Dave, it looks reasonable, however from my very limited perspective it looks like you are still not using nearly all of what the airplane can do. This is NOT sarcastic or mean spirited criticism, please do not take it that way. Also I do not have the experience that some people here probably do, so some people here might have good reason to disagree with my ideas. That being said...
On the second video, you touchdown about where you could have been stopped already. It looks like several hundred feet of usable runway were wasted. The video perspective does not show how close the trees or power line are to the threshold, so perhaps not all of the strip is usable on landing. But there appears to be a LOT of smooth grass you fly over before actually landing.
(later edit, incorrect assumption on my part)
All in all it's a good start. Most importantly your airplane looks like it's under full and complete control (check), and you are not wavering, bobbling, dutch-rolling or PIO'ing (check), and you are not knocking branches off trees (check) and you are coming down the chute nice and slow (check). What that means is that you are starting from the conservative side and working your way towards the maximum performance (ding ding ding/audience applause!!).
So now IMHO you should be working on getting the airplane on the ground closer to the approach end of the strip (terrain permitting) as a first level of improvement.
Last edited by EZFlap on Mon Jul 18, 2011 9:20 am, edited 1 time in total.
Thanks for the input. The second landing all that runway left behind was flooded, thats why there are marks (blanket and cone. Those were meant to be the touch down point. See below when I touch down the splash of water.
Look from inside , same landing cant go any slower,see the airspeed.
The next attempt I stalled it over the runway , my worst landing ever. Did I flare too high?
from inside
All advice, critics are welcomed feel free, I wont be offended want to learn from errors,this is a practice session I was doing for short field, field was wet ,sea level 50 gallons to pilots 170 pounds each, tall grass and flooded the first 600ft . Iput the cone and blanket as my intended touch point after the flooded section , then 600ft further there was a mark across the runway of new cut grass and 150ft farther I did put another blanket as mark.
My intention was to land before the last blanket 750ft, all the landings I stopped before the 600ft mark, however I was dragging the plane in,which doesnt feel safe, and also a couple of landings were a a few feet before the first cone/blanket.
There isn't anything to criticize. No injuries. No bent plane. I'm sure there is lots of advice available here for trying to make it look pretty, though. If I'm light and nose heavy in a 182, I will crank the nose trim all the way down on final if I need to keep the prop out of the grass during roll out. I don't recommend this to anyone without experimentation.
On landing, as long as you can *safely* get the wheels *consistently* where you want/need them to, saving a hundred feet on roll out by dragging it in at very low airspeed really isn't necessary (there are exceptions). There are many opinions on whether dragging in landings are safe ones when the windsocks are twirling around.
*Safe* and *consistent* optimal/predictable TO performance is normally what determines if marginal field lengths/terrain/weather are usable or not for me.
Get rid of the hub caps and add some bigger tires...Your converting your plane into a BC plane and practicing BC landings, etc. Make the move and go all in!!
Your landings are not so bad. As referenced above, trim is your best friend. I think you were just a bit slow on the one landing with the stall. You will fix all of this with practice as you learn your plane and the characteristics of the STOL kit. Fly with the throttle in your hand and constantly work it throughout the landing to keep your desired airspeed. Dont just fix it and fly.
You will figure it out.
Go get some bigger tires and remove those darn hub caps ....
OK, I will admit I was wrong about much of my previous post. After learning you did indeed hit the intended touchdown aiming point, and after hearing the stall horn buzzing, it looks like you were getting closer to maximum performance out of the aircraft.
The one thing I will mention after seeing the next videos is that there is what appears to be one un-necessary risk in your technique. I don't see a good reason why the airplane has to be on the edge of a stall half a mile out on approach. You of course need to be at minimum speed where it counts, the last 400 feet down short final and into the flare. But if you are hanging on the stall buzzer much further out, you are putting yourself at risk of an upset from a good gust, updraft, downdraft, etc. etc. In calm weather like in your videos it will not be a big issue, but any time there is brisk atmospheric movement, winds flowing around mountain strips, etc. you would be at more risk than you really need to be for a longer period of time.
So perhaps you can develop a technique to carry a little bit safer speed (to give you more control and more options) until you get right down to where it counts, and then scrub off that speed just before you truly need to be that slow. Of course you can still get hit by a gust or thermal on short final, but if you can cut out 90% of the risk then you are simply stacking the odds in favor of safety. Perhaps a little higher altitude, steeper descent, and aiming a little short of your touchdown point... then when you're in close bring the nose up higher and slow down, extending your approach path to the touchdown point by exchanging that airspeed for distance only where you need it to be?? I've used that technique very often and it worked very well, but admittedly in a much different type of aircraft (T-craft).
Also, did you re-adjust your stall warning system after you put the STOL kit in? Your stall vane may or may not be making the right noise for a stock 182. If you did not adjust it, it's likely leaving you a lot more room than you need for a STOL kit equipped airplane.
The runway looks solid and you have a long aproch to the runway. I would make use of the long aproch. Mark off a target with cones or flower on the ground and hit your mark. Use flaps and adjust your power on the aproch. If you feel as if your sinking on the aproch add power. On landing keep the stick in your lap. Once on the ground pull back on power. Your landing looks good. Just pratice. Then work on makeing your stoping distence shorter. Makr off the runway. Now you have something to go by.
Might try to work on centerline control. The guy shooting the video is obviously in the right seat and he is left of centerline for the whole flare and rollout.
I'd suspect you are trying to compensate for your being seated on the left. Well, you are left of your airplanes centerline, but only 10 inches or so. You don't need to offset that much. You can move the plane to a long line and then climb in to see what it's supposed to look like. Then make it look like that all the time.
My instructor told me long ago that if you can sit there and maintain 4,450 feet msl for 20 minutes then you can just as easily maintain 4,500. Either you're on altitude or you're correcting to get on altitude. Same can be said for centerline.
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