flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

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lordauriel
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flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by lordauriel » Thu Jun 13, 2019 11:33 am

Hi

Risking putting this in the wrong forum category, but in good faith - I'm not really sure where this question belongs.
I have no IRL experience in flapped ships, only club-class work horses, so maybe you're wondering why I ask such a stupid question but this has been nagging me for quite some time.

In Condor 2 (and IRL?), flapped ships behave "odd" during landing. Let's say Ventus3-15: Approach and landing with flaps +1 and healthy spoiler deployment is fine, but with flaps +2 and L I get extremely steep approaches for a 105kp/h final, and rounding out (in this context, rounding out simply means not pushing forward that much) bleeds speed very very fast. Usually, even when roundig out waaaaay late, the glider floats a lot, then bleeds speed extremely fast and drops down faster than I can even pull back . Most of the time I get main wheel landings with the tail still up. At least i'd like to touch down in the correct attitude (tail & main at the same time) but that seems hit or miss.

Is this really how it is IRL? What tips can you experienced pilots give me on how to handle a flapped glider correctly during landing?

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Olympia
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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by Olympia » Thu Jun 13, 2019 5:06 pm

Flaps are for staying up.Spoilers are for coming down. You should not deploy both at the same time - no wonder you got such strange flying. The only flapped ship I have flown was the Blanik. I once inadvertantly pulled the flaps on an approach instead of the spoilers. I 'ballooned' rather than descended, and swiftly swopped the flaps for the spoilers. I haven't tried that again RL or Condor.
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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by Bre901 » Thu Jun 13, 2019 5:17 pm

Olympia wrote:
Thu Jun 13, 2019 5:06 pm
Flaps are for staying up.Spoilers are for coming down. You should not deploy both at the same time - no wonder you got such strange flying.
I beg to differ, flaps are also for landing on modern ships (actually also on vintage ones, I do have some experience on the Breguet 901)
The "Landing" position is to be used especially for short fields, with no headwind, otherwise a positive value is usually fine enough
Once extended to the "Landing" position, the flaps should not be retracted when close to the ground.

Whatever the flaps setting, the round-out should be performed with some airbrakes deployed, and once the wheel has touched, the airbrakes should be fully deployed (unless you want to roll) and, for plastic ships (for the Blanik I guess it's no real issue) the flaps should be retracted up to the most negative position, which will prevent ballooning and improve bank control at low speeds.
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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by wickid » Thu Jun 13, 2019 7:10 pm

Landing flaps are there for extra drag and lowering approach speeds. As mentioned above it enables very steep approaches.

Aim is to do the flare with half spoilers. Full flaps and full airbrakes leads to the behaviour you describe. If you are not comfortable with flaps L. Use the flap setting just below that. This is recommended for turbulent approaches by most manufacturers
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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by OXO » Thu Jun 13, 2019 7:48 pm

.. also positive flap increases the angle of attack and you will have to push stick forward to maintain airspeed
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lordauriel
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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by lordauriel » Fri Jun 14, 2019 9:47 am

thanks for the replies; I do all that. flaps #2 on final, speed trimmed to yellow triangle plus whatever the wind requires, spoilers not too aggressive but about 50%. It's the strong tendency to drop the nose just before touchdown that gets me, as if the glider wants to smash down with the main wheel.
Now imagine how many bounced landings I'd be doing in the real Ventus before I get used to that XD

PS So TLDR; with flaps +2 or L I float a LOT and then suddenly drop like a stone. more or less. So I tried flaps +2 approaching at 90-95 kmh. Was better. Not much time to pull on the stick and get the nose up before it touches, and done a biit too early and the glider balloons.

I just feel a lot more comfortable with flaps +1 and then landing like you'd land an ls4 or any other unflapped glider.

It's just weird

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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by Olympia » Fri Jun 14, 2019 11:51 am

Hmm, As an instructor I would never ever teach the use of flaps and spoilers together at any phase of flight. Pupils have enough trouble without juggling with the flaps.
Last edited by Olympia on Fri Jun 14, 2019 12:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by Bre901 » Fri Jun 14, 2019 11:58 am

IMHO plastic flapped ships should not be used for basic training. Period.
IIRC, when flying cross-country training in a Janus with pilots preparing for their 50km, I used to manage the flaps for them, especially for their first landing.
I hope that no instructor ever allowed a pilot to fly a flapped ship before he was experienced with solo flying standard or club class ones.
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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by Olympia » Fri Jun 14, 2019 12:19 pm

+1
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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by lordauriel » Fri Jun 14, 2019 12:28 pm

yeah but I'm not a student pilot.
My point is, can IRL pilots of modern, plastic flapped gliders confirm that what the Ventus / Diana etc in Condor2 do during hold-off is realistic and just like IRL

Video below certainly doesn't look like it's THAT convoluted

https://youtu.be/mAGKivQYVNI?t=387

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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by Olympia » Fri Jun 14, 2019 12:35 pm

I think this discussion points up the problem of using Condor as a training platform. Till the day you have your first really heavy landing IRL you will have no fear of fiddling around in the flare phase with anything, flaps or spoilers. In Condor you can do all these funny things and get away with it. In RL you might break a valuable glider - which won't make you many friends if is a club machine.

Half spoiler at the start of the finale flare should be taught so that you retain options. Good speed control to ensure that you retain enough energy to make a good flare is the most important thing.
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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by OXO » Fri Jun 14, 2019 12:40 pm

Are you up and running with Condor 2 Alistair?
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lordauriel
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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by lordauriel » Fri Jun 14, 2019 12:45 pm

so, what would you tell an experienced club class pilot before his first flight with a 15m flapped glider?
If this tendency to float forever with a sudden transition to drop the nose / stall is real, this is something i'd discuss.
setting flaps to their final setting after turning finals and then using airbrakes as normal, and maintaining speed, is something I assume is already mastered and not the point of my question

I find those gliders very unnerving to land, very tedious. I don't like to just "drop" from beer bottle height, I like smooth touchdowns.
When talking to a Kestrel owner, I never heard him mention this difficulty with landing, He simply said, "well it's a glider, you simply land it. there's nothing special about it."

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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by CFrench » Fri Jun 14, 2019 2:05 pm

I am use to using a little bit of flap for thermalling and a up to max for landing depending on how steep and the energy i need to bleed off. That I get from experience flying large RC sailplanes. Another thing we do on winch launch we lower the flaps and ailerons for some more camber, is that done on full sized flapped sailplanes at all? I have yet to try it.

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Re: flapped ships flight model question - OP can't land

Post by wickid » Fri Jun 14, 2019 5:17 pm

I manage nice 2 point landings with real life flapped gliders as well as the Condor ones. I don't notice any weird stalling or nose drops. If you are trying the Diana i may understand it a bit as that is a special case. The antares is a better reference if you only have the default ships
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