Short Field+Soft Field=How?

[PhatAJ2008]

Heard the DE has students so a short and soft field landing at the same time. How would this be performed? Use breaks? Flaps?

Thanks

 

[gkrangers]

They kinda contradict each other.

 

[tathepilot]

no so..

softfield technique minus the brakes, its that simple

duh :smash:

 

[xjcaptain]

Anybody ever consider that many times a very short strip might also be soft? This is where PTS meets reality and learning at the rote level might leave you a bit short. Short answer, soft field technique, but keep it rolling around the corner. Lift off into ground effect at minimum airspeed to eliminate the rolling drag, and accelerate to Vx to clear obstacles at the end of the short runway that is also soft. Technique also works well on a firm grass strip that is in need of mowing. Amazing how much drag long grass can add!

 

[gkrangers]

Anybody ever consider that many times a very short strip might also be soft? This is where PTS meets reality and learning at the rote level might leave you a bit short. Short answer, soft field technique, but keep it rolling around the corner. Lift off into ground effect at minimum airspeed to eliminate the rolling drag, and accelerate to Vx to clear obstacles at the end of the short runway that is also soft. Technique also works well on a firm grass strip that is in need of mowing. Amazing how much drag long grass can add!

Landing...not takeoff...

 

[avbug]

Short and soft field techniques most certainly do not contradict each other. Very often a field which is soft is short, surrounded by obstacles, and requires the advantages of both techniques...which are the same.

This applies regardless of w(h)eather you do it taking off or landing.

Short fields are frequently soft, soft often short. Not uncommonly, high obstacles are in close proximity. A better way to think about these techniques is to consider them maximum performance techniques.

How you do it really depends on the aircraft, but getting the airplane into the air as soon as possible, or getting the wheels away from obstacles and out of the muck, is the goal. A soft or slick field may not permit stopping, so holding the brakes for takeoff may be out. To say nothing of potential propeller damage. Runups are often not possible in such locations; you do those in the air before you land, not before you take off.

 

[gkrangers]

Well from your standard, run of the mill short field landing perspective, you could dig your way into the ground by using max braking on a soft field.

It would seem to me that just sticking to the normal soft field technique would be fine for a short soft-field, as the extra friction of the ground should do the trick in slowing the airplane...

 

[great cornholio]

Well from your standard, run of the mill short field landing perspective, you could dig your way into the ground by using max braking on a soft field.

It would seem to me that just sticking to the normal soft field technique would be fine for a short soft-field, as the extra friction of the ground should do the trick in slowing the airplane...

You can hit the brakes pretty hard and not dig in on a dry grass field from what I've seen in the GA stuff I flew. I used to take my students to Pierson FL alot back in the day. It wasnt really that short, but I experimented around with the brakes some. On a dry day you could hit the brakes really hard and would just slide across the grass instead of digging in. I never tried it on wet grass cause I never landed on wet grass, just because it seemed to me that if it was a muddy day it wasnt worth it.

Here would be my answer to the original question. 1. try to put it on the ground as soft as possible while aiming for a spot close to the threshold. 2. Keep the yoke back to keep as much pressure off of the nose wheel as possible while hitting enough brakes to get the stopping perf you desire/need. 3. When slow enough do a 180 or whatever turn needed to get to where you want to park the plane while trying to avoid comming to a complete stop until you get where you want to leave the plane.

This is where rote memorizaton of techniques is a bad thing cause people think soft let it roll and short max brakes. When really all you have to do is use a little of both and just fly the plane in a way that will keep you from crashing....that will pretty much work in any situation.

 

[nosehair]

Heard the DE has students so a short and soft field landing at the same time. How would this be performed? Use breaks? Flaps?

Thanks

It's unfortunate that a combo short/soft isn't a choice on the PTS. That doesn't stop us as instructors from teaching some combination techniques, but there are many different ways of extrapolating the two, and the extrapolation would be dependent on the unique conditions of the shortness and softness of the landing strip being considered.

No DE should ever ask a student to make these kind of judgements because there can be so much variation on the subject.

I think it would be great to have some set of standards and included in the FAA Airplane Flying Handbook with the kinds of techniques that are offered here, and in the PTS, but without standards, my opinion is as good as yours. Each DE will have his/her own level of experience and opinion.

 

[avbug]

You can hit the brakes pretty hard and not dig in on a dry grass field from what I've seen in the GA stuff I flew.

Grass doesn't make the field soft. Tall grass certainly can, because it grabs at wheels, but merely the presence of grass doesn't make it a soft field, and normal takeoff and landings on a turf runway are common practice.

Mud, slush, sand, and other such surfaces are soft. These not only make taxiing difficult, but bind tires and slow down acceleration. On landing, they can grab tires and cause both directional problems and control problems such as pitching a conventional gear airplane onto it's nose.

Rough field is somewat in the same vein as soft field, which may include big rocks or logs, chunks of ice, etc. A very neven or unprepared surface can be a rough field. Soft field techniques are generally applicable on rough fields or unpepared surfaces, too, and the need to minimize exposure to them also makes them by necessity short fields.

Short fields are often short because they're limited by takeoff area, which is usually limited by obstacles, which puts obstacles directly adjacent to the takeoff area in many cases. It may be limited to a drop off or river, but often as not by trees, power poles, cliffs, fences, terrain, or other hazards.

In most light airplanes, the technique is the same. Get the airplane off the surface and into ground effect in as short a distance as possible, and accelerate in ground effect. This often requires a very gradual application of power and application of flaps well into the takeoff roll, both potentially advanced techniques, as is the takeoff and landing from a short, soft field. A pilot should have some solid flying under his or her belt before coming back to be taught these sorts of practices; it's nothing a student pilot should be taught and then kicked loose to try.

When the examiner asks you to perform one technique or the other, put on the brakes right there and find out exactly what is going on, review the proceedures, pull out the performance charts and show the examiner what you have to work with. If the example field that the examiner wants you to demonstrate is too much, explain that you wouldn't be taking off or landing there in the first place. The one exception is the emergency landing site...whch you don't always get to choose.

If yo have performance data for a dry, standing takeoff with brakes held and released at full power, then use that. If you have performance data for a maximum performance takeoff on soft surfaces, then use that. If you're given a scenario where it's both, remember that the soft field technique you're given is the only way to taxi and takeoff...you have no other choices...use the performance data (understanding that a soft field will make it substantially longer, and you can't really predict how much longer because of the wide variance in surface conditions with which you might be presented) given you. Use the longest distance listed. If it's longer than what the examiner has given you to work with, just tell him you can't do it and you're refusing as PIC to take off. Nobody can fault you for that.