Crosswind capabilities

[Casey020]

Hello, everyone! 
 

I recently purchased a 1968 M20C Ranger. I have gone through the entire owners manual and cannot find anything about Crosswinds. Do any of you have information about the crosswind capabilities of my exact airplane?  I phrase it that way just in case other Mooneys have different capabilities.

 

As always, thank you very much for your time!

 

Best,

Casey 

[Yetti]

Short or long rudder?

[Casey020]

10 minutes ago, Yetti said:

Short or long rudder?

I didn’t know there was such a thing. How can I find that out?  

[Yetti]

Put this into Google   mooneyspace short long rudder

[Casey020]

11 minutes ago, Yetti said:

Put this into Google   mooneyspace short long rudder

Thank you!!
 

Mine is the short rudder. My tail-come does not look the same as those pictures. 

[Casey020]

[Yetti]

yep short.

It depends on how you do it.

I would say somewhere around 15 mph.

That being said most runways the winds calm down right at ground effect due to ground friction and trees.

Doing a one wheel landing seems to help from keeping the tail from being pushed around.

I rarely use full flaps to land, but half or no flaps for gusty windy landings

A couple of sucky crosswind  landings recently.

 

 

 

[bonal]

Short rudder on ours as well. Afternoon cross winds are the norm at our home field. 15 to 20 knots has never been a problem but would be a good idea to take some instruction from an experienced Mooney CFI to get practiced at how it responds to control inputs. I tend to use forward slips to keep center line.

 

[PT20J]

The M20 was certified under Civil Air Regulations Part 3 which requires:

§ 3.145 Directional stability and control.
(a) There shall be no uncontrollable looping
tendency in 90-degree cross winds up to a
velocity equal to 0.2 Vso at any speed at which
the aircraft may be expected to be operated upon
the ground or water.

Skip

[Guitarmaster]

Stick your foot on the floor, roll the wing down into the wind. When you can't keep the nose straight with the runway, you've exceeded the capability.

[PT20J]

24 minutes ago, Guitarmaster said:

Stick your foot on the floor, roll the wing down into the wind. When you can't keep the nose straight with the runway, you've exceeded the capability.

True, but it makes a difference at what altitude you do this. The winds are usually stronger up higher. So, in a strong wind it sometimes works best to fly the final in a crab and then convert to a slip for the last hundred feet or so. If you can't hold it in alignment with the runway by 50', give up and go around.

Skip

[wishboneash]

Also a wide runway helps ...

[Hank]

I've landed my long-rudder C in crosswinds gusting from the left into the mid-20s, and once on Rwy 23 with winds in the teens, 210V280.

A lot of it is good instruction, practice and proficiency. Right now, I wouldn't try either due to lack of recent practice. 

[carusoam]

Home work for Casey...

There are two methods for cross-wind landings... often used

1) Flying in a slip...a very stable way to approach the runway... but uses lots of energy...and it’s cross controlled so lots of other things go with that...

2) Crab and Kick... Crabbing is a nice way to stay on the centerline, but you can’t land while crabbing... so that the kick into the slip for the final part...

3) Flaps... how much and when to use them... full flap slips use up a lot of energy... so half flaps are often used for this... expect to use extra runway as well... especially while learning...

4) Use extra caution going in and out of crabs and slips... you can easily stall a single wing... you will only do it once...

5) don’t be afraid to contract a Mooney specific trainer for this stuff...

Stomping on the rudder pedal seemed like a fun idea... almost as much fun as letting off the pedals to see what would happen...

At traffic pattern speeds and altitudes... this is a definite no no...

Smooth in, and smooth out...

PP thoughts only, not a CFI...

Best regards,

-a-

 

 

 

[RLCarter]

I agree with the others above, grab a Mooney CFI and go practice X-wind landings, if your coming from a high wing you'll like how low wings handle the x-wind

[N201MKTurbo]

I once landed at Laramie Wy. With a 70 KTS cross wind. The cross wind runway was closed.

With that wind you land with zero ground speed. The problem is taxiing. The plane keeps wanting to come off the ground.

[flyer338]

In my experience the amount of crosswind a given airplane will handle varies directly with the speed flown during final approach. The faster the speed, the greater the rudder authority, and the more crosswind that can be handled. Barry Schiff wrote an article that I read a long time ago. He posited that with proper technique, almost any crosswind can be successfully handled.

What Barry advocated was an approach with the upwind wing low and enough top rudder to maintain runway alignment. Approach speed is whatever necessary for sufficient rudder authority to maintain runway alignment. This is not a full stall landing but rather one where the plane is flown onto the runway, upwind main gear

first. Ailerons into the wind until speed decays and the downwind man gear is on the runway, followed by the nose gear. I tried this technique in a short rudder C and it works. 
This is not a technique for a short field because the touchdown speed may be higher than normal. You may also decide to leave the flaps up.

[bonal]

2 hours ago, PT20J said:

True, but it makes a difference at what altitude you do this. The winds are usually stronger up higher. So, in a strong wind it sometimes works best to fly the final in a crab and then convert to a slip for the last hundred feet or so. If you can't hold it in alignment with the runway by 50', give up and go around.

Skip

What my instructor stressed was being aware of how winds will determine when to make your base to final and if done at the right time the need for a crab should be minimal as the cross wind will align you with the runway. We spent a lot of time flying the box and around a fixed point. Really fun and valuable lesson to see the effects of winds and how to compensate for them. 

[Ibra]

I used to plan along 0.2*Vs0 and POH max demonstrated wind but later I found if the runway is long and wide enough, I can always land as long as I am able to taxi, stick position is really important for taxi ! takeoff I tend to be ultra careful, ground roll may double or triple from crosswinds turbulence and never climb bellow 1.3*Vs0 + Gust factor

In M20J, personally I stop the show at 15kts crosswinds and 10kts gusts when landing in short runways as extra 10kts speed with no flaps means 3000ft long...

17 hours ago, Casey020 said:

I have gone through the entire owners manual and cannot find anything about Crosswinds

There are two schools techniques, but let's see the merits:
- Crabbing: basically stable approach but hectic flare, something that works better for slow approach in smooth air-mass
- Wing-down: basically hectic approach but stable flare, something that works better for fast approach in gusty air-mass

I have zero preference in practice, I just find myself crabbing when high and wing-down when low without thinking about it, in theory, all depends on your approach speed vs wind/gust components:  
- If you go wingding only, you will run out of rudder authority when going slow in 15kts winds
- If you go crrabing only, you will find it hard to stay in runway line wing level in 10kts gusts
- You should be crabbing base to final turn with ball dead in the middle on slow flying speeds
- You should be wing-down crossed controls when wheels touch the ground on slow taxi speeds
 Also, be aware of wind gradient/turbulence and decide if you want to deal with them on power or stick, but usually both required 

11 hours ago, RLCarter said:

I agree with the others above, grab a Mooney CFI and go practice X-wind landings,

I did 30kts gusting 40kts in a school aircraft last weekend on my own (plan for me was to give a student a flying lesson, unfortunately we had to cancel: training school manual explicitly says no training flight above max 20kts crosswinds, so I end up flying on my own for fun), IMO, teaching up to 15kts crosswinds tend to have better value for pilots anything higher than that is just difficult for everybody CFI & Student and does not confer much "teaching value" apart from "demonstration value", above 20kts crosswinds is something the pilot have to explore on his own and mainly relates to his own currency/comfort....

The hard bit with crosswind teaching is you can't just dial 15kts crosswind on the day

Edited February 25, 2020 by Ibra

[Ibra]

14 hours ago, Guitarmaster said:

When you can't keep the nose straight with the runway, you've exceeded the capability.

Does that account for how much you crabb before side slipping? A mix of crab & sideslip increases your crosswind capability

In theory, you can keep the runway line (but not aircraft nose on it) by crabbing only, say crabb at 85deg while flying at 90kts in 400kts crosswinds 

AFAIK, the 0.2×VS0 crosswind limit seems to do with ground taxi at slow speeds? Altough seems very generous for some certified tailwheels...

Edited February 25, 2020 by Ibra

[FloridaMan]

I have the long rudder. The highest winds I have landed with in my m20f have been reported as 29kt sustained direct crosswind with full flaps. 

Edited March 1, 2020 by FloridaMan

[M20F-1968]

On 2/24/2020 at 10:21 PM, Hank said:

I've landed my long-rudder C in crosswinds gusting from the left into the mid-20s, and once on Rwy 23 with winds in the teens, 210V280.

A lot of it is good instruction, practice and proficiency. Right now, I wouldn't try either due to lack of recent practice. 

When moving my F model with a towbar on the ground, the turning radius is different from Rgt to Left (As I remember a tighter turn is possible to the right).  

I assume the rudder has more authority on the right as well since the nosewheel movement is integrated into the rudder system.  I assume this is the reason for this post describing more crosswind capability with a Left crosswind than a right crosswind.

John Breda

[carusoam]

Interesting point John...

1) turning radius on the ground is tighter going to the right...

2) Why that is.... I’m not sure...

3) Does it effect rudder position... I never thought that far out....

4) Could it have something to do with the set-up to combat the rotary slip stream caused by the rotating propeller?... that would be my guess...

5) Rudder specs I believe are +/- the same number of degrees...

6) Rudder trim to handle the quirks of the rotating slip stream have been handled by bending a tab... at the rudder..  which isn’t much in cruise...

7) Compare to LBs with rudder trim that gets set for a T/O position... and centered in cruise... and adjusted for descent...

8) I would expect no additional amount of rudder one way or the other... the ground steering I believe is a limitation of bars up front.... the rudder had priority over ground handling...

Great question for a Mooney CFI...

Best regards,

-a-

[Hank]

51 minutes ago, M20F-1968 said:

When moving my F model with a towbar on the ground, the turning radius is different from Rgt to Left (As I remember a tighter turn is possible to the right).  

I assume the rudder has more authority on the right as well since the nosewheel movement is integrated into the rudder system.  I assume this is the reason for this post describing more crosswind capability with a Left crosswind than a right crosswind.

John Breda

Being based for my first seven years at a field with no taxiway (every landing was a backtaxi, as was every departure), I quickly figured out that my C turned tighte to the right. Went through nkse tires pretty quickly there, too, about every 3-4 years. Mains lasted a while, though. No idea why it turns better to the right, but it seems to be a common Mooney condition.

My own demonstrated crosswind is stronger fro  the left only because that's the way the wind was blowing. I do find it easier to slip left wing down, because that's the side I sit on, and coming in to land eith my side high just feels funny . . . . . .

[M20F-1968]

1 hour ago, Hank said:

Being based for my first seven years at a field with no taxiway (every landing was a backtaxi, as was every departure), I quickly figured out that my C turned tighte to the right. Went through nkse tires pretty quickly there, too, about every 3-4 years. Mains lasted a while, though. No idea why it turns better to the right, but it seems to be a common Mooney condition.

My own demonstrated crosswind is stronger fro  the left only because that's the way the wind was blowing. I do find it easier to slip left wing down, because that's the side I sit on, and coming in to land eith my side high just feels funny . . . . . .

With L crosswind you are using rgt rudder.  If the plane turns tighter to the rigt, that would also assume greater rudder authority when bringing the nose rgt in a Left crosswind.  

I believe there is a mechanical reason why rgt turns on the ground are tighter than left turns.  In any case, the end result is that there is apparent greater rudder movement/rudder authority with the rgt rudder.  In airports like mine where there seems to be a 90 degree crosswind 1/2 of the time, perhaps it is best to enter the end giving a L crosswind.

John Breda