Ron Natalie writes:

Depends on the aircraft. Some planes they are purely mechanical from
the flap handle in the cockpit.

I'm surprised that a small handle in the cockpit would provide enough
leverage to lower flaps. Isn't there are a lot of aerodynamic
pressure to overcome against them (at least if they are lowered in
flight)?

I'm always surprised by how much is still mechanically linked in
aircraft. I'm not necessarily saying that's bad--simple is reliable,
generally speaking--but somehow I don't picture control surfaces as
something that one could easily move without assistance. I suppose
small planes are lighter than they appear, and just because the wings
look relatively big doesn't mean that they are heavy or hard to move.

My plane specs flaps up or 1/2 for takeoff (short field takeoff done
with 1/2). Landing can be done with any setting of flaps.

I've always been landing with flaps down completely, and usually
taking off with some flaps, as I had read that this was necessary (and
I had seen accident reports about pilots who crashed because they took
off without first lowering flaps). But from what you and others here
say it sounds like I have considerably more discretion in whether or
not I lower flaps for both operations.

Are there good reasons to lower flaps in flight, outside take-off and
landing? I've thought that they would be useful for increasing drag
and lowering airspeed, but since they apparently cannot be used at
high speeds I guess this isn't a good idea. Sometimes if one must
descend rapidly just idling the throttle doesn't seem to be enough to
stay below hazardous speeds, and few aircraft seem to have speed
brakes.

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