On Tue, 10 Jul 2007 20:14:04 -0500, "Dan Luke"
wrote:


"Matt Whiting" wrote:

The Arrow I now fly which has a 3-blade prop is much worse than my 182 in
the glide ratio department. I can barely make a 180 power-off landing with
it. You have to turn base as soon as you cut power abeam the landing spot
or you'll never make it!

As a CFI giving me a checkout in an Arrow put it: "You can cut the power and
glide a Cessna in, but a Piper comes down like dropped car keys."

You can also dead stick a Cherokee 180 with a little practice. If you
want steep try landing a Glasair III power off. It has a little bitty
wing with nearly 30# per sq foot of wing loading. The Cherokee is
about 17# (give or take depending on year and version) At best glide
you are probably looking at descent greater than 2200 fpm yet you
should be able to grease it on.

Even a Bonanza power off with gear out and full flaps has an
impressive rate of descent.OTOH with gear and flaps up best glide at
roughly 120 MPH gives a rate of descent of only 500 to 600 fpm which
gives a glide ratio between 17.6 and 21 to one.

Engine out is gear up and no flaps until the runway is made. Then you
hit the gear switch and flap switch to full. As you need to get rid
of a LOT of speed it's a good idea to practice this so you know "when
the runway is made" because if you wait until you are over the end of
the runway you are going to use a LOT of it, probably over 3000 feet.
OTOH a short filed landing will use less than 1200 and with a bit of
practice you can shorten that. Of course, final for a short field is
STEEP.

Flaps are a good portion of the energy management.