Bouncy bouncy

[kaosfere]

I am loving this plane as much as I thought I would. However, has anyone else has trouble sticking a nice landing? For me, touching down is like trying to land a rubber ball - bouncy bouncy. I thought it might be the tundra tires, but even the standard gear variation is the same.

Am I just worse at landing tail-wheelers than I thought I was? I'm usually OK with them, although I always struggle getting a nice three-point landing.

[Ron Attwood]

LOL. Last night, try as I might, I could not get a 'greaser'. With due diligence I managed, and can now mostly get, a tiny hop.(a double 'chirp') In fact I put it down to being fairly realistic unlike my previous Beaver which was far too easy. As you are about to touch down keep saying to yourself "Hold it off, hold it off"

[wiltzei]

Attempt this: Cross the threshold at 70MPH. Start reducing power slowly and aim for Idle power at touchdown. While reducing power maintain flightpath towards the aiming point with increasing elevator. Maneuver into a 3 point attitude for the (stall and) touchdown.

[StearmanDriver]

She 3-points beautifully for me, you've just got to hold her off until she's fully in the 3-point attitude and done flying (which is entirely realistic). Wheel landings, now... different story. I do see some porpoising and tail bouncing off the ground even on brush-on wheelies. I can't help but feel like it's related to not being able to get the tail up quickly enough on takeoff; the plane just doesn't seem to have quite enough down elevator authority on the ground. Just my opinion...

[Ron Attwood]

Emptying the rear tank worked wonders for me. Just sayin'.

[Flyboy1]

Emptying the rear tank worked wonders for me. Just sayin'.

Yep, an aft CG has an adverse affect on the handling of the Beaver.

Regards,
Ray

[StearmanDriver]

Yeah, wheel landings with a forward cg work out better, though the tail still seems a little heavy. Takeoffs though... even with a light airplane and full forward CG, the tail *grudgingly* unsticks around 50mph for me, with full forward yoke. Contrast that with a takeoff in the real thing:
https://youtu.be/KHVfZx_MCoc

Are others seeing different performance than me?

[Krazycolin]

Actually, most video's that I've seen show the tail sticking and all three wheels coming off at the same time...

It would be hard to say what that particular video is of... is it a higher rated engine? Where's the CG?

We are lucky that Tom F, who has actually flown Beavers (a lot) did the FD. So, in the end, we're going to go with what he says as he's got the experience where it counts.

[StearmanDriver]

A lot of my real world flying is in Alaska. I have occasion to watch Wheel beavers take off pretty often. That video is pretty typical of a lighter plane at sea level, on a cool day. Notice how positively the tail comes up. If I remember right, that's a 450 horsepower radial engine. That's a lot of prop wash to get the tail up. I've never flown a beaver, but I've also never flown any single engine taildragger where the tail comes up so sluggishly with a forward CG at, at Full Throttle. It just feels... Odd. And it doesn't seem to match what I see in Alaska.

[Krazycolin]

Again, I'm going to go with the experienced Beaver pilot. Seeing is not enough. Doing is.

Do feel free to make changes to the airfile should you wish to do so but i think, other than some very minor tweaks, we're done on this.

[StearmanDriver]

... which is why I think you should maybe take another look at that video, or any other video of a wheel takeoff in a Beaver. They do things that can't seem to be replicated in your model.

Now, I don't meant to be argumentative, I'm not one to really dwell on this kind of stuff. It is just a game, after all, and just like in real life, the only real answer is to just fly a plane like it needs to be flown instead of wishing something were different. It certainly won't spoil my enjoyment of what is, overall, a very fine product. But obviously I'm not the only one to have noticed this and I'm not sure dismissing it outright is necessarily the way I'd go with it.

But either way I suppose you're right, we're probably done with the subject. It's been pointed out as an attempt at constructive feedback, which was my only intent.

[Krazycolin]

I don't have a problem with constructive crits... really.

But I do have an issue with basically saying that the person who has the most experience flying actual beavers and then comparing that to a video (or even a bunch of videos) when it's common knowledge that there's no such thing as a "default" Beaver. They've all got mods. Perhaps that one has the bigger engine, the COG mod, the gas mod, the who knows WHAT mod.. (STOL mod even)...

Just can't tell.

Now, if Tom wants to mess around further with the FD, he's more than welcome to do so. I will not stop him and, any changes/mods that he makes will, absolutely, be propagated to all users.

[StearmanDriver]

All excellent and fair points. You are correct that I'm not familiar with all, most, or even many mods available for the airframe.

I apologize if I came off like a d#@*, which, re-reading my posts, I think I kinda did . Chalk it up to being in a hurry to bang out a reply and not taking the time to read before posting, not because I actually had an issue with you. Sorry bout that...

And I really am having a blast with the plane. I think the stall and spin modeling is the best I've ever seen, and I love the 3 point behavior too. You guys really HAVE hit a home run here..

[Krazycolin]

Tom F said this to me in an email on this subject:

"The Beaver when heavily loaded is no Supercub. Maybe I have made more than a thousand take offs in one? I did a lot of testing at Talkeetna with similar loads to which we carried. I have flown some modified Beavers (STOL) but mostly all they did was reduce the cruise or climb performance. One did have the wing incidence kit ( from zero inc to two deg) which helped but the climb was bad. The Beavers main attributes are ruggedness and a decent load. You can drag it in to places with a decent load, drop the stuff off and then takeoff empty."

So, as you can see... I think we're on the money.

That said, if you feel like messing with the FD, do feel free and even, if you wish, post that modified file here...

[Fliger747]

Hi:

I'm Tom Falley and did the flight dynamics for the Beaver. By way of experience I have flown everything from my Supercub to the Boeing 747 Intercontinental Dash 8 plus three years of flying the Beaver as a glacier pilot on Denali. A typically loaded Beaver lifts it's tail reluctantly, for a ski plane this is a big deal as on a glacier tail ski drag on takeoff is not a plus. I've done more than a thousand takeoffs in the Beav and tested it extensively with typical takeoff loads from Talkeetna, tail rise and takeoff runs were pretty typical for real world conditions. In Flight sim we do have an issue with tail rise as the sim does not model tail lift, and especially elevator deflection, positive or negative but applies a calculated moment to the main wing. This totally ignores prop blast and tail ground effect. The Beav is a really rugged aircraft, with a tail that you and your three buddies can't lift.

Ah, landings, she will bounce pretty well on a botched wheel landing, you can learn to roll her on with a brief skip, but a tail low almost three point was the preferred method. There are no springs or shocks per se in the landing gear, suspension movement and dampening is provided by rubber doughnuts which are compressed (squeezed) at the top of the gear legs where they hinge, allowing a degree of swing in and out. Easier to land than a 185..

The Beaver is no Supercub when it comes to takeoff with a load though there are techniques that help. This is as said, a rugged aircraft that can haul a pretty decent load into short strips, get her slowed down with the big flaps out and some power and a decent landing roll is possible. You can get into places with the load that requires an empty Beaver to get out of. Rugged, reliable, good load into places, that's it's forte.