Cause my VA has some rediculous landings... and im not sure how realistic that is.

It could be possible when landing on a sloped runway, like Lukla (VNLK). You are going slightly up (3ft/min uphill) but slower than runway beneath Your gear strut.

But I do not think sloped runways are possible in FSX

-3ft/m is not a climb, its a 3 feet per minute descent. And OP is right, its not very realistic

Unless its an angle of descent which will make sense?

 

Where did you find this -3 figure and was the ft/min clearly indicated or its an assumption?

-300 ~500 is more real I think.. remember a firm landing, not a semi stall.

3ft per SECOND is a good landing - 180fpm. Maybe that's what they mean.

 

The only other 3.0 I can think of is that 3 degrees is the descent angle on an instrument approach. But on landing it's not, you would flare and make it less than 3.

 

What's the context?

Have never understood this flight sim VA obsession with touchdown rate. While you dont want to be crunching the machine into the Tarmac, greasers in large commercial aircraft is not what you should be aiming for.

 

Firm touchdown slightly below vref/vapp and withIn the tdz.

 

A lot of VA's get this wrong you don't get points for greasing a landing at Max landing weight on a potentially contaminated runway in the real world.

USAVA - it states all of the recent/best landings on the home page. And There is one that is -3.00 Feet per Minute. Thats a landing descent that is 3 FEET PER MINUTE. That is a completely unrealistic landing lol.

That would be one very, VERY L O N G final!

 

Let's see... 1500' @ 3'/min = 500 minutes = ~8 hours 20 minutes!!!

That would be one very, VERY L O N G final!

 

Let's see... 1500' @ 3'/min = 500 minutes = ~8 hours 20 minutes!!!

 

hahaha thank you for doing the math.

That pilot must've came in really low lol

It based off of touchdown so -3 is actually more possible than you think. Realistically speaking though if you were to touchdown such as that you could bald a tire. Its happened at the company I fly for, a guy had a greaser pulled into park and noticed a bald spot. Has to do with friction.

Someone said 300-500 ft/min. I can tell you that 300 is most probable, 500 ft/min is from not flaring enough. C-130's use 540 ft/min on assault landings to bleed energy, its enough to make your cringe.

what do you mean by bald a tire? Like the tire doesn't spin or something from landing too soft?

Have never understood this flight sim VA obsession with touchdown rate. While you dont want to be crunching the machine into the Tarmac, greasers in large commercial aircraft is not what you should be aiming for.

 

Firm touchdown slightly below vref/vapp and withIn the tdz.

 

A lot of VA's get this wrong you don't get points for greasing a landing at Max landing weight on a potentially contaminated runway in the real world.

 

This is exactly right. At least in the real world, one other important factor weighs in on this. The VVI instrument lags your actual situation, sometimes by three or four seconds. So, you never reference a VVI in the flare -- never! You gauge the softness of your touchdown much more accurately by seat of the pants feel and the flare is a 100% visual maneuver! Your vision is properly focused on the far end of the runway and allow your peripheral vision and sense of velocity to determine your height above the runway plus with your focus on the far end of the runway, you lateral positioning on runway centerline.

 

If you have a second crew member, then it is possible for him to reference the VVI, but again it is pointless because at the time of touchdown it is about three seconds behind the time and unhelpful. The other key is that per the FAA's definition of a "perfect" touchdown, the VVI doesn't have much bearing on the situation. An FAA defined perfect touchdown is to make initial contact in the normal landing zone of the runway with the stall horn sounding concurrent with touchdown. The point of this FAA focus is to time initial touchdown so that the plane is stalling, and the point of emphasis is that when you stall then the plane is "done flying!"

 

This means a gust of wind is far less likely to put the plane back into the air. A "greaser" with a very soft touchdown, with the plane significantly above stall speed can sometimes set yourself up for a bounce, with the wind gust causing the plane to climb several feet off the runway, which could result in getting out of ground effect at the same time the gust subsides and then the pilot finds himself out of ground effect and stalled! That causes the horrible nose gear first crump, or even in cases where you are just a few feet above the runway, the dreaded teeth rattler!

 

As my old instruction told me many years ago. You aim, level, and flare, and in the flare your objective is to keep the airplane from touching down as long as you can by constantly pulling back on the yoke. On some airplanes you can scrap the tail that way but on others it works great. But, in all cases, the objective is to be "surprised" when the plane touches down, and you keep back pressure on the yoke and be ready to jam in power should a wind gust take your otherwise perfect touchdown into a return to flight.

 

Those should be the focuses in the flair.

 

Cheers,

 

Ken

 

It based off of touchdown so -3 is actually more possible than you think. Realistically speaking though if you were to touchdown such as that you could bald a tire. Its happened at the company I fly for, a guy had a greaser pulled into park and noticed a bald spot. Has to do with friction.

Someone said 300-500 ft/min. I can tell you that 300 is most probable, 500 ft/min is from not flaring enough. C-130's use 540 ft/min on assault landings to bleed energy, its enough to make your cringe.

 

Oh yes, I remember many an assault landing in the C-130! That's a different animal, where spot of touchdown is the key objective, and you are right, the touchdown rate is deliberately designed to bleed kinetic energy and reduce landing distance.

 

Ken

USAVA - it states all of the recent/best landings on the home page. And There is one that is -3.00 Feet per Minute. Thats a landing descent that is 3 FEET PER MINUTE. That is a completely unrealistic landing lol.

 

"WEEEE!!!!! Too bad we're out of runway and bent the airplane!"

They're "floating" along the runway to get that vertical speed. Check, i bet they're 5000 ft or more past the threshold.