When i started on flight sims it was throttle for speed and elevator for up/ down

Then read somewhere it was wrong, must be the other way around but nobody could really tell me why.

Tried it a couple of times and thought to myself, naaw this is wrong.

About a year ago read stick and rudder and the penny dropped.

 Started simming that way  and yes , it was the right way. I even got to the point where going down the glide slope with diamond centered, just very small corrections (No wind)

Now all that time i was making small corrections here and there to try and achieve what i want.

Then i started the other day looking at things like AoA, torque etc. Things i didnt really take into consideration before,  and now its all going down the drain. Its like taking too much time "staring " at the instrument instead of glancing at them and let the interpretation come itself a split second after that.

Why all this long whining?

Yes, i can go back to like before, but i actually want to fly right. If i do need to take in concideration torque, AoA etc, i want to learn that

My real dilemma is i dont know what to do first. Is it first trimming for speed then throttle for up or down or what?

(Especially approaches and landings)

I mostly fly King air in x plane 10

Would really like to hear how you guys are doing it. And how much of what and when

Maybe i must just do this: When a old hand ( real pilot) was asked about comments on the Jacobson flare, his reply was something like this : "Aah i dont listen to all that fancy stuff. Its really easy, i just go and land the bloody plane " 

 

 

have you seen

https://www.faa.gov/regulations_policies/handbooks_manuals/aviation/airplane_handbook/

Plenty of training videos on you tube if you look from flight schools.

Have a read of this:

https://www.flyingmag.com/why-learning-to-fly-by-tlar-is-important/

Well, it is simpler for me since IRL I fly gliders only - it's definitely Trim ( AoA ) for speed, and while I don't have a spinning prop or a fan anywhere around to give me thrust, I do have a spoiler that acts pretty much like the throttle during approach & landing, controlling the rate of descent. Stuff can even get fancier if I fill my glider water tanks ( ballast ) for a competition, but that's yet another story 🙂

In smaller aircraft the trim for speed / power for V/S applies, but it can turn out totally ineffective when flying an airliner, where a lot more of stuff get's into play, including the various interactions between thrust and pitch...

I would suggest reading Hardy Heinlin's comments in this post at a very interesting thread at the Aerowinx PSX forums is worth the read about the techniques used in an airliner ( non FWB, because that's another story... 😞

http://aerowinx.com/board/index.php?topic=5013.msg53501#msg53501  ( big paragraph after the quote on that post )

If you want to dig deeper into theory without falling the in blackhole of rocket science maths, "See How it Flies" is always ( my ) reference:

7  More About Energy and Power (av8n.com)

 

 

Edited January 3, 20215 yr by jcomm

4 hours ago, mSparks said:

have you seen

https://www.faa.gov/regulations_policies/handbooks_manuals/aviation/airplane_handbook/

Thats a great link. Thanks for sharing. Nearly unbelievable it`s for free.

As a general rule of thumb light aircraft are controlled an approach by using pitch for speed control and power for rate of descent.

larger aircraft it’s the reverse.

In reality you just fly it without thinking, you’ll soon notice if you’re using the wrong technique, pull the power off a large swept wing jet and the speed drops rapidly .You’ll subconsciously realise your mistake and apply the correct technique without thinking. 
Too much analysing yourself on the approach will be a distraction, as has been said, just fly it, and the correct technique will fall naturally into place automatically because the incorrect technique just won’t work properly.

The truth is - it is actually both. They are interlinked and can´t be viewed separately. Speed will also govern flightpath (due to different AOA at different speeds), so if you vary your speed on an ILS without also changing your pitch you will go high or low off the path.

Don´t try to view these separately - it is more of an "energy state". The engine can add kinetic energy (drag will subtract it) and the flightpath will determine the state of your potential (height) energy. You can trade these energies (dive to trade potential for kinetic), however energy lost to drag will need to be replenished by engine power.

If you change your flightpath to gain (or loose less) potential energy (flying up or less down) you need to add engine power to maintain the speed. They are really intertwined and if you try to see each one separately you will not achieve smooth and controlled flight.

Jan

 

17 hours ago, jon b said:

larger aircraft it’s the reverse.

Thats interesting. I would have thought the same principals apply

Ok let me maybe ask part of my question another way

Lets say i do a straight run in to land, do i first get my descent right, lets say 500 fpm, and then use pitch to get my speed right?

Or maybe, after what Janov are (i think)  saying , its a conbination of jiga jiga both till you  are happy

Logic tells me i am wrong, there must be a sequence to first do this and then that, otherwise , if not lucky, you going to jiga jiga aaall the way down to climbing into a new plane and start again 

4 hours ago, ILSFREAK said:

do i first get my descent right, lets say 500 fpm

You pitch the nose down and simultaneously pull out the power.

If you just pitch down you will gain speed.

If you just pull out the power you will loose speed ( but not descend enough initially and miss the descent point).

You can theoretically fly with "just the power" - an aircraft is normally stable at one speed (the currently trimmed speed). If you fly slower, it will tend to pitch down. If you fly faster it will pitch up. Both of these effect make the aircraft return to its "trimmed speed". You can try it in X-Plane.

With this method you can not fly accurately, though. It takes a while for the aircraft to respond, it will overshoot the trimmed speed and move in oscillations.

For accurate flying you need to realize that for every state of the aircraft, there is a combination of pitch and power that must be met exactly:

Pitch + Power = Performance.

A good pilot has these values memorized and does not "hunt" them (much). For example you will "know by heart" the pitch and power required for the -500fpm and 100kts IAS required on the glideslope, for example +1 degrees pitch and 40% N1.

Now you can immediately "set" pitch and power for the desired performance, then finetune.

Jan

 

Thanks Jan

This info will help me a lot

Hello,

I have a question to real world pilots, would be very thankful if anybody can help on it. My question is:

- Does the rudder alone change the direction of the plane?

 

The reason I am asking. In X-Plane, I can solely use the rudders, to change heading instantly. That`s especially helpful on approach, when there is no need to roll the airplane to change (to correct) direction. In FSX, it is the opposite, it does change at roughly 1 degree per 5 seconds, which is actually no change at all. 

 

I am asking because I red on mSparks linked FAA guide, on page 3-12:

"The purpose of the rudder in a turn is to coordinate the turn."

Thanks in advance.

 

 

 

On light aircraft you can indeed fine tune your localiser tracking using rudder alone.

I remember on PA28s you could trim it out and take your hands off the yoke and just correct small bank and heading drifts by squeezing on the rudder.

Here we are getting into the primary and secondary effects of controls, the primary effect of rudder is yaw, the secondary is roll. If you somehow lost control of your ailerons you could still get back to the airport using rudder alone.

There are several flight instructors knocking about on the forums, they’ll be able to explain much better than me as this sort of thing is their bread and butter.

In large swept wing aircraft you don’t touch the rudder unless you are 1) dealing with an engine failure in a multi engine or 2) removing drift in a cross wind landing. 3) countering the weathervane in a crosswind takeoff or landing roll.
The Secondary rolling effect of yaw in swept wing aircraft is much more pronounced as the geometry effectively enlarges one wing and shrinks the other aerodynamically speaking. This causes what is known as “ Dutch roll” and to help stabilise this unwanted side effect airliners have a gyro stabilised system called a yaw damper.

So going back to your question yes you can steer a light aircraft using rudder alone , but you should probably expect a slap around the head if you try doing it with a flight instructor sat next to you.

On 1/4/2021 at 5:44 AM, ILSFREAK said:

Thats interesting. I would have thought the same principals apply

It has to do with the inertia on large aircraft, getting them to accelerate needs a large input in the form of engine thrust. You could accelerate them by pitching down of course but the amount of height you would have to trade to get them to accelerate would be disproportionate, especially on the approach and you’d end up being unstable and low.