When I left teaching History and English and started spraying the full season, I worked as an apprentice plumber the first winter. My boss, Mike Labor, was a great teacher. He used memorable illustrations to prevent common errors like installing sweeps backward. You don't forget, "farts up, turds down."

Why didn't I think of this earlier? Students tend to forget, or mix up the wine glass method to remember drainage. And they often avoid wind rather than learn its tremendous lifting energy over rising terrain. Here we have a way to remember both. Farts up: why not use 2,000 fpm free lift if offered? Pitch up in updrafts or fly ridge lift. Turds down: why not takeoff down drainage and use drainage systems (they're everywhere) to egress limited engine energy situations?

If farts created lift I'd be able to out climb anything

I had a flight instructor while living in Tok in 1974. He was a guide on the AK Peninsula but took a job flying BLM fire patrol in a Beech Baron for the summer. I asked what survival gear he carried. There was a list but he always had a couple cans of pork and beans. Quick food and if the strip was short they would "blow him off the ground". His words and good humor. Learned short radius turning slips to landing from him. Like in a narrow curving valley situation.

Gary

Slip for drag and slower, tighter turn and skid, with the nose well down, to bring the nose around quickly. That rudder is a fine tool.

I like that. If I ever get another airplane I'm going to put that saying on the panel. Or maybe just FUTD.

Getting the nose down when the engine quits is well taught, I think. Not so much getting the airplane going down drainage for gravity thrust when zoom reserve is deplenished.

PA1195 wrote:... Learned short radius turning slips to landing from him. Like in a narrow curving valley situation.

Gary

nose to inside or outside of slipping turn? Feels like outside would feel most natural, but could you do either, dealer's choice?

I got a comma wrong on post about slips and skids above. In slipping turn the objective is to get down quickly without increasing airspeed. In slipping turn, the nose is outside the turn. Any slip decreases rate of turn.

In a skidding turn the objective is to get the nose around and onto target quickly. It is very important for the nose to be well down unless we have the extra energy of being in low ground effect. In the skidding turn, the nose is inside the turn. We are simply pushing the nose around with rudder.

Getting the nose around and onto target quickly is important in low level work where vertical space is limited. We need to get the nose onto target and the wings back to level before going over any wires or obstructions where the down wing could hit. Skidding also helps with getting the turn done early and before this becomes a problem. Increasing bank earlier in the turn also helps with this problem, as in the canyon turn or crop duster turn. Bank increase is absolutely no stall problem, no increase in g load, unless we attempt to hold the nose up with elevator. Don't try to hold the nose up with elevator. Only the pilot can stall the airplane.

Hi Contactflying. I know you and I have discussed this previously, but I’ve had a chance to work on this and have a couple of questions - still. So my plane is quite nose heavy, and therefore once the bank begins so does the race for Mother Earth. It is a very uncomfortable feel to get enough rudder to bring the nose around to complete a 180. That’s with NO elevator at all - which I think is what you’re saying. I will be 90+% nose down by the time I get it around. Should I vary the bank angle, or is that a steeper is better thing? I just can’t get a grip on this, and yes I’m sure I’m making a simple thing complex.

Ken,

Yes, the steeper the bank the steeper the nose goes down. The airplane wants to return to trimmed airspeed quickly, but that is not necessary. I carefully say pull back on the stick a bit, once the nose is well down, to take some of the tuck out.

Both slow airspeed initially, angle of bank, increase nose tuck. That can carefully be taken out with elevator so long as the nose is allowed to be well down.

Practice shallow energy management turns to target at 10 and 2 as well. Not as much pitch up wings level required to begin and not as much tuck in the turn. Then try 90 degree turns. Fly a straight section line north and turn to a section line east or west.

45 degree of heading change takes least pitch up and least bank, 90 degree takes more pitch up for slower airspeed and more bank, 180 degree takes most pitch up to near stall wings level and most bank even 75 degree in the turn.

The most common error in level and especially in energy management turns is slipping around. The nose must be made to move aggressively with aggressive rudder in steep banked turns. A thousand times I have said, while teaching energy management turns, push that nose around. Don't let that nose push you around (a slip).

Go dynamic (not the appropriate technique) in the turn to get a feel for the difference in rate of turn. Put in too much rudder, a skid, for a faster rate of turn. Put in too little rudder, a slip, for a slower rate of turn.

Perfect coordination is fine but not common. We want the nose down and we want to err on the side of skid. A slipping turn problem, not enough rudder, is deadly in the low altitude maneuvering flight game. Crop dusters who do that break things.

Thank you Contactflying, that’s helping explain what I’ve found, and yes it fills in some holes!

The energy management turn is appropriate at any altitude, but critical for low altitude work. I forget to mention that the trim is set to cruise. The airplane will try to return quickly to cruise because the airspeed starts slow and the nose is well down. In light airplanes flying all day at low altitude, there is no long climb or long glide requiring trim setting change from cruise.

There seems to be a trend towards installing bigger and bigger engines, in even LSA types like my Rans S-7S, all for making it a "better bush plane." I have resisted this, as almost, heck, ALL my off airport landings are on slopes, uphill, and I never have any problem with the takeoff, and I want to keep the plane light as possible for the slowest and shortest landings. The other day I took off my 5640' high 14 degree runway at 1700 RPM at the prop, and climbed up to 10 K in 12 minutes, and never increased the throttle. The wind was blowing into the big ridge behind my place, sure, but very lightly, 5 mph. I have such a habit of using only partial power on takeoffs, I sometimes find myself doing so on flat ground

courierguy,

That too is energy management. With less engine thrust, you are more able to ferret out orographic lift, even at 5 knots. The 65 hp trainers were also very light, unless rebuilt with too much show quality dope.