flaps

"BT" wrote

You knowingly had problems in the traffic pattern and landing because you did
not know the flaps were not working, and yet you took off on a night cross
country in marginal weather to a relatively short runway based on your
mechanic calling you a "wimp".

Whoa, there. Facts are getting twisted.

The mechanic called him a wimp after the fact (of the unrecognized no flaps
landing) in reference to bringing the plane back home.
--
Jim in NC

Kobra,

He also said I was a complete wimp (he used
a different word that began with a p) if I couldn't land that plane without
the flaps on our 3,500 feet of runway.


He's damn right!

Seriously and without trying to offend or anything, I think your post reveals
a ton of problems.

First, the flaps. For a no-flaps landing you add maybe 5 knots to your
approach speed. That's less than a 10 percent increase in speed, which results
in less than a 20 percent increase in distance. From a quick google search, a
standard rollout for the 177RG is 730 feet, total distance over the 50 feet
obstacle is 1350 feet. With an additional 5 knots, if you come anywhere close
to a 3000 feet roll and require heavy breaking, as you describe, you REALLY
need to work on those landings (the normal ones, not even the short-field
variant). You should be able to stop in well under 1000 feet with no flaps
every time you try. Even giving any thought to a 3500 feet runway being a
problem indicates a serious problem with pilot training, IMHO.

As others have posted, this is just one of the many problems your post
indicates:

- You seem to have been WAY too fast on final. Yet you don't seem to have gone
through enough trouble-shooting to find the (rather obvious) cause. You didn't
go around with so many things not "going right", either.
- You seem to have little to no familiarity with your plane in slow flight,
especially without flaps.
- You seem to have more or less included in your planning the possibility of
flying at night, yet you let the landing light go unrepaired for a long time.
- You pondered the potential difficulties of your landing AFTER taking off,
IOW in the air.

IMHO, a serious re-evaluation of your decision-making process in connection
with piloting would be a very good idea.

--
Thomas Borchert (EDDH)

Longworth wrote:
I fly my own plane the same way that I flew rental planes. Every
so often, Rick and I would try to do some basic maneuvers such as slow
flight, steep turns, stalls, soft and short field landings. We have
the tires and brakes replaced about every 250 or so hours. I have no
ideas how much money we would have saved if we had 'babied' our plane.
IMHO, being proficient at short field landings may save my skin
someday and no amount of money is worth my life.

Hai Longworth


Couldn't have said it better myself.

Roger,

I subcribed to NASA Callback and had filed a NASA report once
(eventhough everything I did in that flight was legal). I think the
very fact that a pilot filed a report or posted their experience
indicates that he/she had reflected on the event, learned a lesson
from it and wanted to share the experience with others to learn. I
don't think that any pilot could honesty say that he/she had never
made a bad decision or an error.

Kobra was surprised that he did not notice that the flaps were
inoperative. He called his mechanic. He pondered about the
situation. He advised others to go practice no-flap landings. He
certainly DID think enough about the incidence to post it here. He
might have even thought about it while sitting in a quiet corner ;-)

Everytime that I read a post about some bad events from a fellow
pilot, I always cringe in seeing reprimanding or scolding remarks from
the Monday morning quarrterback or armchair pilots. It's a good thing
the Callback site does not have a readers' feedback option!

I have flown for less than 7 years and have just a bit shy of
700hrs. I have learned a lot about flying, about safety, about my own
capability and limitation skillwise and judgementwise from other
pilots, from posts such as this one by Kobra. I am a very safety
minded flyer. I do my best not to fly when being stressed, tired. I
am very lucky to have a constant copilot to share the workload. I
fully sympathize with the single pilot especially single pilot
IFR. Flying can be very demanding. I can see myself making the
same errors as confessed by other pilots under similar circumstances.
I am grateful to learn from their mistakes. I do not want to see
people gets discouraged or afraid of posting their flying experience
for fear of criticism or condemnation.

Hai Longworth

On Wed, 11 Jul 2007 04:21:15 +0000, Jim Carter wrote:

It is almost 2nd nature to reach for the trim wheel right after
selecting flaps in a Cessna so why didn't the poster notice that he didn't
need to retrim?

Perhaps that - the "second nature" part - is exactly why it didn't
register.

I just did a flight review in our R182. Discussing gear use, the CFI
mentioned that during some training he did of someone once upon a time
there was some extended flight during which the gear horn was sounding (a
simulated engine failure). When it finally came time to land, the pilot
never put down the gear; he'd completely tuned out the sound.

Our brains are weird.

The CFI called a go around on that landing. The student went to pull the
gear up for the go around and only then realized that it was still up.
Despite the horn still doing it's bleat bleat.

- Andrew

"Roy Smith" wrote in message
...
Peter Clark wrote:
The intent of the limitation - flaps have to be working - is obvious.
They don't say you have to actually use them, but they do have to be in
working order.

There is some logic in this. All the Cessna AFMs I've seen (i.e. for
various flavors of their piston singles) have nice detailed performance
charts showing how much runway you need to land with various combinations
of weight, temperature, elevation, wind, and phase of moon, but the
numbers
always are for full flaps. There is NO data on how much runway you need
without flaps, therefor there is no way you can comply with 91.103 which
requires that you familiarize yourself with the takeoff and landing
distances.

Now, you know, and I know, and every body hanging out in the airport
coffee
shop knows that you can land a 172 with no flaps on a 2000 foot paved
runway without any problems (assuming you know what you're doing). But,
that doesn't count when it comes to determining if the airplane is
airworthy.

Well said Roy. I can see Cessna adding it to the "Operating Limits",
after all the charts
for that aircraft using specify their use, hence the KOEL. The 1967 172H
manual I'm looking at has a single page limitations section, with no mention
of flaps. Just the Day/Night/VFR, with instruments, IFR, normal category.
The landing chart is a single line assuming short field over an obstacle,
with 40 degrees of flap.

Remember, airworthy is a state of paperwork, nothing more, nothing less.

Interesting concept, what would Orville, Wilbur, or Dudley think? You
don't happen to have an "FAA" definition of airworthy do you?

Al G

"Longworth" wrote in message
oups.com...
Roger,

I subcribed to NASA Callback and had filed a NASA report once
(eventhough everything I did in that flight was legal). I think the
very fact that a pilot filed a report or posted their experience
indicates that he/she had reflected on the event, learned a lesson
from it and wanted to share the experience with others to learn. I
don't think that any pilot could honesty say that he/she had never
made a bad decision or an error.

Amen.

Al G

On 07/11/07 07:01, Longworth wrote:

[ snip ]


I have flown for less than 7 years and have just a bit shy of
700hrs. I have learned a lot about flying, about safety, about my own
capability and limitation skillwise and judgementwise from other
pilots, from posts such as this one by Kobra. I am a very safety
minded flyer. I do my best not to fly when being stressed, tired. I
am very lucky to have a constant copilot to share the workload. I
fully sympathize with the single pilot especially single pilot
IFR. Flying can be very demanding. I can see myself making the
same errors as confessed by other pilots under similar circumstances.
I am grateful to learn from their mistakes. I do not want to see
people gets discouraged or afraid of posting their flying experience
for fear of criticism or condemnation.

Hai Longworth


I agree 100%, Hai. I hope Kobra and others continue to post these type
of accounts. I learn a lot by reading and participating.

Al G wrote:
Remember, airworthy is a state of paperwork, nothing more, nothing less.

Interesting concept, what would Orville, Wilbur, or Dudley think? You
don't happen to have an "FAA" definition of airworthy do you?

I do.

A review of case law relating to airworthiness reveals two conditions that
must
be met for an aircraft to be considered "airworthy." 49 U.S.C. § 44704(c)
and 14 CFR § 21.183(a), (b),
and (c) state that the two conditions necessary for issuance of an
airworthiness certificate:

a. The aircraft must conform to its TC. Conformity to type design is
considered attained when the
aircraft configuration and the components installed are consistent with the
drawings, specifications,
and other data that are part of the TC, which includes any supplemental type
certificate (STC) and
field approved alterations incorporated into the aircraft.

b. The aircraft must be in a condition for safe operation. This refers to
the condition of the
aircraft relative to wear and deterioration, for example, skin corrosion,
window delamination/crazing,
fluid leaks, and tire wear.

NOTE: If one or both of these conditions are not met, the aircraft would be
considered unairworthy.

Hilton

Longworth wrote:
Everytime that I read a post about some bad events from a fellow
pilot, I always cringe in seeing reprimanding or scolding remarks from
the Monday morning quarrterback or armchair pilots. It's a good thing
the Callback site does not have a readers' feedback option!

Well said.
Dave
M35