What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

BIG, double-deck, four-engine, medium to long range, high altitude, high speed, commercial transport airplane
Jimbo47
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What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by Jimbo47 »

:?: I am crossing the threshold at around 120 or even 110 knots, with flaps at 35, and at altitude 100 feet or less. I then lower flaps to 40, and idle back to zero, with a slight flare at 20 or 10 feet to go. Still, it lands rough, or bounces. Probably 110 to 100 knots at touchdown. I have the auto flight engineer, the auto pressurization, and the auto turbo all turned on. What should I do to get a smoother landing?
Thanks,
Jimbo47

pjc747
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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by pjc747 »

Jimbo47 wrote::?: I am crossing the threshold at around 120 or even 110 knots, with flaps at 35, and at altitude 100 feet or less. I then lower flaps to 40, and idle back to zero, with a slight flare at 20 or 10 feet to go. Still, it lands rough, or bounces. Probably 110 to 100 knots at touchdown. I have the auto flight engineer, the auto pressurization, and the auto turbo all turned on. What should I do to get a smoother landing?
Thanks,
Jimbo47
Well you need to float for awhile, and flaps should be fully down, usually as you pass over the middle marker. You keep flaring and you get the main first, and pull back slowly to get the nosewheel down.

Elington
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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by Elington »

Hi Jimbo,

It took me some time to land her smoothly too ! As PJC is saying I have full flaps down all along final. I do not cut to idle but rather to 20" MP when crossing the threshold. She will start the flare by herself due to ground effect, so you'll need a very gentle pull at the beginning (around 20 feet). Then as she's loosing speed she will start sinking again, and then you need a firmer pull (with an eye on the vertical speed indicator) to achieve the ideal "kiss landing" :)

Just my two cents,
Happy flying,
David

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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by Raebo »

After over 500 hours on this great aircraft I have found that tracking just below the glide slope gives me the float room I'm going to need.
I never land using full flaps, (40 max) I am fully configured at 1500 feet AGL and keep her at 20", don't ever cut power until she is planted, then go into reverse.
My landing speed works best at 100 to 105, a long gradual approach into the wind will help you achieve this.
Try to use every foot of runway, and yes I know she floats badly but be patient it will eventually sink with a very slight and gentle nose up at about 10 feet, you will not usually run out of runway even though it looks like you will.
Check the wind speed and direction, make sure you pick a runway that has you landing into the wind.
I practice a great deal making her land with a significant nose up attitude not unlike a 737, however sink rate speed must be watched very carefully doing it this way.
When its done right its a joy and a wonder to behold to see it on your replay.
To fast, to much flap, landing down wind will result in a nose wheel first landing with the rears gently dropping down if your lucky and thats not a bad thing, B29's did it all the time, a severe tail wind landing will usually result in the loss of directional control ( no right or left full rudder will help you here ) she's going into the weeds.
Practice, practice, and more practice.
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Warbirds
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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by Warbirds »

Very hard to land but the most trouble I have is lining up with the runway. This planes takes a wide turn and trying to figure out how to turn into that line is a mystery to me.
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Jimbo47
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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by Jimbo47 »

:D Ah hah! So it's an art, as well as a science. Thank you Pjc, Elington, and Raebo for your sublime advice. :)
Jimbo47

pjc747
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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by pjc747 »

Warbirds wrote:Very hard to land but the most trouble I have is lining up with the runway. This planes takes a wide turn and trying to figure out how to turn into that line is a mystery to me.
This is why I always punch in the ILS frequency, even on a visual approach, so I can keep on the glidepath the entire time.

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bigjuicyspider
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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by bigjuicyspider »

Warbirds wrote:Very hard to land but the most trouble I have is lining up with the runway. This planes takes a wide turn and trying to figure out how to turn into that line is a mystery to me.

I think the key here is to go up in an aircraft equipped with DME, even the default Cessna will do, and practice Eyeing your distances to a 10,000 foot runway equipped with a co-located VOR/DME. Fly visual patterns and lean exactly what the runway will look like on your screen when you are 4 miles abeam, 2 miles abeam, and 1 mile abeam. Practice it a hundred times until you can always judge by Eye, how far away you are.
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Once you can judge those distances, you can use that judgement to set up the width of your visual pattern. So when I'm flying the Stratocruiser on Downwind, at 1500 ft AGL, I want to be at 2 miles distance, and I will know it by eye.

If your distances are correct, then do exactly what the Landing Diagram says. Configured as per the diagram, fly 30 seconds beyond the threshold-abeam-point. Begin a standard rate turn, descending at about 600-800 fpm. You should be able to roll out aligned with the runway at about about 600 feet agl, aligned for a 2 mile final approach.

I've practiced this religiously, and it works....And the cool thing is, is that with some variations, you will be able to do exactly the same thing with your big Jets too. If you can do this is the Stratocruiser, you will have absolutely no trouble doing it in your MD-11 or 737 as well: It is just a matter of altering your bank angle a bit in the turn to accomodate the particular type. In the jets, try timing yourself 45 seconds beyond the abeam threshold point instead of 30 seconds in the Stratocruiser.

EDIT: If you don't have a TrackIR, buy yourself one for Giftmas. A Track IR and a joystick-mapping to enable/disable and another to "reset point-of-view" is the greatest thing ever invented for flight simulation. It will enable you to do all kinds of things Visually, heads-up, that before you simply couldn't do.
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seaniam81
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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by seaniam81 »

The best advice anybody can give is practice practice practice... lol... also the key to a great landing is a consistent stable approach. The better your downwind, base, and final the better your landing.

pjc747
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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by pjc747 »

seaniam81 wrote:The best advice anybody can give is practice practice practice... lol... also the key to a great landing is a consistent stable approach. The better your downwind, base, and final the better your landing.
Although in a lot of airline operations, you're not doing a pattern, your at least 10 mile out on the approach for straight-in.

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seaniam81
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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by seaniam81 »

pjc747 wrote:
Although in a lot of airline operations, you're not doing a pattern, your at least 10 mile out on the approach for straight-in.
Doesn't matter. If its not a good stabilized approach your landing is going to suck. Also the pilot manual has a nice diagram of how to fly the pattern in the B377 and in the corner of said diagram is a chart of what speed you should be flying at the threshold for your aircraft weight and flap settings. hmmm... it seems the 747 manual has a diagram how to fly a pattern too... hey look at that so does the MD-11... and so forth...

Just because 90% of the time you have to do a strait in doesn't mean you shouldn't know how to fly a proper pattern.

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Warbirds
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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by Warbirds »

Thanks, nice post but not sure what any of it means. I have never flown airliners and with the light planes I fly you see the runway and turn into it, simple. With the airliners you never see the runway to line up and you depend on instruments and that is where I get lost. I know that there is a line to the runway and ILS feather numbers and I set them but to turn base at the correct place and actually get those twitchy ILS needles to line up is like walking on a balloon.

As for TrackIr, had it for years but only use it in war sims as it is much to twitchy to use in fsx. Trying to use TrackIr to look at a small switch to click can be a real challenge. Nice to sightsee with though.

Thanks again, lots to learn if I am going to correctly land this beast.
Last edited by Warbirds on 11 Dec 2011, 12:17, edited 3 times in total.
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Scott - A2A
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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by Scott - A2A »

":) Ah hah! So it's an art, as well as a science."

I always enjoy thinking about how to be a truly great pilot you have to use both sides of your brain. The mathematician deals with the navigation, communications, etc. while the artist actually flies the plane. Mathematician gets it on approach and the artist does the flare.

Same for a musician. The mathematician manages parts of the rhythms, notes, scales, etc. while the artist plays the instrument. No wonder why so many pilots are also musicians.

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pjc747
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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by pjc747 »

Warbirds wrote:Thanks, nice post but not sure what any of it means. I have never flown airliners and with the light planes I fly you see the runway and turn into it, simple. With the airliners you never see the runway to line up and you depend on instruments and that is where I get lost. I know that there is a line to the runway and ILS feather numbers and I set them but to turn base at the correct place and actually get those twitchy ILS needles to line up is like walking on a balloon.

As for TrackIr, had it for years but only use it in war sims as it is much to twitchy to use in fsx. Trying to use TrackIr to look at a small switch to click can be a real challenge. Nice to sightsee with though.

Thanks again, lots to learn if I am going to correctly land this beast.
Well in a lot of airline operations these days, you're not always in IMC conditions, ATC vectors you onto the flight path and you can use an ILS, RNAV, or VNAV path to direct yourself in sight of the VASIs, but you still do visual approaches a lot. With an ILS approach, you never do a pattern, unless you're checking you instruments in VFR conditions. ATC will, like I said, vector you to intercept the glidepath by the first waypoint on the chart, and you use your markers (outer, middle) to unsure that you are at the right altitude at the marker, in case your instruments aren't working perfectly. With most modern antennae and localizer transmitters, you seldom get needles that are twitchy enough to cause serious problems. It usually at smaller airports, not major international airports where you get that trouble.

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Re: What is the best way to get a smooth landing?

Post by Treetop64 »

"What is the best way to get a smooth landing?"

Practice, practice, practice, and more practice. True in RL flying, true in flightsimming, especially with high-fidelity aircraft like A2A's products.
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