Why is it so much harder to hand land this baby (relative to other addons that is...)? I have about 50% successful hand lands....Autolands are always successful (thanks to PMDG). Any ideas, suggestions?Benny K

Benny. for me , it´s the easisest plane to land by hand. Forget thrust (push speed button), just guide smoothly the ac to the runway...Best.Miquel Egea.

Benny. for me , it´s the easisest plane to land by hand. Forget thrust (push speed button), just guide smoothly the ac to the runway...Best.Miquel Egea.

You mean that you leave ATS on all the way for speed control?Benny K

You mean that you leave ATS on all the way for speed control?Benny K

I usually leave ATS on all the way.Sometimes, I'm trying an autoland,but due to crosswinds it is not permitted,so I have no choice but to handfly.Ron

You mean that you leave ATS on all the way for speed control?Benny K

Yes. At 20 ft (more or less) , the system auto-disconnects. Just try it. I think, you´ll be pleased with your landings.Best.Miquel Egea.

I had the privilege of meeting a FedEx MD-11 FO on my way home from Hong Kong last week and we had some time to talk on the way.He indicated that the MD-11 vs. MD-10 (he flies both) gets a little shaky <30 ft over the ground. WIth LW >450k, it drops like a brick and your flare has to be early. <450k LW, you can encounter pitch up/down with a cross wind.I guess what I took from that is, you have to be very aware of your landing weight and stay ahead of the aircraft. Practicing approaches at all different LW's will increase your success rate.Interestingly, he indicated the MD-10 (he calls it the MD, not the DC) is a dream to land.I didn't think it would be that different, but I guess so.

It's the MD-10 because it has been updated to the MD-11 standard flight deck, thus his common type rating between the two. If you ever run across the flight deck of one, the yoke also has MD-10 written on it in the same MD-11 typeface.

PMDG have done a very good job of modeling the low speed characteristics in my view.In fact this topic is rather serendipitous as I just SLAMMED the merry crap out of my poor MD-11 undercarriage going into LFMN an hour ago. Basically I disengaged the autothrottle on very short finals (100ft) and had forgotten to pull my throttle controller back, so of course the thrust rocketed up. I got distracted by this for a second enough that the plane got a tad high, I overcorrected for that AND pulled the throttle back too far so all of a sudden I was basically short of everything. All of a sudden there's a cacophany of "FIFTYFOURTYTHIRTYTWENTYTEN BOOM" as the plane and cringing, whimpering pilot hit the runway. And bounced...Long story short: one go a

Thank you guys. I'll try ATS on and will see...Benny K

All of a sudden there's a cacophany of "FIFTYFOURTYTHIRTYTWENTYTEN BOOM" as the plane and cringing, whimpering pilot hit the runway. And bounced...

Hey...at least it's not from another manufacturer. It could have called you a retard in the process.(yes, I know the "retard" command in the 'bus is to retard the throttles and not an insult)

It's the MD-10 because it has been updated to the MD-11 standard flight deck, thus his common type rating between the two. If you ever run across the flight deck of one, the yoke also has MD-10 written on it in the same MD-11 typeface.

Scandinavian13: Just when I thought I knew a lot, you dropped this obvious one on me....What a great retro-fit Boeing did on the DC-10 to MD-10. Thanks for the good reading tonight. I never knew they did this to the DC-10.Do you know of anyone else besides FedEx that got the MD-10 upgrade?Of course knowing this makes me want to slap the PMDG panel on a DC-10 ... but that's a taboo subject. :DBenny: Good luck with the landings. I have a flight setup downwind on KMEM 18L and change the weights / winds around for practice. From what I've learned, autoland is typically used when visibility conditions make it a safe alternative. I think most pilots prefer to hand fly the landings.And I know the FO doesn't get credit for a landing on autoland - so good luck. It's a great plane to hand fly.

Scandinavian13: Just when I thought I knew a lot, you dropped this obvious one on me....What a great retro-fit Boeing did on the DC-10 to MD-10. Thanks for the good reading tonight. I never knew they did this to the DC-10.Do you know of anyone else besides FedEx that got the MD-10 upgrade?Of course knowing this makes me want to slap the PMDG panel on a DC-10 ... but that's a taboo subject. :D

The first time I heard it, it drew a raised eye from me too.

The md-11 was designed with a v-stab that is to small and a wing span that is to small. This makes the plane have a higher landing speed than most planes making it difficult to land. For me I have got the hang of it. The best way to practice is flap 50 landings first then have a bash at flap 35 landings. Flap 35 is harder as the landing speed is higher. The md-11 is a remarkable aircraft, and unique in this way. Try using smaller runways aswell. I know that sounds weird but it does help alot.