Magnus wrote in message ...
Just curious how you guys perform this maneuver. From what I've been
taught you should flare with a little power still in to soften the
touchdown, and then keep rolling to avoid digging yourself into the
runway surface.

I just think that it should be possible to land anyway, without any
power like you normally land. Just keep the plane airborne as long as
possible and keep the nosewheel up as long as you can. Keeping power in
just eats up a lot of runway it seems.

I mean, how often do you happen to find a rough and long field.
Ususally if a soft-field landing is required, it's a pretty short field
too out in the bush somewhere.

Approach like a short-field and flare as long as possible to soften the
touchdown would be my way of doing it.


That's part of the problem with the PTS, a lot of it is not realistic.
Yes, most soft fiels are also short (in my experience). I've taken my
Mooney into a soft fields and its usually the length that I'm most
worried about. Also, a lot of soft fields don't have any go around
possible. Most of the soft fields I used in the Aeronca were "one-way"
fields because some giant trees or soemthing prevent you from going
around. In some planes you can't hold power in the flare (like a
Mooney) so you have to get used to planning the approach right. In
some fields you don't want to have to hold power becaues losing the
engine on short final could mean you're going to hit the trees short
of the runway. You can get just a soft a touch down w/o power. In a
real (i.e. not PTS) soft field landing you should consider...
1) "Drag the field", i.e. do a low pass and decide where you want to
touch the mains and where you want to touch the nose down.
2) Once the mains touch add power to hold the nose off until you reach
the part of the field you plan to drop the nose on. This can be
further down the field because you don't need as much stopping
distance from the nose touch down as the mains.
3) Don't worry about landing on "center line", land in the best part
of the field. Notice that the soft field landing is the ONLY landing
in the PTS that does not require you to be on center line.

-Robert, CFI