Wednesday, June 22, 2005
So you're just gonna pull back until the plane falls out of the sky......
Yeah, sounds crazy, right? Well that is a stall, and that is what I have been practicing repeatedly for the past two flights. The idea is to simulate landing and taking off situations in which you get in trouble and you stall the airplane. You had better be good at recovering, because if you do it on a takeoff or landing, you don't have much time to recover before you hit the ground.
So we climbed up to 2,800 feet above the ground and began to set up for the power off stall, the one which you would encounter if you came in for a landing too slowly. At this altitude, you have plenty of time to recover, no matter how badly you screw it up. Trust me, you can REALLY screw this up. More to follow.
First order of business is to slow down. Power down to 1500 RPM. Until this point, the 4 cylinder reciprocating air cooled engine in front of you has been humming right along at 2000 to 2300 RPM, generating a comforting amount of noise and pulling your little plane through the sky. At 1500 RPM it gets unnervingly quiet. It's no longer pulling you through the air and it feels like something is about to go wrong. 2,000lbs of aluminum doesn't just hover, you know.
Carb heat on, flaps to 10 degrees at 85 knots, nose down, ten more degrees of flaps, nose down again, watch your altitude, more flaps, altitude, vertical speed indicator, full flaps, altitude again, cut power to idle, speed to 55 knots, nose down for the runway. All of these things have to happen before you are even ready to do the stall. Lots of things going on in the cockpit.
So once you've set the plane up like this, you are in slow flight. This is as slow as the plane can fly without falling out of the sky. Time to make it fall.
Without adding any power, you just start pulling back on the yoke. This makes the nose go up, which reduces your airspeed. Just before the stall, a little horn inside your left wing starts to buzz. This is a warning to stop doing what you are doing, you are about to fall. No dice, keep pulling. It takes forever to finally fall, these Cessnas just don't want to fall. Finally, a shudder and then you are falling. Not a comforting feeling the first time it happens.
Now, nose down, flaps to 20 degrees, carb heat off, full power, nose back up to climbing speed and you are out of it. Simple right? Just don't forget to take those flaps back to 20 degrees. On my first stall recovery I did not and when I put the power to full throttle and pulled the nose back up we shot up. Instantly our nose was up at about a 30 degree angle, it shot up so fast that it pushed my head down so I was looking at my knees. My instructor pushed forward and we had a bit of weightlessness as we came over the top of the curve. A little exciting for the first one, but no big deal.
The power on stall is tame by comparison. You have no flaps, the power is on full power and you just pull up too hard. A Cessna 172 doesn't have that much power so you just pull the nose up to about 55 degrees and wait for the stall. Let the nose drop, pitch for the climb again and you are on your way. The only way you can screw this up is if you don't compensate for the yaw of the engine with a lot of right rudder. Your left wing will dip hard and you could end up in a spin if you don't catch it. My instructor almost put us in a spin demonstrating this to me. Exciting shit.
So stalls are no big deal. Landings, on the other hand.....
So we climbed up to 2,800 feet above the ground and began to set up for the power off stall, the one which you would encounter if you came in for a landing too slowly. At this altitude, you have plenty of time to recover, no matter how badly you screw it up. Trust me, you can REALLY screw this up. More to follow.
First order of business is to slow down. Power down to 1500 RPM. Until this point, the 4 cylinder reciprocating air cooled engine in front of you has been humming right along at 2000 to 2300 RPM, generating a comforting amount of noise and pulling your little plane through the sky. At 1500 RPM it gets unnervingly quiet. It's no longer pulling you through the air and it feels like something is about to go wrong. 2,000lbs of aluminum doesn't just hover, you know.
Carb heat on, flaps to 10 degrees at 85 knots, nose down, ten more degrees of flaps, nose down again, watch your altitude, more flaps, altitude, vertical speed indicator, full flaps, altitude again, cut power to idle, speed to 55 knots, nose down for the runway. All of these things have to happen before you are even ready to do the stall. Lots of things going on in the cockpit.
So once you've set the plane up like this, you are in slow flight. This is as slow as the plane can fly without falling out of the sky. Time to make it fall.
Without adding any power, you just start pulling back on the yoke. This makes the nose go up, which reduces your airspeed. Just before the stall, a little horn inside your left wing starts to buzz. This is a warning to stop doing what you are doing, you are about to fall. No dice, keep pulling. It takes forever to finally fall, these Cessnas just don't want to fall. Finally, a shudder and then you are falling. Not a comforting feeling the first time it happens.
Now, nose down, flaps to 20 degrees, carb heat off, full power, nose back up to climbing speed and you are out of it. Simple right? Just don't forget to take those flaps back to 20 degrees. On my first stall recovery I did not and when I put the power to full throttle and pulled the nose back up we shot up. Instantly our nose was up at about a 30 degree angle, it shot up so fast that it pushed my head down so I was looking at my knees. My instructor pushed forward and we had a bit of weightlessness as we came over the top of the curve. A little exciting for the first one, but no big deal.
The power on stall is tame by comparison. You have no flaps, the power is on full power and you just pull up too hard. A Cessna 172 doesn't have that much power so you just pull the nose up to about 55 degrees and wait for the stall. Let the nose drop, pitch for the climb again and you are on your way. The only way you can screw this up is if you don't compensate for the yaw of the engine with a lot of right rudder. Your left wing will dip hard and you could end up in a spin if you don't catch it. My instructor almost put us in a spin demonstrating this to me. Exciting shit.
So stalls are no big deal. Landings, on the other hand.....
// posted by Josh @ 6/22/2005 09:47:00 PM 
