Landing with Tricycle gear

[Dennis Toth]

Guys,
I just started flying my first tricycle gear setup and although take-off is great, landing is another story. Mine is landing like a Ringmaster - bonce-bonce-bonce.

Question: how should one set up the landing glide and touch down with the tricycle gear?

Best,    DennisT

[Gerald Arana]

I am of the opinion that the nose wheel should be slightly shorter than the mains. That way you'll touch down on them first and not have the tendency in bounce into the air.

Good luck, Jerry

[Mark Scarborough]

It meets the same constraints as conventional gear does, , the mains should be no further aft than 15 degrees behind the cg. this is a bigger problem than landing tecnique is

[Gerald Arana]

LOL! That strikes me as funny Ty!

Cheers, Jerry

[Tim Wescott]

And once you touch, you can give it LOTS of down to make it stick.

[Chris McMillin]

Show us a picture of the model from the side and we'll know you're serious.
The model has to sit just slightly nose high, barely a smidgin' above flat level. When you land, you need to flare it a little and land on the mains. If it's bouncing, you're landing on the nose wheel and the force is rebounding it nose high, it rises off the ground and you are holding forward pressure, or down elevator, and it is responding with an elevator force nose downwards in a repeating cycle until it runs out of energy. Notice how an airliner lands, nose high. Land your nosewheeler the same way. If the nose is higher than barely higher than flat level when sitting on the ground, you'll need to adjust it. It helps with a smooth long take off and a nice, slightly nose high landing without bounces.
Chris...

Guys,
I just started flying my first tricycle gear setup and although take-off is great, landing is another story. Mine is landing like a Ringmaster - bonce-bonce-bonce.

Question: how should one set up the landing glide and touch down with the tricycle gear?

Best,    DennisT

[Dennis Toth]

OK, went out today and got better on the first landing and pretty good on the second, just needed to keep the speed up a little, she came in smooth and on the mains. The ship is an EDF 42" span twin boom concept stunter. Flies very strong, did wingover and loop today, forth flight. Still working on some trim issues, needs a little flap tweak and have to rework the nose to get the battery further forward to allow removing nose weight. All in all since there is very little design information on this type of power plant it has been pretty successful.

Best,   DennisT

[Tim Wescott]

Well, you're serious.  Or seriously demented.  Keep us posted.

[Dan McEntee]

   I'm impressed! Straighten up the photo so we can see it better. I'm surprised no one has tested these waters before, even with a smaller 1/2A size plane. Like Tim said, keep us posted.
  Type at you later,
   Dan McEntee

[Ted Fancher]

HI Dennis. What plane are you flying?  Basically, the mains should be 15 degrees behind the CG and as Gerald says the nose wheel should give a down nose attitude.   About 5 degrees.  And of course never land nose wheel first. 

Sitting in my 727 waiting for take off at LAX decades ago I saw a more or (mostly) less under control Mexicana DC-9 touch down nose wheel first while still a bit askew due to gusty cross winds.  It was not a pretty sight!  They did, nevertheless, taxi off the runway onto a legitimate  taxiway.  Heard the Tower ask if everyone was all right and get no response.  I imagine they were still counting.

One thing I learned for sure flying them for almost 40 years; Boeing and Douglas built some darn strong airplanes.  Might have done one or two such "test flights" myself.

Ted

[Tim Wescott]

   I'm impressed! Straighten up the photo so we can see it better. I'm surprised no one has tested these waters before, even with a smaller 1/2A size plane. Like Tim said, keep us posted.
  Type at you later,
   Dan McEntee

Photo straightened up for Dennis.

I want to see a semi-scale A-12 on the stunt circle.

[Fred Cronenwett]

when I fly the B-29 and other Tricycle landing gear airplanes as I am coming in for a landing I slow down and bring the nose up so that the mains hit first, then once they are on the ground then apply full down to stick the nose gear. While I am using throttle I am controlling the speed of the model but also applying up elevator to raise the nose. Since you would be landing dead stick you would have to gauge the airspeed and apply enough up to raise the nose but not stall the model. The model will slow down was you raise the nose. the trick will be in the timing on when you raise the nose so that the mains hit first.

If I was to land flat with all three landing gear hitting at the same time I would get a bounce. The worst is to have the nose gear hit first. to get a smooth landing I have the mains hit first.

You can see that in this video



The attached photo is my old 53" span A-20G coming in for a landing, with the right throttle setting I could slow down, raise the nose and land in this attitude, then throttle back some more and then stick the nose gear. The nose gear should be long enough so that the model will take off on it's own and climb out cleanly. if the nose gear is too short the model will snap from rolling to climbing out when the elevator takes control which looks bad. I like it when the nose gear gives some positive angle of attack on take off to get a clean climb out.

Fred

[john e. holliday]

If people will click on the link below a picture, it will come up right and can enlarged or shrunk.  Strange looking design.  I like it.