind that you might have. The extra speed can be bled off easily on short final with a little bit more 'slip' and/or flaps. S-Turns (with alternating cross controls to stay in a slip (not a skid) for both directions of turn) work well on final to lose altitude as well.

It was said earlier but slips are great because there is no loss of lift accompanied with the loss in drag once you remove the slip like there would be with a flap retraction. You can also save the flaps for 'extra lift' that will reduce your angle of attack and decrease your stall speed if you get to the runway before your planned point and need some extra energy to get it the rest of the way to the point. (which was again said above)

Another point to remember is to SLIP around the turn not SKID around the turn. A slip in a turn is much safer and also more effective because you have adverse yaw working against the turn already and therefore can produce way more drag with the rudder in that 'adverse' direction than if you were not cross controlling.

I agree that it is the most important (and fun) maneuver as well. I feel that good energy management is far more important than the ability to do a nice lazy-8.
 
I practiced all of mine without flaps, once I got proficient with those then when I had flaps available it seemed to make it infinitely easier.
 
tlewis95 said:
It was said earlier but slips are great because there is no loss of lift accompanied with the loss in drag once you remove the slip like there would be with a flap retraction. You can also save the flaps for 'extra lift' that will reduce your angle of attack and decrease your stall speed if you get to the runway before your planned point and need some extra energy to get it the rest of the way to the point. (which was again said above)
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Very good advice. On more thing to remember - the higher flap settings on most piston singles add almost no lift, they are almost entirely drag devices. The first notch or two in some aircraft will lower the stall speed, but past that, it just makes the descent steeper. This is absolutely not what you want. If even a full slip isn't enough, you can still make S-turns to bleed off some altitude if it comes down to it. You can't get altitude back though, so once you are low and at best glide, it is game over. Configuring more drag is generally a bad idea.
 
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