Pattern and Landing

[Ernie Martin]

I go by the book, with some adjustments to ease workload and triple check gear down. My protocol is in the figure below*. Flaps to 1/3 and gear down abeam the opposite end of the runway at 1000 ft. altitude; do nothing but watch for gear down light; throttle to 16 abeam the start of the runway; maintain 1000 ft. until speed bleeds to 100 mph and then lower nose and adjust trim to maintain this speed throughout downwind and base; on final, flaps to full (with modest crosswinds, otherwise 1/3 to 2/3), props full fwd, adjust trim to 90 mph and put hands on throttles until touch-down; inside the fence and clear of obstacles, adjust trim (and, if needed, throttle) to 80 mph; when 3 - 5 ft. above runway, throttle all the way back and try not to land, slowly pulling the yoke back to keep flying 3 ft. above the runway (this is my trick for perfect landings, which avoids float and settles the aircraft down at the lowest possible speed). Obviously, short fields may need a different approach.

Note: I wrote the above before reading Jakes response, and I wanted to alert readers to the differences in speeds, because mine are in mph, and his appear to be in kts.

Ernie
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* Derived from my "Passenger is Suddenly the Pilot" document, which I keep in the glove compartment to assist passengers if I become incapacitated.

[aldoradave]

Thanks for the input. I'll give it a go.

Hey Ernie, I sent in an e mail requesting your check list and that other info, and even included the liability release. Can you get that to me?

Dave Dillehay

[Ernie Martin]

Sorry, Dave, just checked and I never got it (request from others fulfilled 6/28/08, 8/10/08, 2/15/09, 3/7/09 and 3/12/09). Please send it again -- instructions at www.SkymasterUS.com

Updated 1.5 hours later: I found it. Outlook had put it in the Junk Mail folder. Will send it out shortly.

Ernie

[skymstr02]

I use the same speeds as GKEY, but on short final I trim almost full nose up where it takes effort to push on the yoke to maintain the glide path, so when I pull the power, all I have to do is relax the push and the airplane actually flares itself.

[John Hoffman]

Flew with an instructor who was a great Skymaster guy - he had me fly the pattern and down final with out ever touching the yoke. It was all pedals nose up trim and throttle. Had full up trim down final to finally taking the wheel just before touch down. I allways have full up trim now and as you say it pretty much lands itself if you have speed under control.

[Roger]

Two things I might suggest

1) I don't necessarily agree with full up trim on short final, becuase it's possible that you will need to go around, and full up trim will not be pretty if your need full power.

2) I have always said out-loud and used "Down wind / down Gear" as my point to put the gear down. This vs waiting until base or abeam. It's just an easy thing to remember. Once the doors are closed again the speed decrease is minimal, which keeps you moving around the pattern at a good speed, but adds one more way to "not forget".

[Skymaster337B]

My simple method:

Downwind: 100 MPH, 1/3flaps, Gear down
Base: 90 MPH, 2/3 flaps
Final: 90-80 MPH, 2/3-3/3 flaps (depends upon how well the pattern worked out)
Fence: 80 MPH, full flaps
Touch down: Whatever it takes to grease it in!