SEL 'FIRM' landings

I fly a Mooney too and carrying too much speed to the pavement always
ends up with you getting to record several landings. The hockey pucks
that Mooney uses for the shock absorbers are pretty unforgiving when it
comes to too much airspeed. The landing gear basically consists of a
couple pieces of steel with some hockey pucks in the middle for
cushioning. :-)

OK.. Here is my story... New Mooney pilot going to a fly-in lunch at
KBAK (Columbus, Indiana). Can't remember it is was the first time that
my wife flew in the Mooney or not but she hadn't been up in it too many
times. BAK is a nice class Delta field with intersecting runways.

I was unfamiliar with the field and the airplane and ended up over the
field a little disoriented as to which runway I was to land on. Once I
figured it out I had to be quick about getting slowed down so I could
drop the gear. Slowing down a Mooney takes being ahead of the plane,
which of course, I wasn't.

My goal was to show my wife how nice and smooth landing our new
low-winger was but I was 20 mph too fast on short final. Of course I
tried to force it on to the runway causing what could only be described
as a pogo-stick with wings trying to stay planted on the runway.

My inexperience in the plane actually caused me to be suprised that we
were now 10 feet off the ground again. No problem, I'll just flair now I
thought. I came down even harder than before and up we went again. I
finally occurred to me that at this point a touch of power may be in
order, so so in goes the throttle. This allowed me to arrest the
bouncing and set up for a proper flair and landing. We rolled to a stop
and I sheepishly walked to the resturant.

I'm quite sure that all the folks in the Tower were having a good laugh
at my expense. I did however log it as 1 T/O and 3 landings. :-)

On the return flight we needed to traverse Indianapolis International's
class Charley. No big deal and we were cleared. What I didn't know
what that my wife had her headset turned down so much that she couldn
hear the controller calling out traffic. As we passed the runway 23
arrival corridor I heard "Mooney 4443Hotel, traffic 3:00 o'clock, 3
miles, westbound a Boeing 757". I looked to my right and there it was
heading staight for us. I called to the controller "Indy Approach,
Mooney 4443Hotel has the traffic". Just then I saw the look of terror on
my wifes face. She had not been able to hear my exchange with the
controller and was a "little concerned" about what she was seeing out
her window. :-)

Needless to say we made it back home and landed uneventfully (using the
proper airspeed of course).

Lessons learned:
Airspeed is important for landing safely
Make sure that the wife knows how to work her headset volume

Jon Kraus
'79 Mooney 201
4443H @ TYQ

Tony wrote:

'Fess up' time. We were having a hanger session a while ago, talking
about firm landings. My worst was going into an airport near Urbana IL
(not sure of the spelling, this was back in the early 80s so it made an
impression on me.)

There was a cross wind from the left, and for some reason I I decided
to land close to the numbers. Turns out there was a big barn not far
from the runway threshold, and it really messed up the airflow right at
the runway. I fly a Mooney, and don't like to carry a lot of airspeed
into the flare.

The wind went from a headwind component of 5 or 8 knots to a tailwind
right at the start of the flare and the airplane quit flying a couple
of feet off the runway. I thought the gear would come through the
wings!

Turns out nothing was damaged, and the locals said they did like to
watch transient pilots deal with that problem.

I had to return there later that day, landed a lot longer on the
runway, and carried a few more knots of airspeed as well.

I learned a lesson most of you probably already know. If there's a
crosswind and there's any kind of obstruction to the windward side of
the runway, take special care.

That's my story (and I'm sticking to that excuse!). What's your's, and
what were the lessons learned?

It doesn't take long to figure out you need really long runways if you
carry too much speed into the flare with an M20J! Too any of us Mooney
jocks still don't hear the stall warning horn before touchdown: if you
really want to have fun with a 172 driver in the right seat really hold
if off with a little power until you touch down with the tail skid
first. They NEVER will have been that nose high in the flare.


I'll bet you find this true as well: watching a Skyhawk make an
approach to a fairly short runway and telling yourself he'll NEVER get
it down in time from there. But he does, without even using a slip.
Know thy airplane, huh?

Tony

If it goes 'Beep'-'Squeak' in a Mooney, you know you made a excellent
landing )

Big John
Ex Mark 20C
```````````````````````````````````

On 8 Jan 2006 21:40:31 -0800, "Tony" wrote:

It doesn't take long to figure out you need really long runways if you
carry too much speed into the flare with an M20J! Too any of us Mooney
jocks still don't hear the stall warning horn before touchdown: if you
really want to have fun with a 172 driver in the right seat really hold
if off with a little power until you touch down with the tail skid
first. They NEVER will have been that nose high in the flare.


I'll bet you find this true as well: watching a Skyhawk make an
approach to a fairly short runway and telling yourself he'll NEVER get
it down in time from there. But he does, without even using a slip.
Know thy airplane, huh?

It doesn't take long to figure out you need really long runways if you
carry too much speed into the flare with an M20J! Too any of us Mooney
jocks still don't hear the stall warning horn before touchdown: if you
really want to have fun with a 172 driver in the right seat really hold
if off with a little power until you touch down with the tail skid
first. They NEVER will have been that nose high in the flare.


I'll bet you find this true as well: watching a Skyhawk make an
approach to a fairly short runway and telling yourself he'll NEVER get
it down in time from there. But he does, without even using a slip.
Know thy airplane, huh?

Confession time & a learning moment -

Picture my then nearly new C172M on the ground at Philipsburg MT, with
a runway 16/34, and a strong hot wind from what seemed like WSW at
maybe 25 knots. We had been camping with another couple that had
driven from from Idaho Falls & was time to shift the vacation back to
IDF. We loaded all the gear and the two women into their truck & us
guys were to fly to IDF. Obviously a better decision would have been
to wait, but I reasoned that since we were light.........

What runway to use? Well it was downhill slightly to the south so I
chose that one.

For some stupid reason (thinking a short/soft field situation because
of the elevation and the heat?) I tried to raise the nosewheel early in
the takeoff roll while using full right aileron. Things quickly
deteriorated into the rubbity-scrubbities as the gear protested being
dragged sidewise. Acceleration was slow, and it seemed like an
eternity to get to flying speed. Once horsed into the air, we cleared
the barb wire by a couple of feet.

It was pure chance that I took the crosswind from the right. Had it
been on the left, I'm sure we would have rolled it into a ball. My X/W
technique was awful & it took the next biennial to straighten that out.
Lessons:

1) In any choice situation, take the crosswind from the right. Be
especially wary of left crosswinds. (I have not seen this published
anywhere)

2) Recognize that in any marginal short field/soft field situation,
the presence of a crosswind takes precedence over everything else.

3) Plan your takeoffs. It is too late to start planning them once
initiated.

1) In any choice situation, take the crosswind from the right. Be
especially wary of left crosswinds. (I have not seen this published
anywhere)

Can you expand on that a bit, please? I'm not sure I see where you're going
with this.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Jay Honeck wrote:
1) In any choice situation, take the crosswind from the right. Be
especially wary of left crosswinds. (I have not seen this published
anywhere)

Can you expand on that a bit, please? I'm not sure I see where you're going
with this.

When the nose is high in the flare, if you have to add power for any reason,
P-factor will tend to add to your problems with a wind from the left and help
you with a wind from the right. In addition, I've always found that slipping
into a wind from the right gives me better visibility in the high-wing aircraft
I've owned.

George Patterson
Coffee is only a way of stealing time that should by rights belong to
your slightly older self.

Jay Honeck wrote:
1) In any choice situation, take the crosswind from the right. Be
especially wary of left crosswinds. (I have not seen this published
anywhere)

Can you expand on that a bit, please?

I should have clarified the sentence & said for takeoffs only. It
already takes right rudder in a zero wind to compensate for the
rotating slipstream etc, but it takes still more right rudder for any
left crosswind. The result for me (C172M) is that a 10 knot left
crosswind is like a 20 knot right crosswind in terms of rudder-needs
and pucker factor.

Is this true in the Cherokees? It may not be so much so because of the
fixed nosewheel steer connection, although when the nose is raised it
has to be true.

NRP

nrp wrote:
I should have clarified the sentence & said for takeoffs only. It
already takes right rudder in a zero wind to compensate for the
rotating slipstream etc, but it takes still more right rudder for any
left crosswind. The result for me (C172M) is that a 10 knot left
crosswind is like a 20 knot right crosswind in terms of rudder-needs
and pucker factor.

I'm still not sure I follow you. If your objective immediately after
takeoff was to have the fuselage aligned with the runway, as it is
immediately before landing, I'd agree that more rudder would be
required against the rudder weathervaning. Takeoff is not the same as
landing in this respect though. Upon liftoff you should make a
_coordinated_ turn into the wind in order to add the appropriate amount
of crab angle required to stay above the runway (left aileron and left
rudder into a left crosswind). Asymmetric rudder usage shouldn't
really apply, I think, aside from the usual net left-turning
tendencies.

If you're not flying in a coordinated manner on takeoff you're throwing
away performance and operating at less than optimal efficiency - at a
time when you can use all the performance you can get.

Or maybe I'm misunderstanding. I'm still licensed to learn.

-R

If you're not flying in a coordinated manner on takeoff you're throwing
away performance and operating at less than optimal efficiency - at a
time when you can use all the performance you can get.

Or maybe I'm misunderstanding. I'm still licensed to learn.

Makes sense to me!

:-)
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"