Whats the shortest strip you will land at?

[rbp]

in order to be at 75 over the fence, the plane need some combination of potential (speed+power) and kinetic (altitude) energy. my preference is for 0% engine and 100% kinetic, which I believe is a carry over from gliders, autorotations, and 3-point landings in the T-6, all of which are energy management exercises, and seem to reduce the amount of runway necessary for a short field (this topic) landing. i admit it may not work for everyone, and I don't claim its the "best" or "only" way

[A64Pilot]

Some would consider kinetic to be speed and altitude to be potential, both are interchangeable.

To get in shortest you carry power, the reason is you can fly slower with power than you can power off.

But you can get yourself hurt doing this if you carry it too far.

With an airspeed boom with an articulating pitot tube so that it always points into the wing regardless of attitude you can see the rather marked lower airspeed you can fly at with power, but if anything over low power a stall is particularly nasty.

My Maule would fly comfortably at such a high angle of attack and such a low airspeed the airspeed indicator would read zero, but remember my Maule could land in 150’ Book numbers but you could beat that pretty easily. That’s the airplane to play these games with

Edited June 4, 2022 by A64Pilot

[rbp]

actually you're correct. kinetic is speed. without enough altitude and airspeed to make the airport, power will add energy into the system by reducing the descent rate. 

[PT20J]

33 minutes ago, A64Pilot said:

This, you control rate of descent with power not with pitch as in a normal landing, you hold airspeed steady, enough power and she will climb, idle and it drops, like a rock, so be careful. Lose power and you will tear up the airplane.

Just before touchdown you must add power to arrest the descent or you will break something. Adding power is often required also to get the nose up, average airplane at idle and at stall speed has very little elevator authority, but thrust from the prop adds airflow over the tail and it will bring the nose up. Be comfortable with rudder too or she will drop a wing when you add power if you aren’t on top of the rudder, don’t go to ailerons or you will stall the low wing

Bush guys call this “dragging it in”.

The 3 deg approach at 1.3 VSO is fine for normal flying into paved airports, but if you have to come over 100’ trees it’s not going to work.

This kind of flying a Mooney isn’t a good pick for, sort of like the C-140, but worse.

‘If you look up the word compromise in the dictionary, you should see an airplane pic, because they are compromises.

A good bush plane when you pull the power off will glide about like a coke machine, which is desirable, cause that’s how you get into that strip with the 100’ trees on the end, but a Mooney glides very well even with gear down and full flaps

If you want to play this game and it’s fun, I did for years, go get yourself a Kitfox or Zenith or whatever and have a blast, but leave the Mooney at home, playing STOL games in a Mooney makes as much sense as taking a 911 mud bogging.

No, that's not how it works in a Mooney because the flaps, though very effective lift producers, do not create a lot of drag. The amount of power is just barely above idle and removing it will not cause it to drop in until you are well into the flare. Now, if you have a STOL airplane and you do drag it in under high drag and high power, you will definitely have a problem if the engine quits, but that's not what I'm talking about.

[A64Pilot]

7 minutes ago, PT20J said:

No, that's not how it works in a Mooney because the flaps, though very effective lift producers, do not create a lot of drag. The amount of power is just barely above idle and removing it will not cause it to drop in until you are well into the flare. Now, if you have a STOL airplane and you do drag it in under high drag and high power, you will definitely have a problem if the engine quits, but that's not what I'm talking about.

I understand, if you carried it to a higher power setting and actually were behind the power curve it would. If it doesn’t drop when power is removed then you are not yet behind the curve AKA the “region of reversed command”

Now, I am NOT saying put a Mooney there, doing so would be indeed foolish, I never have and never will, but did so in my Maule often. It’s how to get a Maule M-6/235 down and stopped in 100’.

https://www.aopa.org/go-fly/aircraft-and-ownership/aircraft-fact-sheets/maule-6

Any airplane can be flown in the region of reversed command with or without flaps. But don’t do it in a Mooney, and don’t take the Porsche 911 mud bogging, neither will do well.

[Shadrach]

1 hour ago, A64Pilot said:

This, you control rate of descent with power not with pitch as in a normal landing, you hold airspeed steady, enough power and she will climb, idle and it drops, like a rock, so be careful. Lose power and you will tear up the airplane.

Just before touchdown you must add power to arrest the descent or you will break something. 

1) There is one way to slow down and go down and it involves the yoke, not the throttle. 
 

2) the increase in performance while in ground effect is more pronounced than any other airframe I’ve flown. It would be very rare for me to need power to arrest the descent (as in only if I F’up) because ground effect magnifies the effect of the remaining energy.

I agree it’s not a STOL plane, but I don’t think that’s what we’re talking about. We’re talking about short field landings. My normal approach is 1.2Vso at calculated stall. Even as I slow before the threshold, that speed still produces significant float. Presumably if I want to minimize float and land shorter, I need to slow down. Dragging it in with power at 1.1Vso has disadvantages that I don’t care for.
I will almost always take steep, slow and power off over shallow, slow and power on.  To each their own. 
Don’t misunderstand this as descending nose high to the runway. That’s not what I’m suggesting. The final descent to the runway should be nose down with the wing unloaded. Almost all of the remaining energy is used arresting the descent.

This method delivers the aircraft to the runway with the least amount of energy. 
 

I’ve never flown a real stole Aircraft but most of the competitions I’ve seen involve a lot of throttle jockeying at high AOA all the way to ground effect. I would never do that in the Mooney.

[McMooney]

On 5/26/2022 at 8:35 AM, Mooney Dog said:

Well tomball jet was sold off and the rumor is the guard is moving in so maybe thatll force them to change a few things as well.

just a thought, does that mean that maybe hooks will take a bit of govt money?  would love a 20yr guarantee for that place.  i'm scared one day the family will get an offer they can't refuse

[A64Pilot]

17 minutes ago, Shadrach said:

1) There is one way to slow down and go down and it involves the yoke, not the throttle. 
 

I think it would be safe to say that most of us reduce power to land

[rbp]

we need to have a spot landing contest! 

this is my son: 

 

 

[A64Pilot]

2 hours ago, rbp said:

we need to have a spot landing contest! 

this is my son: 

 

 

I’m in, but for me it would have to be in Fl.

Spot landings in my opinion show skill without the danger of how short can I stop does.

[carusoam]

Looks like 4” to go…

Does the boy have a Landing Height system to use for that?

Best regards,

-a-

[rbp]

On 6/5/2022 at 9:08 PM, carusoam said:

Looks like 4” to go…

Does the boy have a Landing Height system to use for that?

Best regards,

-a-

he just has amazing skills that he got from his mom. She learned to fly when he was an infant and she just buckled his car seat into the back seat of the plane during all her private, commercial, multi, instrument and CFI training

[carusoam]

Some kids get all of the luck!

-a-

[Mooney Dog]

On 6/4/2022 at 1:54 PM, McMooney said:

i'm scared one day the family will get an offer they can't refuse

i had thought they already sold it honestly