David Megginson said: > I've been frustrated with the tendency of the DC-3 (--aircraft=dc3) to > noseover during the takeoff and landing rolls, and of the J3 Cub > (--aircraft=j3cub) to nose over during wheel landings. I've fiddled with > the YASim files a lot in the past but have never found a good solution. > > Finally, today, I had a DUH! moment. On non-aerobatic planes, the > horizontal stabilizer is set at a negative angle of incidence so that it > will not stall before the wings (tail stalls are rarely recoverable). I set > the hstab on the J3 Cub and DC-3 to -3 degrees of incidence, and the > tendency to nose-over has virtually disappeared. The takeoff roll of the > DC-3 is a joy, and for both planes, I can now use the technique described in > STICK AND RUDDER for taildragger wheel landings -- just as the wheels touch > the pavement, push the stick or yoke full forward. >
Have I had this backwards all along? I knew of the incidence angle on the hstab, but always thought that positive values meant the leading edge was higher than with a negative incidence angle (assuming the trailing edge stays the same). IIRC P51 specs I have show a positive number for this. On the P51-D I generally hold the stick back a bit to keep things under control which is actually compensating for the extra tail-incidence (combined with the attitude of the a/c on ground). I believe this is normal procedure. In general though, I do not think that the ground modeling is very accurate in any of the flight models (a bold statement for a non-pilot :-)). What you are saying regarding stall angle makes sense, but this web page describes an opposite technique than the one you've quoted from Stick and Rudder: "Once on the ground the elevator control should be 'sucked into your gut,' that is, it is held back firmly as far as it will go. This places weight on the tail wheel and provides more steering authority. If the airplane touched down in the three-point attitude, moving the elevator control full aft will prevent bouncing or skipping." see http://www.mountainflying.com/taildrag2.htm Best, Jim _______________________________________________ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel 2f585eeea02e2c79d7b1d8c4963bae2d
