While my KR was a retract, and before I installed flaps, the only was to
slow the KR to a reasonable landing speed was to fly with the nose high and
the tail low. If not, the approach speed would always get too high. It
was quite common for me to come in and land with the tail touching first.
The tail would touch and you could hear that little caster wheel start to
spool up and the tail cone would act as a megaphone and the noise was like a
roar. I could balance the aircraft on the tail and very slowly lower the
nose until the mains would touch. My forward roll out would me all but non
existent. This could usually only be accomplished with the wind down the
runway.
Obviously I changed gear and added flaps for a reason. On all the days
except the perfect ones, My approach had to be flat and in the nose high
landing attitude I had no forward visibility. The flaps corrected that
problem and the fixed spring bar gave me the ability to bounce on the days
when I was less then perfect.
Now most of the time I wheel land and hold the tail off like Larry described
till it won't fly any more and use lots of brakes to keep the roll out
short. On the occasions when I have had lots of pattern practice and fly
the final approach at less then 70 MPH my roll outs are fairly short. As
my approach speeds near 80 MPH, I can float for what seems forever.
Managing the final approach speed and visibility over the nose was my
motivators for installing flaps.
Orma
Southfield, MI
KR-2 N110LR 1984
See Tweety at http://www.kr-2.aviation-mechanics.com
See other KR spces at www.kr-2.aviation-mechanics.com/krinfo.htm
