What's your IAS, power settings, flap settings, and bank angles for short field landings on a stock 182?

Refining my technique, looking to set some goals for myself.

Thanks

CParker wrote:What's your IAS, power settings, flap settings, and bank angles for short field landings on a stock 182?

Refining my technique, looking to set some goals for myself.

Thanks

I have a narrow body 182 and my information would be useless to a wide body do to completely different tail feathers. Also the info from a 1962 to 1964 wide body would be different from a later wide bodies because of tail feather changes. What year is your 182

Slow airspeed enough to get full flaps prior to short final, power sufficient to control sink and pitch sufficient to maintain an apparent brisk walk rate of closure to flair (protect the nose gear) and touchdown slowly and softly on the numbers. Somewhere on short final the rate of closure with the numbers will appear to speed up. Don't let it. Bank angle sufficient to eliminate drift, otherwise wing level. Direct nose to numbers/centerline (look between legs) with rudder only wings level or banked into any crosswind. Aileron, adverse yaw, wing wagging in coordinated turns is not helpful.

This is the EXACT response I expected when I read the post... Or as my instructor would say, "It depends..."

LOL!

contactflying wrote:Slow airspeed enough to get full flaps prior to short final, power sufficient to control sink and pitch sufficient to maintain an apparent brisk walk rate of closure to flair (protect the nose gear) and touchdown slowly and softly on the numbers. Somewhere on short final the rate of closure with the numbers will appear to speed up. Don't let it. Bank angle sufficient to eliminate drift, otherwise wing level. Direct nose to numbers/centerline (look between legs) with rudder only wings level or banked into any crosswind. Aileron, adverse yaw, wing wagging in coordinated turns is not helpful.

contactflying wrote:Slow airspeed enough to get full flaps prior to short final, power sufficient to control sink and pitch sufficient to maintain an apparent brisk walk rate of closure to flair (protect the nose gear) and touchdown slowly and softly on the numbers. Somewhere on short final the rate of closure with the numbers will appear to speed up. Don't let it. Bank angle sufficient to eliminate drift, otherwise wing level. Direct nose to numbers/centerline (look between legs) with rudder only wings level or banked into any crosswind. Aileron, adverse yaw, wing wagging in coordinated turns is not helpful.

Perfect answer - notice not a single number anywhere? [emoji1360]

Guys,

I'm just looking for basic procedural specifics assuming calm conditions. I always end up with too much energy on short final so I'm looking for some basics to help with my technique. I understand the variability of this, I'm a new pilot and I need to begin by flying by the numbers to get the correct feel.

My current process, which is how my CFI taught me to fly short field pattern:

Abeam the touchdown point - Carb heat, 10* flaps, 90mph IAS, powder reduced to ~15" which should result in ~400fpm
Base - 80mph IAS, 20* flaps, ~500fpm
Final - 70mph IAS, 40* flaps, attempting to slow to 60mph across the fence but always struggling because I'm high and don't want to overshoot so I end up chopping power

I feel like each leg needs to be reduced by 10mph, assuming steady wind or calm conditions. I've also heard some apply 20* flaps abeam the touchdown point.

I'm flying a small tail 1963 182F. I understand there aren't many of those around so I'm happy to hear everyone's 182 techniques and I'll adjust to fit my aircraft.

Thanks

CParker wrote:Guys,

I'm just looking for basic procedural specifics assuming calm conditions. I always end up with too much energy on short final so I'm looking for some basics to help with my technique. I understand the variability of this, I'm a new pilot and I need to begin by flying by the numbers to get the correct feel.

My current process, which is how my CFI taught me to fly short field pattern:

Abeam the touchdown point - Carb heat, 10* flaps, 90mph IAS, powder reduced to ~15" which should result in ~400fpm
Base - 80mph IAS, 20* flaps, ~500fpm
Final - 70mph IAS, 40* flaps, attempting to slow to 60mph across the fence but always struggling because I'm high and don't want to overshoot so I end up chopping power

I feel like each leg needs to be reduced by 10mph, assuming steady wind or calm conditions. I've also heard some apply 20* flaps abeam the touchdown point.

I'm flying a small tail 1963 182F. I understand there aren't many of those around so I'm happy to hear everyone's 182 techniques and I'll adjust to fit my aircraft.

Thanks

I was in your shoes and started a kind of similar thread 9 years ago, I had 180 then, it helped me a lot.
Go thru it, lots of good info from experienced pilots.

https://backcountrypilot.org/community/ ... 213#p81213

To me those numbers seem a little high for the 182. My normal landing sequence in a 182 was carb heat a couple of minutes out from the field (or when established on downwind if working the pattern), reduce power abeam the numbers with 10-20 degrees flaps and trimmed for 80, another notch of flaps on base and trimmed for 70, and final notch of flaps on final trimmed for 60 with the goal of achieving full stall at touchdown while aiming for the numbers. I usually found that minimal trimming was necessary because adding each notch of flaps will automatically lower your forward speed without further adjustments. All of this will likely give you right around a 500fpm drop which should be pretty comfortable and allow you to time your legs to hit the numbers (or whatever spot you have selected). Oh, and these were the numbers I used for a normal landing, not short field.

That being said, not all 182’s are created equal and it is important that you continue to practice and become comfortable with your airplanes upper and lower limits. Know your stall speeds in all configurations. Also know the book numbers for your specific airplane and see how your stall practice matches up to that! And while the numbers are important it is equally important to be able to fly with your eyes outside the airplane and feel what it is going to happen before it happens. All of this will increase your comfort level for getting slow on short final and achieving that short field landing your are looking for. It just takes time and practice and it will all come together.

Be safe and have fun. And keep a grain of salt handy for any internet advice you may receive

CW

I have a whopping 2hrs in a Cessna 180 so I can see why Chris is asking for people’s technique and numbers. The C180, and I imagine the 182 isn’t any different, flies so truck like I couldn’t feel anything and had to fly it all by the numbers. Undoubtedly with more time one gets the feel for it and no longer needs to look at the numbers but a low time pilot and low time in type it’s clear to me why numbers would be very helpful.

What clippwagon described is what worked for me. 60 on short final, 500fpm decent, full flaps and whatever power was needed to maintain it is what I found to be the most important.

I’d suggest taking your normal approach and getting very good at it then whittling down on any excess energy that exists. Or better yet, wait for the offseason and have George show you how it’s done.

Thanks guys.

That's a lengthy thread on the subject. I got throught the first page, I'll read more later. The comment on carb heat is typically true for me I usually pull heat on the descent into the airport from cruising altitude so it's already on. If I'm flying locally and have little if any descent, the carb heat comes on abeam the numbers.

whee, I'll definitely be taking George up on his offer to help me with back country flying. I just want to make sure I get a lot of these basics nailed first, that way I'm not wasting his time. I'm getting pretty comfortable with my 182 at this point, I just need to get these spot landings down. I flew a circuit on Saturday from Smith Prairie to Magic, Fairfield, Picabo, and Carey and it turned out really well. Pine spooked me a little because of the high water levels and short runway, so I decided to skip that until I'm more confident.

I'm very curious about this as well. I'm all too new at this to chime in with any real insight but I will happily share what I'm doing as a noob who is also trying to dial in a short field approach. I have a '60 182C - fastback swept tail, narrow body, bone stock.

For me, carb heat comes on at pattern entry, 1000 AGL.
I'm at 80IAS abeam with 20 degrees flaps (seems to slow on down better with 20 over 10), 15" MP down to 800 AGL at 300-500FPM descent, turn base
70IAS 30 degrees flaps on base, still 15" MP down to 500 AGL at 300-500 FPM, turn final
65IAS 40 degrees flaps slowing to 60 if possible, prop all the way in, power is brought back to idle once I feel like I have the runway made. I'm aiming for the threshold, staying in a short ground effect with the intent of touching down on the numbers.
Once I'm planted, flaps up and heavy on the brakes and stopped before the VASI's. At my normal practice airport, the VASIs are at about 500'. On grass, braking isn't as heavy obviously.

In my case, I'm practicing this technique on either hard surface runways or grass strips with wide open approaches. I realize that in a real back country scenario using ground effect to bled off excess speed is not always applicable procedure due to higher terrain or trees at the approach threshold....

There are a couple places we go into regularly with high trees at the threshold and the same routine applies with a light slip to drop on down quickly without building a ton of excess speed.

If anyone has advice or insight on how to improve upon this, please share.....meanwhile I'm going to go burn some gas.

This thread resonates with me, not so much because I also fly a '63 182 but because I was really looking for a formula from which to explore the limits of me and my plane. I've owned my plane for a couple years now, one year on wheels, one on amphibs. I passed my PPL just after I bought the plane so I'm a green pilot too.

I never got much of a formula on wheels but on floats my instructor taught me 18" in the circuit will roughly hold altitude just inside the white arc. He would have me cut power to 15" and add 20 flap for turn to base and reduce to 12" with 40 flap after I turned final to provide a good glide slope into the flare. It worked, but I had a lot of river to work with so it didn't matter if I took a while to get down. I think I have about 40 hours since flying with that instructor and the only thing that has survived is 18" to hold altitude and get into the white arc. Everything else is based on where I want to touch down. I try and keep my target at the same place in my windscreen and just push or pull power to achieve that while holding pretty steady at 70mph, 80mph if it is windy as is often the case at my home airport. It took me a long while to truly believe that attitude controls airspeed and power controls descent but, lo-and-behold, all these old salts know what they are talking about.

One thing that really helped me was loosening throttle friction on final so I could react more smoothly and instinctively when I needed to add or subtract power. That, and a bunch of avgas. No replacement for repetition.

Hope this helps.

Clipwagon made a very significant point about looking outside. We have all these various airspeeds for getting set up for short final. None of them have anything to do with how or where we are actually going to touchdown, hopefully well below Vso with full flaps.

Slow flight with full flaps and the horn blasting and stall practice is just the starting point for how things should sound and feel at touchdown in one inch ground effect well below Vso with the control wheel full back.

The only way to get significant time and significant iterations of this gait, to use Wolfgang's terminology, is thousands of hours and iterations of actually touching down or hundreds of hours of hovering in low ground effect down long runways touching down several times. And that is a power pitch to touchdown deal. That's our choices. Thousands of power off touchdown after round out and hold off or hundreds of touchdown with power pitch in low ground effect.

Finally we come to truely short backcountry stuff. It can be done inefficiently with round out and hold off after much, practice. It can be done efficiently with far fewer iterations of power pitch to touchdown at the desired point rather than where the airplane actually quits flying.

And I'm sorry but any talk of brakes indicates too short for reasonable safety or poor technique. We shouldn't need brakes in a place we can get out of with normally powered airplanes.

Another options after doing the slow flight work is to try a pattern that doesn't go so far out from the field, and that involves getting into final configuration by the time you're abeam.

Whatever your flaps are going to be, power, etc - get it there - or at least within 5% (I'm sometimes 50 on short final, but I consider 60 to be my "Final" speed on a normal day when landing short isn't a consideration) - then gradually descend and fly the downwind to base, base to final turns already configured.

Was taught that by some mountain flying folk since reconfiguring in a non-typical pattern isn't helpful in Idaho, and found it was useful for regular city patterns too (even though it sounds slower, my approach ends up faster than most people flying 3 mile files with more speed on downwind, more of a quick teardrop to final at slow speed which takes down the overall pattern duration).

A thousand ways to practice - all the more reason to practice a thousand times.

contactflying wrote:And I'm sorry but any talk of brakes indicates too short for reasonable safety or poor technique. We shouldn't need brakes in a place we can get out of with normally powered airplanes.

Never thought about it this way, thanks for sharing that.

C Parker,

You mention always ending up with too much energy on short final. Most do that at first because most are taught round out and hold off technique first and usually have to figure out something more useful for short field on their own.

You mentioned 10 slower at the various stages in the pattern. That would be helpful to give you a little more time to see the too much speed on short final problem, but that doesn't fix it. You already are seeing the problem but are probably uncomfortable with the slower control response at near touchdown speeds. Get comfortable with those speeds and control feel. Get slow enough to see that aileron is not your friend here and that rudder and power are your friends here.

You are already seeing the problem, too fast to land slowly and softly on the numbers because you have seen the same problem hundreds of thousands of times approaching an intersection with your automobile. And you instinctly know what to do: decelerate as you approach. That is what will improve all landings, but especially short field, in your 182. It is heavier than a 150 or 172 and it will sink when slow enough to land, but it has a big engine and is fine with the higher pitch and slower airspeed. At least rudder, elevator, and throttle are fine with it.

You want numbers; everybody wants numbers. They will get you set up for short final. They will not help you beyond there. They will not help where the problem is because we have to feel it on slowly and softly. Vso is the lowest published number and it will bounce you back up because the wing will fly much slower than Vso in low ground effect.

Find that good instructors willing to look in the horses mouth rather than quote his favorite numbers. Attack the problem for what it is, too much airspeed.

Keep in mind that a 182 of any year has a large loading envelope, both weight and balance. Most of the older ones are more nose heavy, so that with only one or maybe two aboard, the CG is right at the forward edge of the envelope. So if that's the only way you practice, you're not going to have the same feel as when the airplane is fully loaded. More importantly, your airspeeds will be much less with a light load!

Newbies are taught, unfortunately, in airplanes that are pretty much at full gross and with the same CG. So you're taught specific numbers. That doesn't work in any airplane that has a wider envelope, both weight and balance, as the 182 does. The book numbers assume a full load, and you can safely reduce airspeeds by a substantial amount by some practice, practice, practice.

You can get a start on a rough and dirty speed reduction at any weight by going up to about 2500' AGL, dropping full flaps, raise the nose gently and hold it there until the airplane stalls, and seeing what the airspeed indicator is showing. Multiply that indication by 1.3, and use that new airspeed as your final approach speed with full flaps.

Forget about doing all that calculations of converting IAS to CAS etc. Just about nobody does that in the real world of flying GA.

Now do some mock approaches starting at 2500' AGL again, at that new approach airspeed. Work the controls, and learn how they feel. Do it several times, from 2500' AGL down to 2000' AGL, climb back up, and do it again, until you feel pretty comfortable at that airspeed.

And don't do it just on calm, windless days. That's not real world, for most places.

Cary

CParker wrote: I flew a circuit on Saturday from Smith Prairie to Magic, Fairfield, Picabo, and Carey and it turned out really well. Pine spooked me a little because of the high water levels and short runway, so I decided to skip that until I'm more confident.

Go practice at Smith Prairie more, nice long runway at decent elevation to learn on. Great place to hone your skills. I spent a ton of time there to really know the plane before I even thought about going anywhere else. Makes your first time into a semi sketchy strip a lot less unnerving.

Airplanes are individuals, they'll all fly a bit different and stall at different speeds.
I second Gary's suggestion of going up and determining the actual indicated airspeed at stall (power off, full flaps) in your airplane.
I do it at my "usual flying weight", then figure it'll be a bit higher when loaded up.
Or you can do it at full gross, then mentally adjust downward a bit when light.
Then use that information as a baseline.

As far as location & altitude turning base & final, when & how to deploy flaps, airspeeds at different points in your approach....
keep in mind, pilots are individuals also.
I think we're all gonna have a little different technique.
And IMHO there's usually more than one "right way" to do anything (but any number of wrong ways).
You doubt that, just ask "what's better, a wheel landing or a three-point?"

IMHO the main thing about your pattern or approach is to end up on final, on airspeed, and flying a good glideslope.
How you get there isn't too important, except that "a poor approach makes for a poor landing".
Since terrain etc often won't allow you to always fly the same approach, you need to be flexible.
And you need to practice that flexibility, so practice making different approaches--
a tight pattern, a wide pattern, a long final, a short final, a long (maybe dogleg) (maybe blind) straight-in, etc.

Thanks everyone, lots of good information here.

I'm going to spend some time playing around with various techniques over the coming week. I'm also going to book some time with my CFI practicing spot landings. My CFI isn't a back country guy, but undoubtedly practicing spot landings will help refine my technique all around.