Read the Manual!

Arguably the finest fighter aircraft of World War II.
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twsharp12
Staff Sergeant
Posts: 480
Joined: 15 Dec 2015, 09:30

Read the Manual!

Post by twsharp12 »

I died today. Was coming in for a standard landing but was coming in a bit hot. Lowered full flaps to slow down quickly. Unfortunately for my virtual pilot, the right flap malfunctioned, putting me into a spin to my death. I'll be in the manual studying for a while...

alan CXA651
Senior Master Sergeant
Posts: 2438
Joined: 15 Mar 2016, 08:23

Re: Read the Manual!

Post by alan CXA651 »

Hi.
The flaps on one side , have failed on me a couple of times , once like you i lowered them when slightly to fast , other time i was well within the speed range , for safe flap deployment .
Now i go through a routine , of glanceing left/right on every change of flap , in the hope that if a patial failure occurs , at any setting , i can hopefully get the chance to get flaps set in same setting on each wing , no garentees though.
I have the advantage of track ir5 , so glancing left/right only takes about a second.
As for safe flap/gear deployment , most aircraft have a white band on the ASI , showing the safe speeds for these to be deployed , others have a placard on the panel some where.
regards alan. 8)
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Piper_EEWL
Chief Master Sergeant
Posts: 4544
Joined: 26 Nov 2014, 14:14
Location: Germany

Re: Read the Manual!

Post by Piper_EEWL »

You shouldn't use the flaps as speed brakes. Lowering the flaps at high speeds will put a massive strain on the whole mechanism. So to prevent flap failures you should stay within the speed limits (if I remember full flaps max speed is 150kias in the P-51) and also check the maintenance hangar regularly and fix the flaps at the mechanics recommendation. Same goes for the gear btw!

But reading the manual is always a good idea :wink:
B377&COTS, J3 Cub, B-17G, Spitfire, P-40, P-51D, C172, C182, Pa28, Pa24, T-6 Texan, L-049&COTS, Bonanza V35B

twsharp12
Staff Sergeant
Posts: 480
Joined: 15 Dec 2015, 09:30

Re: Read the Manual!

Post by twsharp12 »

Thanks for the advice everyone. Hopefully we can prevent a little incident like that happening again :)

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ratty
Technical Sergeant
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Joined: 29 Oct 2013, 21:08
Location: KPMP

Re: Read the Manual!

Post by ratty »

There's a placard on the right hand side of the cockpit that lists the flap limit speeds.
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Roadburner426
Technical Sergeant
Posts: 871
Joined: 29 Jul 2008, 20:20
Location: Hampton, VA

Re: Read the Manual!

Post by Roadburner426 »

Just so you guys know the first notch of flap can actually be used as a speed brake. Obviously not at maximum speed while in a dive, but it is very good at slowly the aircraft down if you just need that little bit of help to slow down to put down the gear or something. 248kts is the max deployment speed for 1 notch of flaps if memory serves me correctly. I have had an asymmetric flap failure 1 time when I was trying to land at KDNL. Was very inexperienced with the Mustang at the time, and was making multiple approaches trying to get the aircraft on the ground. I think it was 3 or 4 approaches in to it that I was coming in on short final when the aircraft violently started rolling to the right. Had to be through sheer luck that I applied full power and as I was gaining airspeed managed to gain more control of the plane, and then figured out what happened so retracted the remaining flap. Wound up diverting to KAGS, and having the issue fixed there. Needless to say in the 300 or so hours since I have not had it happen again as I am very cognizant of my speed during the approach and landing phase now. The only other Mustang failures I have had since was the complete generator failure. Other than that recognize something isn't going right and get it fixed in the hangar. Just waiting for my yellow fuel and oil pumps to fail at some point now.
S. Jordan
AM; United States Navy
FSX/P3Dc4 Hours: 3100 and counting! All A2A birds in the hangar except the 172.

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