Landing Worse with Rudder Pedals

[Greazer]

I've been simming for a long time, but only recently invested in rudder pedals. I got the Logitech G Flight model, and it's calibrated.i reduced sensitivity to -50%

I had hoped to be getting a better experience and better landings. But actually it's the opposite. Landings are sometimes all over the place.  It's awful.

Anyone got any tips?? What settings do you use?

[martinboehme]

I use stock settings (with MFG Crosswind pedals), no issues.

When you say the landings are all over the place - is this before or after touching down? What aircraft are you flying? How does taxiing work (assuming you're not flying an aircraft with a tiller)?

Have you used rudder pedals before? (I'm asking because using rudder pedals to steer on the ground is something that a lot of student pilots take a while to get used to.)

Edit: Just wanted to add some encouragement - you _will_ get it worked out, and when you do, you won't want to go back. 

Edited August 8 by martinboehme

[sloppysmusic]

You haven't said what you were using before. Auto rudder or joystick with twist rudder? The probable reason it's suddenly worse if auto rudder is that you've gone from the sim being on rails to full realisation that crosswinds are now a major problem! 

[Greazer]

Previously, I used the joystick twist for rudder. So I had rudder and nose wheel steering with twist. Not ideal, but landings where actually better. Right now I don't get controlled touch downs. I have tried different sensitivity settings without much success. The taxi is okay, takeoff is kindof okay. But not touching down. Tried small and large aircraft. It's not good.

[qqwertz]

I got the Logitech pedals when my twist joystick started failing. I since upgraded to Thrustmaster TPR pedals. The Logitech pedals are OK, but not great; I could always land with no issues, but hitting the centerline was difficult. With the TPR I can do that reliably. Having said that, the Logitech pedals were much better than the joystick for me.

If I recall correctly, I had a dead zone problem with them around neutral. You can use either Logitech software or the flight simulator to adjust that. Increasing the dead zone eliminates small random rudder changes due to voltage fluctuations.

To get to the bottom of your issues, I would start with a nice long runway and clear skies. See if you can hold centerline and if changing directions is easy. Check the calibration settings in MSFS or Logitech. I would also set up a scenario with a specified crosswind. Say, Rwy 27 and 10 Kts from 360 for a small plane, and 25 Kts for a large plane. Check if the rudders do their job in keeping you along runway heading if the nose points somewhat away from it.

Posting a video may enable us to provide more specific comments.

Peter

[Bobsk8]

Got rudder pedals, now you have to learn how to be a pilot.

[vadriver]

2 hours ago, Greazer said:

I've been simming for a long time, but only recently invested in rudder pedals

🤔

we are talking about "simming" a C150 one assumes .....

Edited August 8 by vadriver

[kerosene31]

Do what real pilots do - pattern work with a 152 or similar small GA plane.  

I find having some sort of real time wind indication can help too.  I use shift-z stats from flightsim dot to.  It will display the wind in real time.  The winds will vary and move your airplane around.  You have to make constant (but small) adjustments unless the wind is calm.  

Even a light crosswind component needs to be adjusted for.  

You can also set up a calm wind day to practice as well.  

There's lots of good Youtube videos on doing sim and real patterns.  Find a nice GA airport on a day with light winds.  

[martinboehme]

1 hour ago, Greazer said:

Right now I don't get controlled touch downs.

This implies, then, that you're doing crosswind landings? (Just checking.)

@qqwertz has a lot of good points that I wanted to add some thoughts to. To check if you have "slop" / deadzone around the center, you can open the controls settings and see if you get a reaction on the rudder axis when you make small movements of the pedals around the center. Alternatively, you could just go to an outside view and look at what the rudder is doing (or not doing) when you make small movements of the pedals.

To get a feel for how your particular setup works and test adjustments that you may want to make to the controls, I would also echo @qqwertz's advice of doing some high-speed taxi runs up and down the runway, with varying amounts of crosswind. That will give you the most feedback in the least amount of time. And I would also echo that a video might help to give some additional advice.

45 minutes ago, vadriver said:

we are talking about "simming" a C150 one assumes .....

Not sure I understand? A C150 needs more rudder work than the big jets. (Heard of P-factor, spiraling slipstream, torque? No yaw damper to keep turns coordinated either.)

Some people may have financial or space constraints that prevent them from getting the hardware that others take for granted. Why the gatekeeping?

[SAS443]

24 minutes ago, martinboehme said:

Why the gatekeeping?

It's apparently a backbone in this hobby.

somewhat offtopic:

A fun exercise if you want to be familiar with your new rudder pedals is the wing rocker.
Take a typical GA. Fly straight and level, around 60% power and make assertive wing rocking maneuvers. Don't be gentle! This needs to be quite firm. 

Watch the nose, it will want to point the opposite direction due to the adverse yaw created by the ailerons.

Your goal is to keep the nose basically fixed at the horizon (while you keep rocking the wings with ailerons)  by using your feet.

I still do this every time I fly a new airframe just to get a "feel" of the it. Some planes require slight rudder lead in before you bank, some don't. Airplanes are different, even in the SEP segment.

Parrying incipient spins in power on-stalls is also great fun, but might be beyond accurate replication in the sim. It's quite an extreme part of the envelope for a GA.

Have fun with your new gear!

Edited August 8 by SAS443

[SuperKaro2014]

Bought rudder pedals myself a month ago. It is my first pedals as well.

I got the Velocity One and just use them with standard settings. I had a joystick before with twist rudder as well.

There is a learning curve for sure… suddenly you need to allocate a part of your brain to coordinate legs and feet as well! 😁

This is where the beauty of MSFS And Youtube comes in. I’ll probably get killed by some of the IRL instructors, but here is what worked for me as practise:

• Create a controlled environment
• Pick an airfield you are familiar with
• Set a stable weather scenario e.g. clear skies, stable cross wind, no gusts
• Make loooong approaches so you can get yourself set up without stress
• Fly along the runway, no need to land initially
• Use pedals to keep the plane parallel with the centerline
• Use yoke or stick to counter drift and stay on the centerline
• Repeat, repeat, repeat
• Once you can fly the length of the runway in the right position, add the landing

What only dawned on me after getting the pedals, is that a correct crosswind landing in a GA should actually be with the upwind main wheel first, the downwind main wheel next and then nose wheel. But the logic kind of happened by itself when I followed the above.

Also I have realised that the rudder input I use during approach may (of course) have to be reversed after landing to correct on the centerline… it may seem obvious now, but it feels more logic with the pedals.

Good luck!

Edit: I still have the occasional panic landing, so not 100% consitent yet 😉

Edited August 8 by SuperKaro2014

[MrBitstFlyer]

When I was learning to fly, I had lazy feet - I was very slow to react with rudder. My instructor picked a day with a 90 degree strong crosswind at Duxford in the UK.  We spent a couple of hours in the circuit, flying low down the runway. My feet got a good workout!

I wonder if your feet are lazy like mine, after controlling the rudder with your joystick?

[Noel]

2 hours ago, qqwertz said:

Having said that, the Logitech pedals were much better than the joystick for me.

I don't have a lot of room under my flight desk so haven't purchased pedals and use a Cessna Trim Wheel for rudder and it works really well as it's easy to fine tune its sensitivity setting.  The main issue is you have to use a hand and I only have two hands so that is where pedals would really help for me.  But that being said I do good landings with the trim wheel and have worked out a sequence of hand use so I can do what I need to do.

[SuperKaro2014]

@NoelI think you wrote about this another thread about me converting a USB volume knob into a trim wheel?

Based on that I also tried it as rudder control… and it does indeed work!

I wished for a third arm and hand though but it is possible 😂

I am better with the pedals.

[eslader]

The Gflights are rebadged Saitek pedals, which I used to have. I had the same problems as you, to the point that I just gave up - probably prematurely. I probably could have gotten them into a fairly workable state with enough patience in adjusting axis parameters, but I wasn't that patient. Now I have MFG Crosswinds and everything clicked from the get-go.

That's not to say you have to trash your new pedals and go get something expensive. It's just to say give yourself some grace and know it's far more likely your pedals are the problem, and much less likely that the problem is in your piloting skills.