223 touchdowns. No [pretend] death ...

Discussion in 'Off Topic International' started by hezey, Oct 11, 2013.

  1. hezey

    hezey Well-Known Member

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    220 safe flights.
    this is 223 I think...
    I fly the A6M around the Frazer Valley, in BC, Canada, because I know where the airports are, so VFR is no problem and the Zero is a very easy plane to fly. I don't always fly the P-39, and I don't dare crash it, because I promised mys elf I would do hari kari....
    But if I crash the Zero, I will be disappointed, but I do not have my personal challenge involved. My challenge is to not crash the P-39.
    The Zero? Oh, sure, I could crash it, but I don't want to.
    I don't want to crash anything.
    223.
    :rolleyes:


    http://youtu.be/Dlqz8frP0Jc

    This is my writing that I put in youtube:

    Touchdown at Abbotsford, BC, canada.
    You might think, "Hey Tom, isn't your descent too steep?"
    Well, no, it isn't, see the Big Fucking Trees just by the approach end of the runway? It is a long runway, yeah, but I still need room to flair so I can touch-down on the stall.
    A6M can touchdown at about 60 Knots IAS, but I like a bit of wiggle-room, I am sure no-one at the [fake] airport minds me coming in at 90 to 100. A Zero can touchdown at 60, but it can touch-down at 90 just fine too.
    Looks boring, but if you use flight sims, you might like it, knowing well how hairy consistant touchdowns can be, I mean, being able to do it over and over again, without [pretend] dying.
    I have, now, over 220 touchdowns without a crash. Last time I crashed, it was because I wanted to take a terrible risk, which I would not have in real life, or if I were counting numbers of successful flights, which I have been the past year or so.
    Big deal, right? real fliers do it thousands of times. I am not a real flier but I still do like to look at the number of successes I have. Navigation is fun too, really low key stuff, very 'adult' sort of fun.
    Sorry.
    Well, not.
    The sim is called X-Plane 10.

    Oh and uh; This is from a flight recording, I do not step outside the cockpit while piloting in-sim.
     
    Last edited: Oct 11, 2013
  2. hezey

    hezey Well-Known Member

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    385 now
     
  3. hezey

    hezey Well-Known Member

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    Yep. just like in real-life. HAVE to practice. Oh, and the A6M3 that I really like to use? It doesn't like crosswind landings, not one bit. If I have a 10-15 MPH crosswind to 90 degrees of my heading..... uh, big deal, right? But the A6M is a light as balsa, and I am touching down at 60, which means 10-15 MPH wind is a BIG Breeze.
    As a result, I am being a chicken about crosswinds and am not doing them.
    I think after I crash, and I surely will, I will start in crosswind landings, because I, being already died and resurrecting, won't be counting coup anymore.
    Oh, why don't I try a big plane with lots of mass, that doesn't get tossed around by the wind so much?
    Well, errrrm.
     
  4. -ALW-

    -ALW- Well-Known Member

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    Well, then you need to jump into one of these then.... [​IMG]

    :D
     
  5. hezey

    hezey Well-Known Member

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    I can find one that isn't pay-ware for X-Plane. It is a L model. It flies like a dream, and can do that nasty break turn and then revers behind an enemy too, like Robin Olds did. But the cockpit in the one I can download sucks like hell and the exterior paint sucks like hell too.
    Oh, I will, but when I show the vidio please be aware it is a freeware and was made to emulate the plane, not it's looks.
    Wait, ALW, I will show you one, not crosswind.
    What is really important is that I don't crash the AirKobra.
    So, Maybe I will test a P-38 in a crosswind......
    I would like to show off as-described-by-him the maneuver Lt Col Robin Olds described, a nasty-break turn. That man went on to be a master. And he had very good teachers too.
    It is/was amazing plane. Olds was amazing pilot.
     
    Last edited: Nov 10, 2013
  6. -ALW-

    -ALW- Well-Known Member

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    That turn sounds like if I remember correctly, "differential turning/banking". A method using the P-38's ability to alter engine speed and combined prop pitch which would send the aircraft into a dip and slight spin on the engine that had been turned down. Before attempting the procedure a person would have been planning it with a combined roll/bank, opposite rudder. Kinda like putting your foot out while skidding on a motorbike to accomplish a 190°.

    I tried for a while to incorporate that action in WB with my own experiments. The effects were pretty lame. I would attempt it as a last ditch effort before being overtaken by a quicker turning aircraft. When I would lose my rudder and/or vstab, I would navigate my way home and land using a manual throttle control over either engine. If WBFH were able to integrate a combined dual throttle control into aircraft, it would be an interesting outcome, especially for the P-38. Differential turning was used during WWII combat dogfights with great success. The counter-rotating engines played a large role in that.

    :)
     
  7. hezey

    hezey Well-Known Member

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    I have been trying to duplicate it too. I can't. I have one throttle. I could, I suppose map both. See the youtube video about Olds encounter when he was snuck up on when retreating to base. He didn't describe the break turn, just said it was a gut wrenching break and then a recover and then was behind his opponent who overshot him, converting the enemy into a target.

    http://youtu.be/ITRLk9b9AcY
    He does his conversion just a bit after 4:20.
     
    Last edited: Nov 13, 2013
  8. mumble

    mumble Well-Known Member

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    You found out the stall speed with your flaps and gear extended plus 30% trick on your own (Vso *1.3). Very good! There's more to it, though. Vso *1.3 + half gust factor. So for your xwind landings, try to touch at that speed. Windward main, lee main, then let the tailwheel settle. It's a bit tricky with the weather vaning, but you can figure it out.

    The thing about the crosswind landing is the speed. Think vector. The reason the heavier birds have an easier go at crosswinds is because of the higher speeds involved. At least that's my theory. That's why I'd rather land at a bit higher than the suggested 80-100 mph window.

    You might want to practice holding a straight line with crossed controls (dip one wing a little, rudder opposite direction to maintain your path) at safe altitude first. If you can choose your crosswinds, I'd try to start with something like 30 degrees off rnwy hdg first, steady winds. That's just to get a feel for when and how to transition from crabbing the wind to aligning the plane with the runway. When you get bored with that, you can up to 45 deg, then 60, then 75, and the soul crusher; 90 degrees. Then you can start that process over with gusts (or some time shortly after you get comfortable with the 30 deg thing :)).
     
  9. hezey

    hezey Well-Known Member

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    Thanks. Yeah. I have been coming in for approach at a beacon that is marked on the map, and then swinging the plane into the reciprocal direction from the touchdown point. And that is way too close in, usually about 5 miles and then I have to be maintain perfect flight path in, and should be maintaining a 'V' rather that some direction I am calculating form a map. I do not know the correct jargon mor much of what I am learning, I can't afford to go to a school and get proper instructions....
    I am trying to prepare for IFR approaches. Bit there is no need for that, as you say, correctly. I can and do slip into the proper glide envelope, but am no need to do that, this is VFR and nobody is watching from from the tower.
    P-39 is tough and dangerous. 140 Nts is critical on final, there is no wriggle room in the P-39. Fiddling with crossed controls is fiddling with varial pitch prop and a 1000 HP motor, sitting over the CoG, which will wrench the P-39 into the dirt. I use that plane when I want something tough to do.
    Gusts are hard to imagine. I dread them.
    I have said before, I really admire people who fly planes so often, so much and spend so much time that they are very prepared for all the things that can and do go wrong.
    Vso 1.30 Okay. Half gust factor? I will look that up. I just did wiki, but have to more ground school time.
    Doing one's own flight instructions would be dangerous as hell in real life.
     
    Last edited: Nov 13, 2013
  10. hezey

    hezey Well-Known Member

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    Well, the P-39 I have been using is not backed up. I grabbed it a year ago from a web site. Now it has been removed, I suppose the dev wants to tweak it, in the mean0time, I do not have a working P-39 anymore, as I can only find one for X-Plane 8 and 9 won't work in 10.
    SO, I am off my quest for perfection in P-39 now, as I don't have one anymore.
    PFT.
     
  11. hezey

    hezey Well-Known Member

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    Well. I have some things to do first, before other things. No instructor to tell me what my priorities are and I have been doing things backwards.
    This, Mr Mumble is taking off from a runway pointed 70 degrees [Magnetic]. climbing gently at at 140 Knautical Miles Per Hour. Wind 280 [Magnetic] 10 to 11 Knots. I am letting the plane fly itself. All I have done is maintain roll trim and pitch nose up 5 degrees.
    Oh, I know what is happening, now I have to go back to Ground School and learn to vector.
    Yup.
    Gonna be a winter project, never mind aerobatics, time for some Navigation.
    I suppose I should also learn about the little switches I have in the cockpit, that will enable various autopilot functions, so I can look at maps in real-time [and calculate course, uh heading, uh vector].
    When I was a boy I looked over the little clear plastic thingies that pilots use when drawing their course on their huge and complicated maps.
    [​IMG]
     
    Last edited: Nov 13, 2013
  12. hezey

    hezey Well-Known Member

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    Crosswind landing with winds as Mr Mumble advised me. Except I have the wind varied from 10 to 11 MPH [ha, just to make things a little wobbly]
    I was, clumsily, slipping, with rudder and aileron 'sort of ' coordinated.
    I am going to do this a hundred times. When I am comfortable, I will swerve the wind to 310 degrees [Mag]. Keep it at 10-11 MPH.
    While I am playing around like that, I am gonna find some articles about vectoring in, no more dead reckoning.
    Thanks for the very simple tips [simple isn't easy, both of us know that, eh?].
    Simple is best when instructing.

    http://youtu.be/Df02PgOWIOo

    THANKS MAN!!!!
     
    Last edited: Nov 13, 2013