Pattern Target Power Settings and Speeds

[DCoburn]

[N3322G]

[trmckn]

Hi,

Every pilot has his own procedure...but here's what I use approaching VFR to an uncontrolled airport...

Approaching the pattern (let's say on a 45 at about 3 to 5 miles out):
set 18"MP, which will slow you to the 105 range holding altitude. I'll extend the gear at this point if I've got altitude to loose...otherwise that's the first thing I do turning downwind.

Turning Downwind:
extend the gear, set 15"MP holding pattern altitude, which should put you around 95mph.

Abeam the Numbers:
one notch of flaps, trim for 90, GUMP check, hold 15"

Base:
two notches of flaps, keep trimmed for 90, hold 15". You should be coming down nicely now.

Final:
three notches of flaps, trim for 85, adjust power for proper glidepath (usually a reduction) and one more GUMP

Short Final:
reduce power and smoothly bleed speed off...at this point, everything is visual.... for me at least. There is a "right" attitude transition for the transition to the flare that just takes a few times through to get burned into the brain. Speed over the fence is 80 or less with full flaps...but I pay more attention to the sight picture, and adjust power to fine tune things if things don't work out exactly right.

For what it's worth though, I've never been one to be focused on making the field at any point in the pattern should power fail. Keeping 15" until short final keeps the pattern wide enough to keep things confortable for passengers. That's not everybody's cup of tea though, so you'll need to adjust if you like to keep the pattern tighter.

I tend to mostly use full flaps, mainly because that's the habbit that I've gotten into. Partial flaps works fine also...but of course the power setting, target speed on final and the sight picture changes.

There has been a bunch written about Comanche landing characteristics being different (meaning more difficult) than other light planes. I don't see it myself. I don't tend to come in hot, and the plane slips nicely in case if you find that you're high and fast....but if the runway is long enough, anything 90 or less over the fence seems to be workable.

By way of disclaimer and full disclosure, I've had my comanche for just over 3 months now...about 50 hours in it. This has worked out well for me so far though. Hopefully some of the long time owners here will chime in with their thoughts also.

Tom

[DCoburn]

Tom, that's exactly the type of feedback I was looking for - thanks much. The C182RG I was flying previous to this worked well at about 18" for pattern entry, so with the Comanche that's too much and I think I was carrying too much power and then had to pull way back on final. We all know how much easier landing is when you're set up well on final.

What do you consider a 'wide' pattern? I typically use 45 deg from the #'s to begin a base turn. Is that what you are calling 'wide'?

Thanks again.

[trmckn]

[Alan Cheak]

DC : I agree with those numbers. When descending say out of 10K from a cross country I'll pull the power back 1 inch at a time to get the airplane to start down. From 10 to 15 miles out I use around 20" to keep my enging warm, speed up, (but not to much) and once I enter the downwind or a little before I set 17". This slows the plane down to gear speeds. I like to drop the gear around 120mph to lesson the gear stress. Nothing wrong with 150mph though. For me I tend to use a 800' pattern altitude. X navy fighter pilot and our carrier patterns are 600'. I split the differance. Once the gear is down I set 15" to walk around the pattern. I like to fly about half my landingings using flaps and half without. 95mph without and 85 with full flaps. These are over the fence numbers. Around the pattern I'm usually around 100mph. If the air is rough I find 85 uncomfortable in that it feels like the A/C wants to fall out from underneath me. Also if you use a 1000' pattern altitude and keep a tight pattern the Comanche has a tough time trying to get down while not speeding up. You can get sqeekers but it does take practice

Alan Cheak