Under what conditions should I land with less than full flaps? I'm thinking that the answer is probably high winds, where the landing speed will necessarily be faster.thanks

Hi :)Are you talking about a single-engined propeller plane or a larger twin? I have a little bit of knowledge concerning the latter ;)Pilots of twin-engined jets sometimes land with less than full flaps. The higher the flap angle the higher the level of drag. If one of the engines failed before landing there would be a risk of stalling, due to the flaps creating so much drag.

thanks for the info. I was actually thinking of a small turbojet, specifically a beechjet 400A. There is a warning alarm if you lower the gear without full flaps down - and there is an override switch. The manual just says, "use this switch if you want to land with 10 degree flaps" it doesn't say why you'd want to do that.

ok, good question and there are a few cases.land with less flaps when:1. density altitude is high - in case of needed go-aroundland with NO flaps:2. if you went through icing and suspect that ice may remain on parts of the aircraft.Michael J.http://www.precisionmanuals.com/images/forum/pmdg_744F.jpghttp://www.hifisim.com/images/asv_beta_member.jpg

As you suggest, the most common reason is wind but guting crosswinds rather than simply high wind. In a light aircraft in rough conditions it can be preferable to land with flaps up and add 5 knots (or so depending on type) for the wife and kids.Also, some types don't like being sideslipped with a certain amount of flap.

>thanks for the info. I was actually thinking of a small>turbojet, specifically a beechjet 400A. There is a warning>alarm if you lower the gear without full flaps down - and>there is an override switch. The manual just says, "use this>switch if you want to land with 10 degree flaps" it doesn't>say why you'd want to do that.The only reason you would want to do that in a jet is if the flap system has failed. The override switch will then be called out for in the checklist to silence the GPWS warning of "Too Low Flaps" from repeating over and over again during your final approach. Unlike prop planes, there is no "normal" reason to land a jet with that little flaps.