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By JoeC
#1449873
Did a flapless approach today without meaning to.

Base leg and final I just couldn't get the speed down, picture looked wrong too. Then saw I'd not put any flap in.

Stuck in 30 degrees and landed without drama but was confused for a while at a time when confusion could have been eggy.

Have considered how I missed the flaps but can't work it out. :oops:
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By Miscellaneous
#1449874
When did you last fly? Who was on-board with you? I'm not a believer that these things happen without an influencing factor. :D
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By leiafee
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1449877
I would have done that on my first Tomahawk flight in ages a few weeks ago had not the instructor mildly asked, "So are you going to use any flap then?"

I have them on the X'Air but don't need them often and, as the POH remarks, they tend to lead to striking one's passenger in the face!

Part of me had clearly forgotten they exist in the time since I last used them!
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By Irv Lee
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1449882
I have forgotten what you fly. I have watched someone accidentally retract flap on final due to the famous switch "bounce" on an AA5. He had done it early enough on final for me to let him continue a little while, quite interesting watching. He never noticed despite clues, I had to tell him to go around in the end.
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By Irv Lee
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1449895
Is it one of those switches that, when retracting, retract all after you let go, but when lowering, stops at the current position of flap when you let go ? It is possible I suppose for those switches to do same bounce as an aa5 and retract all when you think you are adding more, but never seen it myself. Do you think you took flap and then it retracted or do you think you forgot?
Little sideline tip for 152 or 172 pilots with the "select value" electric flaps, if micro switch fails after you have selected flap (e.g. you have 20 degrees already, selecting further flap does nothing, neither does trying to retract), when you give up trying and get on with it anyway, always leave flap switch in the position the actual flaps are. E.g. in this case 20., If you give up trying to get it to work and leave it anywhere else, it might suddenly start working again if problem is merely a loose connection, not a good thing on short final. Known it twice.
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By Miscellaneous
#1449914
Aye, I suppose at a certain age the question is more; what are flaps, than I forgot to deploy them. :lol:

Why did you decide to use flap at that late stage rather than land without?
By JoeC
#1449918
Ooh, lots of reasons. Height being one. If I was landing faster and flapless then I would have wanted to be a bit flatter as Netherthorpe is short you have to hit the numbers, no time to float. I had time to stick to the flaps in and the option of 40 degrees (you can dump a 150 from quite a height at a slow speed with 40 flaps) before considering going around too.
By Cessna57
#1449944
Is the important point

JoeC wrote:Base leg and final I just couldn't get the speed down, picture looked wrong too. Then saw I'd not put any flap in.


You notiuced something was wrong, and found a solution.
Would have been more of a problem if you didn't notice ?

So I presume you never said "white arc" ?
When turning base I have a mantra
"ok, let's get this thing down, white arc".

You can probably work out why it replaced
"ok, let's get this thing down, some flaps"

Do you have any mantra after BUMPFICH* ?

I think the interesting question is at what point would you have given up and gone around or would you have tried to land it anyway?


*other pre landing checks are available.
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By Paul_Sengupta
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1449965
Irv Lee wrote:always leave flap switch in the position the actual flaps are. E.g. in this case 20., If you give up trying to get it to work and leave it anywhere else, it might suddenly start working again if problem is merely a loose connection, not a good thing on short final. Known it twice.


Had a similar problem with mine last year. The flaps wouldn't come up, so I mostly flew around in the latter months of the year with landing flap on. Luckily it doesn't cause too much drag. I'd select flaps up, so occasionally at a random time I had the flaps come up. I'd then make a mental note to not put them back down again and do a flapless landing but instinct would make me put them down anyway, then they were stuck down again. :shock:

This was fine until they started getting stuck in the landing position, which creates a whole load of drag. You wouldn't want to try taking off like that. I've now had a couple of new microswitches.

Anyway, being high on final always prompts me to select flap... :clown:
By Spooky
#1450062
I bet you won't forget again :)

At least you

a) saw something was wrong
b) did somethings about it
and
c) had no problems