Landing Issues

15 Answers

1. 
   

   
   

   Lance on Mar 19, 2011

   So is he starting his flare on his own at a good height?  If so, one thing that I have found works well is tell him he is not trying to land, but rather keep the airplane as close to the ground as possible without touching it, then as he begins reducing his power, eventually he will settle onto the ground.  If he comes from a flying family, you might talk to some of his family members, maybe they had the same problem when learning and can tell you what the thing was that helped them to figure it out.  If he is having trouble visualizing where to start his flare, you might start probing into how he is looking at the whole landing, is he looking at the tip of the spinner? 5 feet in front? 10 feet in front? The end of the runway? The edges of the runway?  A bad sight picture can lead to lots of problems determining flare height.  Another trick I have used for students who are good with aircraft control, is take away their entire instrument panel, and force them to do the entire approach and landing based on feel of the aircraft.  I have found that many times students will try to fixate on gauges and instruments rather than landing the airplane, whether or not that realize that is what they are doing.  Of course this means you need to be comfortable enough in that particular aircraft that you feel confident teaching a student to do a landing without looking at any of the instruments as well.  Hope one of these helps, if not but you do get it figured out let us know how you did it!

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2. 
   

   
   

   John A Lindholm on Mar 20, 2011

   From your description, my gut tells me your student might have a “vision” problem.   Have you watched his eyes during the flare?   Might be a fixation issue.   Are you making him reduce power steadily so the flare and landing are not prolonged?  Has he mastered the “decelerating airspeed, increasing pitch to stop descent” concept?
    
   Is he “thinking” about the landing too much?  Aircraft close to the ground and on the runway while accelerating/decelerating must be controlled instinctively.  Too much thinking usually delays basic flight control enough to compromise control.
    
   How was his airwork?  If his basic aircraft control is average or above, I think you’re back to the vision thing.  If wearing corrective lens, what is the eye condition?  A visit to a good eye doctor (preferably one with “pilot” experience) might be in order.

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3. Best Answer
   
   

   
   

   John D. Collins on Mar 20, 2011

   Some individuals have difficulty determining whether or not they are sinking or rising and therefore don’t sense the ground coming up quickly or don’t see the balloon occurring until it is too late.  I have found a technique that allows such a student to see the  the sink / rise in their peripheral vision. Standing out on the Tarmac and focusing on the horizon, have the student bend their knees and observe the sink or rise as they lower and raise themselves.  Once they understand what to look for and to recognize when the airplane is sinking, rising or staying level, point out to them while they are in the cockpit and on the ground to focus off to one side to recognize what the sight picture is on the ground.  I usually use runway light fixtures as a reference. 

    

   I also instruct the student to not attempt to make the round out all in one motion. From the glide as they pass over the threshold, I have them make a noticeable pitch up motion, so they start to arrest the descent rate, but are still nose down.  I have them make successive increases in pitch to break the flare up into several parts.  I have them use their newly found ground skills to estimate their height above the ground and to achieve a level off over the runway.  Then each time they sense they are sinking, I have them arrest the sink.  By repeating this process the nose slowly comes up as the airplane sinks to the ground, and eventually the main wheels touch in a nose high attitude. I also show them to recognize the balloon and to release the back pressure so that the aircraft stops ascending and levels off and then continue the landing process.  Of course if things get towards my safety limits, we go around and try again.

    

   I have found that breaking up the process into a series of steps helps some difficult students learn to land.

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4. 
   

   
   

   Kyle Usher on Mar 20, 2011

   When I was a student, I had trouble landing as well.  It took me about 120 landings before I got it.  I was doing similar landings as your student was.  How one flight instructor broke me of this habit, was to have me land with a little bit of power (as we would if it were a soft field landing).  We did that a couple of times with great success! Then pulled the power out slowly each time thereafter.  Give that a try.
   Kyle  

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5. 
   

   
   

   Wes Beard on Mar 20, 2011

   It seems to be that it is a “where should I look” issue.  The Airplane Flying Handbook has a good deal about progressively looking farther down the runway.  I typically, when flaring to land, look at the far end of the runway and judge my sink / balloon based off of what I see and feel with the airplane.
    
   The other issue might be his seat position.  Make sure he is adjusting his seat the same every time he flies.  If he flies with a different seat position, his perceptions are going to be different every flight leading to interference while he flies diminishing the training experience.  

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6. 
   

   
   

   Micah on Mar 20, 2011

   When I see this with a student I tell them the same thing Wes describes (which is really what John C. describes as well). I tell them if they are looking at the near numbers then they are simply staring and have no idea what’s happening to the airplane. If they look at the far end of the runway then they are able to judge the aircraft’s approach to the ground. Similar to John’s example, I tell students to stand in front of a table and look at the surface. Then they should kneel and watch what the table surface appears to do as their eyes get close to even with the surface.
    
   Also, how is this student with slow flight? Is this student in complete control or making abrupt movements? It may be worthwhile to transition to soft-field takeoff and landing instruction. This may help the student look outside at the proper visual references.

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7. 
   

   
   

   James MacGregor CFI on Mar 20, 2011

    Here is my take on this.
    
    On aprch, lock airspeed hold the numbers steady in your windshield (if they go up your low and need to level off and maybe add power and vise versa).
    
    Once you feel you can glide in, take your eyes COMPLETELY off the panel take the power out and glide her down, once you are nice and low level off and FLY THE PLANE DOWN THE RUNWAY!! (to do this you need to be looking down the runway) as she starts to sink try to hold her off.  This is the FUNDAMENTAL way I teach my guys to land. 
    Flair is not something you do, it is something that happens.

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8. 
   

   
   

   MaggotCFII on Mar 20, 2011

   Just a couple questions:
   How old is your student?  Of his 50 hours – how much is airwork/pattern work?  How frequently does he fly?  Is he flying because he wants too or because of “flying family” pressure?  Has he been flying the same airplane?  As mentioned above – Vision, when did he last have a real eye exam?  Has he been the victim of the time-building CFIs?
   Ask yourself these sort of questions and they may lead to your answer, using what has already been said here.
   The tough call is that the student may not, well, make it, so to speak.  Even with the best efforts of all hoping he can.
   Let us know how you do – hope your find the key to bring another into the flying community!
    
    
    

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9. 
   

   
   

   Earl Kessler on Mar 21, 2011

   Hi All,
   These are all great suggestions.  I am sure that I will be able to use your constructive criticism to convert this student.  Thanks to all for the effort and brain power!
   Earl

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10. 
    

    
    

    Earl Kessler on Mar 23, 2011

    I actually submitted all of these suggestions to him 2 days ago and yesterday, with all of your help, he made 5 acceptable landings.  Thanks all.  This really works!

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11. 
    

    
    

    Louis Destree on Mar 23, 2011

    Interesting replies from all, and glad to hear your student seems to be getting the hang of it with the suggestions already posted.
    I’m a recently minted private pilot, earning my license in January of 2010 in our 182 with my father as my instructor, and I also come from a long line of aviators.  To date I’ve racked up a little over 100 hours in our 182.
    I also have a have depth perception issue.  It doesn’t come out on the standard vision testing, but we were told many years ago by an eye surgeon who worked on me as a toddler (I’m 36) that my depth perception would always be more mechanical than “normal”. 
    I find that if I try to judge the flare by looking out over the nose I’ll start flaring hopelessly high on every landing, or sometimes won’t flare at all.  This drove my father crazy during my training until he finally started making me look out the far left side of the windshield and down a bit to judge the flare.  If I do this I can usually grab something out there to use for a reference so my mechanical depth perception starts working.  It could be the texture of the runway or grass, the windsock, a car on the ground, whatever.
    I still get lazy from time to time and will try to judge the flare without glancing off to the side for a reference, and every time I do I’m guaranteed to botch the landing.
    Louis
     

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12. 
    

    
    

    Tiger Singh on Mar 31, 2012

    I came here through google search to find help in landing planes. The student mentioned above could very easily be me. I’m having the exact same problem and I haven’t yet soloed either. I’ve racked up about 45 hours or so. I will use the above suggestions to see if they will help me also.
    Thank you.
    Tiger

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13. 
    

    
    

    charles on Jan 18, 2013

    If this landing topic is still open I’d like to ask a question. I’m a student pilot who started out in a tailwheel (40 hours) and then transitioned to a Skyhawk (40 hours) now close to taking my checkride but… I haven’t really mastered landing in the Skyhawk; good landings are more luck than skill. I think the problem is this: my tailwheel instructor taught me descend, round-out, and flare. My Skyhawk instructor insists there is no ’round-out’ phase but only descend and flair. So my instincts are conflicting with what I hear him try to teach me… But aren’t there 3 distinct phases in landing which are descent, roundout (break descent and briefly fly parallel to runway) and flare (raising nose while plane settles)? I’d really like to get some advice about whether this a question of semantics or of technique. Thanks.

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14. 
    

    
    

    James on Mar 09, 2015

    I’ve seen this web page as a result of searching “landing roundout problem”. I was just solod last week when my flight hours builds up to 60 hours. I have the excect roundout problem.

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15. 
    

    
    

    Mark Kolber on Mar 10, 2015

    James, did the answers here help? If not, can you be more specific?

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