Hi All, I'm by no means an expert but I am very comfortable with my landings in my stock KR2 tail dragger.
This is how it looks from my cockpit http://www.users.bigpond.com/kr2/Picture_Gallery.htm the bottom 3 pictures, the numbers in the following text may be different (wrong) because my ASI is reading high and the values I use here are corrected by what I think is the variation. I also have a small problem with my brakes, they are either on or off, there is no gradually applying brakes (I currently have my KR2 at home and am adding wing stub tanks and one of my other jobs is to modify the brakes). I do down wind at about 100kts, as I turn base I chop the throttle to just above idle to maintain 90kts and turn final at 85kts. My approach angle is below everything else I've flown (or anything in the circuit) and I aim to cross the fence at about 65 to 70kts with 20ft clearance with the motor at idle. To achieve this I nearly always side slip to loose height in the last 150ft, this means that I can glide to the field if the engine fails. My circuits always allow me to be able to glide to the strip, I very seldom use power from the time I turn on to base. I maintain the speed right into ground effect rounding out only just above the ground, to shorten my total strip usage I fly on ASAP, but when I'm comfortable (if that makes sense), the grass strip slows me down real fast. Because the strip is a little rough I put the into wind wheel on the ground first and try to hold the other off, this stops nearly all bounce (unless I hit a big bump). When both wheels are on the ground I hold the tail up till the speed is below 35kts then let it settle to the ground getting even more drag from the tail wheel in the grass. If I look like finishing my ground roll before the runway exit I hold the tail up for ASAP to extend the ground roll. I problem is short landings over tall obstacles. I've practice many and have done one over 40+ feet trees on to 600m dirt strip. Came over the trees at idle, full side slip, straighten out, , round out, settled nerves and got on to dirt ASAP, the strip was very rough and I did some bouncing and stopped 50m from the end. I'll try this strip again when the brakes work better. The trouble with a short strip is once the tail is down I cannot see the end fence. Next time I will pick a land mark, off to the side, for points to: 1) take off again if I don't think I can stop. 2) do a ground loop if it looks like I'm going into the fence (failed the first decision). regards Barry Kruyssen Cairns, Australia RAA 19-3873 k...@bigpond.com http://www.users.bigpond.com/kr2/kr2.htm ----- Original Message ----- From: Joseph H. Horton To: kr...@mylist.net Sent: Wednesday, November 02, 2005 2:08 PM Subject: Re: KR> landing a KR Larry, Thanks for the advise. I need to find what works for me. I do have flaps but need to test them further before using them at full deflection on landing. One thing that I am curious about is the glide slope lights to the runway. What glide are they set for? I had 2 decent landings and both times I was well below the lights.(red over red) This gives a shallow approach and a more level attitude when the flair starts. After thinking about the bounces from yesterday I think that I actually pushed the stick forward and caused the hard hit. I am not sure why i did that, but my guess is I saw the runway passing by and had the urge to get it on the ground to start the roll. Thanks for the help,
