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Problems just after touch down


jfri

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When landing this plane I have big difficulties during the time after the touch down. It seem impossible to fly straight and when I try to counteract and tendencies of turning things easy go wrong. In best case I might find myself facing the opposite direction or going off the runway without crashing. But often I tilt somehow and crash the plane. I do hold back the stick

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When landing this plane I have big difficulties during the time after the touch down. It seem impossible to fly straight and when I try to counteract and tendencies of turning things easy go wrong. In best case I might find myself facing the opposite direction or going off the runway without crashing. But often I tilt somehow and crash the plane. I do hold back the stick

 

Keep the stick back, so the tail wheel is locked.

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When the global tyre physics change for warbirds happened last year, with lateral grip of all tyres being reduced, it obviously affected the tailwheel lock effectiveness. Previously you just had to touchdown on three points with lock engaged and keep the stick back - the plane was straigtening up even if you botched the touchdown somewhat.

 

Although the change was supposed to reduce the groundlooping tendency of DCS warbirds, with taiwheel lock being MUCH less effective nowadays, I actually find 109 harder to land. I kind of like it that way, as the plane lives up to it's fearsome wartime reputation of being a nasty b..tch on the ground, but still - it's more challenging and requires more focus.

 

My advice for inexperienced 109 pilot - make sure that you touch down on three as straight as possible - try to keep the ball centered all the time and avoid just cutting the throttle (sudden changes of power seem to throw the nose sideways in 109 more than in other DCS warbirds). Roll off the power smoothly instead. Now, after the touchdown, with stick back you "just" have to be dancing on the rudder a lot, with fast left & right dabs rather than longer presses. Easier said than done, I know, but pretty much exactly as in the Spitfire you have more experience with I believe? Then as the plane slows down during the rollout it will become more stable eventually, so it's all about surviving the first few seconds after the touchdown.

 

You'll get there!

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In no-crosswind conditions rudder is enough. For anything worse it's good to know the good brakes are there to help, but I don't fly this plane all that often to have sufficient crosswind experience with it.

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It's usually better not to brake until the aircraft is almost stopped, any inadvertent differential braking at high speed will cause a mayor disaster. With experience, lot of experience, it can be done but let that to later times when you already master it.

 

 

Take a look at wind socket before landing, if you do not land with face wind you gonna get a tough time. If you don't find or there's no wind socket available, watch chimneys around.

 

 

Make sure your tail wheel is still locked from take off, it's any good landing with an unlocked tail wheel.

 

 

Watch your airspeed, landing too fast or too slow means problems always. Try to keep some 250Km/H on final and set the wheels at some 200 or less.

 

 

Make a long and controlled final leg, don't rush trying to land after a steep curve right at the threshold. The old motto '80% of a landing is a correct glide path' is more true then ever on this kind of warbirds, and even more without experience on them.

 

 

 

And finally if all of that is correct, try to land right at the runway centre line and use rudder pedals, it doesn't have to be perfectly straight in the land roll but being in the centre first gives you room for some misalignment which is perfectly fine. But I mean use the rudder, not waiting until the veer is obvious but dancing on then as someone already said, all the time, right-left, right-left, no stop until the aircraft is well under control at a really slow speed, and I mean really slow, like a human walk or so.

 

 

S!

"I went into the British Army believing that if you want peace you must prepare for war. I believe now that if you prepare for war, you get war."

-- Major-General Frederick B. Maurice

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Keep the stick back, so the tail wheel is locked.

Keeping the stick back puts downwards force on the tailwheel and that's the right thing to do. But to lock the tailwheel, you need to use the "Tail Wheel Lock" Handle which is at the left of the pilot! I have mapped it to a switch on my throttle grip and I set it to "locked" in the final approach.

LeCuvier

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landing on huge modern runways does give the illusion that you don't need brakes :)

many temporary airfields in ww2 were on whatever flat ground you could find.

so you needed the brakes to minimise your stopping distance while not losing the plane in a ground loop.

like the British in the battle of Britain. using farm fields instead of airbases because the airbases were under attack.

and the 109 during the blitzkrieg years and retreats across France and Russia, needing to move with the front line.

 

so if you have lots of space you use rudder more than brakes.

but if space is tight you use both for minimum stopping distance.

 

we don't have that issue in DCS because even the Normandy map airfields are nice and long.

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It's usually better not to brake until the aircraft is almost stopped, any inadvertent differential braking at high speed will cause a mayor disaster. With experience, lot of experience, it can be done but let that to later times when you already master it.

 

 

Take a look at wind socket before landing, if you do not land with face wind you gonna get a tough time. If you don't find or there's no wind socket available, watch chimneys around.

 

 

Make sure your tail wheel is still locked from take off, it's any good landing with an unlocked tail wheel.

 

 

Watch your airspeed, landing too fast or too slow means problems always. Try to keep some 250Km/H on final and set the wheels at some 200 or less.

 

 

Make a long and controlled final leg, don't rush trying to land after a steep curve right at the threshold. The old motto '80% of a landing is a correct glide path' is more true then ever on this kind of warbirds, and even more without experience on them.

 

 

 

And finally if all of that is correct, try to land right at the runway centre line and use rudder pedals, it doesn't have to be perfectly straight in the land roll but being in the centre first gives you room for some misalignment which is perfectly fine. But I mean use the rudder, not waiting until the veer is obvious but dancing on then as someone already said, all the time, right-left, right-left, no stop until the aircraft is well under control at a really slow speed, and I mean really slow, like a human walk or so.

 

 

S!

 

 

During my last attempts I got the impression that just after touch down the rudder pedals has no effect at neither does the brakes. After the plane has slowed down a bit the brakes works. My touch down speed is below 200

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But holding the stick back is that not the correct procedure ? Does it not make slowing down more efficient ?
It won't harm, definitely. Just don't if you aren't in the correct airspeed or you'll balloon and take off again which is bad news in that position.

 

 

S!

"I went into the British Army believing that if you want peace you must prepare for war. I believe now that if you prepare for war, you get war."

-- Major-General Frederick B. Maurice

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But holding the stick back is that not the correct procedure ? Does it not make slowing down more efficient ?

 

Holding stick back is making down force on tail which push tail wheel in to ground , you dont want to tail wheel sliding and skidding this leads to accidents.

If you're making 3 point landing you already at touch down should have stick almost pulled all way back, if you are doing 2 point landing dont pull stick too early, plane will lift and can stall right away.


Edited by grafspee

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It won't harm, definitely. Just don't if you aren't in the correct airspeed or you'll balloon and take off again which is bad news in that position.

 

 

S!

 

 

But will it help (assuming we have touched down) ? Just after touch down as I see it the first and only thing you can and must do is slow down. And how to do that apart from just waiting ?

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But will it help (assuming we have touched down) ? Just after touch down as I see it the first and only thing you can and must do is slow down. And how to do that apart from just waiting ?

 

If you are in 3 point position stick full back and hit brakes, in bf 109 there is very little risk of tipping over

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That's it. If you make a correct three pointer then stick will be already backwards, and keeping there is the way to go, so plane sticks to the ground giving then better control in the land roll. Using gentle brakes is fine also, just don't smash and keep them there or you'll tip over. If the gliding path was fine, the touchdown correct with three points and at the correct airspeed, the aircraft settles and stops in a breeze by itself even without brakes. In the long Georgia map runways, 1/4 or less runway is used.

 

In bush piloting and other tail draggers a two pointer can make it even shorter according to some pilots, but that's an advance technique not suitable for beginners not to mention hard to apply in certain warbirds though possible in P-51 and Spitfire for sure, but I'm not so sure you shorten the landing roll doing so. I don't recall having tried in 109 and anyhow it's not recommended at all according to manual (you can see videos of some modern pilots doing it though).

 

S!

"I went into the British Army believing that if you want peace you must prepare for war. I believe now that if you prepare for war, you get war."

-- Major-General Frederick B. Maurice

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If you are in 3 point position stick full back and hit brakes, in bf 109 there is very little risk of tipping over

 

 

Yes during my last attempts this has worked. But both the manual and the tutorial voice instructions tell me to do otherwise. I still can't go straight on the runway but my plane wont break so I can correct that.

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Yes during my last attempts this has worked. But both the manual and the tutorial voice instructions tell me to do otherwise. I still can't go straight on the runway but my plane wont break so I can correct that.

 

Just practice, tail drag planes are very unstable in this situation so full focus is required until plane slows down significantly. If you are skidding left/right correct path with left or right brake. Rudder will not help you much in bf109 but it will have some effect so brakes and rudder will help you keep is straight.

System specs: I7 14700KF, Gigabyte Z690 Aorus Elite, 64GB DDR4 3600MHz, Gigabyte RTX 4090,Win 11, 48" OLED LG TV + 42" LG LED monitor

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