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#11
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"Kyle Boatright" wrote in message
... What's the narrowest runway you've ever used? At what runway width are you comfortable? Phoenix Regional (A39) @ 4000 x 50 Jay Beckman PP-ASEL Chandler, AZ |
#12
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Casey Wilson wrote: snip. and touchdown... THERE WAS THE GOD AWFULEST RACKET I HAD EVER HEARD! Thirty-two years later, I can still hear Bob laughing when I'm on final and I get the center-line more than a wheel-span off to either side. now, that was a great story, well told. thanks my narrow runway is about 3" wide. or so it seemed to me. where i got my ppl there are 2 runways, 17/35 r/l and the one on the west side is big. like bravo big. concrete that goes on, as chris rea says, "forever" and is very wide. too much crosswind for your i52? not a problem, just bring her in crosswise. then there was the runway that we terrified students were allowed: "the little dirt raod". that's what we called it and by golly, that's just what it looks like from 1000'. maybe half as long as the real runway and rather than that pretty greyish/whitish concrete, this path was paved with asphalt. or whatever's left after asphalt dies. all black and rough except for the volunteer plants expressing thru the ample cracks. on paper, it's 50' but i'm suspicious. if ray charles really wanted to learn to fly, he could have learned take-offs there. the many potholes formed a kind of brail that you learned to read and about halfway down there's a huge speed bump that tells you it's time to by-god rotate or brake like mad. mostly, we would launch off it. as you tried to line up on the little dirt road you of course had to especially worry about not wandering into the real runway which is exactly 17" west or, to the east, the water-runway which they use for float plane operations and which is also exactly 17" to the other side and they keep it stocked with sharks. a big-shot thousands-of-hours pilot explained to me that they allowed the students to use the little dirt road only because they didn't want our dirty little carcases interfering with important operations. i felt better then. ((G)) dan |
#13
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I never landed on an 18ft runway - don;t really know it I would want to
- I think not. What was your shortest? Again, I'm very conservative about this. Mine to date is 2400 ft with trees. My worst airport to date is in a very narrow valley where the runway is longer and wider than my minimums, but the surrounding mountains encroach enough that you cannot fly a standard pattern. If I'm being honest, I'm not a great fan of extreme runways (nor is my insurer Tony C-GICE In article , "Dave Stadt" wrote: 18 feet. I'd rather deal with narrow than wide which are usually lacking in visual clues. "Kyle Boatright" wrote in message ... What's the narrowest runway you've ever used? At what runway width are you comfortable? Among other things, I had an interesting experience yesterday with a runway that was far narrower than any I'd used before... We had gone to Dallas for Mother's day, and returned to Atlanta yesterday in my RV-6, which is set-up for basic VFR. The weather was marginal for most of the way, and we made two unscheduled stops and a couple of 180 degree course reversals to avoid weather that was below my minimums. This turned a 3.5 hour trip into an 8 hour odyssey. Our first 180 turn and unscheduled stop occurred when the ceiling was lower than forecast, below my personal minimums, and dropping along our route of flight. I hit the "nearest" function on the GPS, and retreated to the nearest airfield to give the FSS a call on the cell phone (we were too low for radio communication). As we overflew the airfield, I noticed that all it was was a paved strip and a paved ramp. No buildings nearby. Also, the strip looked fairly narrow, but I went ahead with the landing anyway. On very short final, it became obvious that this strip redefined narrow. Accoring to the AFD, it is 50' wide, but what the AFD didn't say is that 3' tall sagebrush grows right to the edge of the strip, and occasionally cuts into the 50' useful width. Given that 3' sagebrush will hit the RV-6's wingtips, I probably had 10'-12' clear on each side. Catching the sagebrush with a wingtip would have almost certainly caused a groundloop. With this in mind, and concentrating hard enough to cause permanant forehead wrinkles, I managed to keep the airplane centered on landing and rollout, then taxiied (sp?) to the ramp, where I shut down, pulled out the cell phone and got exactly zero signal... (Sometimes you can't win.) So, we fired up again, taxiied out, and I kept the bird out of the weeds on takeoff and off we went. In the 30 minutes our detour consumed, the weather along the route improved meaningfully, and we made another 225 miles before the next unplanned stop. After a 3 hour wait and a couple of visits with the on-field FSS at Greenville, MS, we found a safe path around the line of storms on the Alabama/Mississippi border and came on home. One of the real advantages to a relatively high performance airplane is that if the weather allows, you can get above most of the cumulus and eyeball your way around the convective stuff. I'm not sure we would have gotten around yesterday's weather in a C-172 or Cherokee... -- Tony Roberts PP-ASEL VFR OTT Night Cessna 172H C-GICE |
#14
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"Kyle Boatright" wrote in message
... What's the narrowest runway you've ever used? At what runway width are you comfortable? Well, let's see. There are several 30' and under wide runways in the Puget Sound area, almost all of which I use on a semi-regular basis, and have landed on at least once. The narrowest is 24'. It doesn't seem uncomfortable to me at all. I may have even landed on narrower somewhere, but if so I don't recall. In my seaplane, probably the landings with the least margin for lateral error have been in canals in Florida. I don't actually know how wide they are, but if you stay in the center, you're fine. As with the runway you describe, it's not so much the width of the landing surface, as it is the width of the area the wings must clear. My plane has a 40' wingspan, so the canals must be wider than that. In any case, 10' on each side sounds like a LOT of room to me. However, I will readily grant that comfort depends a lot on pilot experience and confidence. Even so, I'll point out that when my primary instructor got fed up with me landing all over the place on Boeing Field's 200' wide runway, he fixed that by taking me over to Port Orchard with their 28' wide runway and demonstrating that, when necessary, I had no trouble staying on the centerline. I was no longer permitted to claim "but it's too hard" back at Boeing. Pete |
#15
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What's the narrowest runway you've ever used? http://www.airnav.com/airport/L53 Lodi Airpark near Sacramento, CA has an 1875x22ft. runway. If I remember right there's a ditch on the side too - leaving little room for error. Also, Harris Ranch (also in CA) has a 30ft. runway which can be really challenging because in summer afternoons the wind tends to gust straight across the runway. http://www.airnav.com/airport/3O8 - Ray |
#16
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In article ,
"Kyle Boatright" wrote: What's the narrowest runway you've ever used? At what runway width are you comfortable? IIRC Tew-Mac in MA was 26' wide, and it was fine. My CFII was tired of me landing left of centerline at KBED (150' wide) so he took me to Tew-Mac. He proved to me that I can land on the centerline and I proved to him that I can land on the centerline when I want to. :-) -- Bob Noel no one likes an educated mule |
#17
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Kyle Boatright wrote:
What's the narrowest runway you've ever used? At what runway width are you comfortable? Among other things, I had an interesting experience yesterday with a runway that was far narrower than any I'd used before... I think 35' was the narrowest. My comfort level depends on the wind, etc. In calm conditions, I'd be comfortable with 10'. In a stiff cross wind, I like at least 50'. We had gone to Dallas for Mother's day, and returned to Atlanta yesterday in my RV-6, which is set-up for basic VFR. The weather was marginal for most of the way, and we made two unscheduled stops and a couple of 180 degree course reversals to avoid weather that was below my minimums. This turned a 3.5 hour trip into an 8 hour odyssey. Our first 180 turn and unscheduled stop occurred when the ceiling was lower than forecast, below my personal minimums, and dropping along our route of flight. I hit the "nearest" function on the GPS, and retreated to the nearest airfield to give the FSS a call on the cell phone (we were too low for radio communication). As we overflew the airfield, I noticed that all it was was a paved strip and a paved ramp. No buildings nearby. Also, the strip looked fairly narrow, but I went ahead with the landing anyway. On very short final, it became obvious that this strip redefined narrow. Accoring to the AFD, it is 50' wide, but what the AFD didn't say is that 3' tall sagebrush grows right to the edge of the strip, and occasionally cuts into the 50' useful width. Given that 3' sagebrush will hit the RV-6's wingtips, I probably had 10'-12' clear on each side. Catching the sagebrush with a wingtip would have almost certainly caused a groundloop. Another good reason to fly a Cessna. :-) We have the same problem with snow windrows here in the winter. Matt |
#18
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What's the narrowest runway you've ever used? At what runway width are
you comfortable? For three years I flew out of little Sylvania Field (C89), in Sturtevant, WI. 2272 feet long, 33 feet wide, paved. (With a parallel grass strip that saved many a young pilot's hash...mine included.) Precision was rewarded. -- Jay Honeck Iowa City, IA Pathfinder N56993 www.AlexisParkInn.com "Your Aviation Destination" |
#19
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I think 35' was the narrowest. My comfort level depends on the wind, etc.
In calm conditions, I'd be comfortable with 10'. Methinks you exaggerate a tad? :-) What's the wheelbase of your plane? -- Jay Honeck Iowa City, IA Pathfinder N56993 www.AlexisParkInn.com "Your Aviation Destination" |
#20
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Kyle Boatright wrote:
What's the narrowest runway you've ever used? At what runway width are you comfortable? Among other things, I had an interesting experience yesterday with a runway that was far narrower than any I'd used before... Liberty, NC, 2A5 Runway 2/20 Dimensions: 3800 x 40 ft. / 1158 x 12 m http://www.airnav.com/airport/2A5 The Mooney's wingspan is 36' 1". There are no noticable obstructions along the sides of the runway, so I didn't have any heartburn about taxiing / takeoff / landing. It definitely is a good place to observe the optical effects of a narrow runway during short final, though. My home airport has 150 ft wide runways. Dave |
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