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While Dave's answer is a pretty succinct answer to this common question, I would offer a differing opinion on a few points.
1. I wouldn't worry too much about bleeding off the forward speed. It is always nice to get it slowed down, but the airplane is designed to land at its cruising speed and the amount of side load on the gear is so transient, it really is not that much of an issue.
First there is no sense in placing anymore stress on the mains, which is also transmitted through to the spar than necessary and Second by bleeding off all excess speed when the upwind wing swings around it will be moving just that much slower and therefore producing that much less lift.
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2. If the wing does come up, and I have had this happen on a number of occasions (although I'm not in that selective club who has the 45kt experience) you can do one of two things to bring the wing back down. Slight brake pressure applied just once will usually do it, or a slight one time push on the yoke.
Since I do admit to being in the "selective club" I feel that experience has taught me something. Hitting the brake on the one main left on ground has the same effect as hitting the brake on only one side of any aircraft with differential braking. This is not something many pilots choose to do at 60 MPH or better, especially when one wing is flying and the other is not.
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3. If you are going to change direction, DO NOT STEER INTO THE WIND, steer away from it slightly, the aerodynamic push of the wind will put the upwind main back on the ground. It is not a dissimilar aerodynamic function than a forward slip where you use the fuselage to destroy lift.<<<<
By steering ever so slightly (think of it more as a slight pressure than actually steering) towards the downwind wing you are once again applying downward force to the downwind wing and additional lift to the upwind wing (same maneuver you do when turning in flight, one wing goes up and the other goes down,,,right? Think about which way the ailerons move when you turn the wheel) accentuating the problem and risking scraping the downwind wingtip on the ground. Because of the dihedral of the wing on the Coupe you really have to raise the one wing unbelievably high. Wingtip contact with ground could cause a ground loop or worse. I have no doubt that a hard application of steering towards the upwind wing will get you in trouble as well.<<<<
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Last, let me point out that in a conversation with Fred at his next to last trip to the "Chicken Ranch" he told me of his experiences landing in "very high X-winds" and these were his recomendations and explinations. He also explained that aside from the increased stability the high dihedral of the wing also made it virtually impossible to drag the wing tip in such a situation. I can only assume that since Fred designed the Coupe, and did a lot of test flights exploring the envelope. His advice seemed fairly valid, at least in practice it was for me . :-)
Just to be fair here Bob Sanders in a memo also advised touching down at the slowest possible speed. He did however divert from Fred's opinion by advocating a "sharp application of the brake" to bring down the wing which he acknowledged in his memo happens. Assuming he tried this in a real X-wind, it may well mean it doesn't much matter what you do. The bottom line then is that as you slow down the wing looses lift and down it comes.
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Other than that, enjoy them. The first one is a leap of faith. From that point on, they are close to a non-event.<<<<
Keith
N5663F
