On Sunday, February 3, 2013 12:50:16 PM UTC-5, waremark wrote:
In Europe standard practice is to teach fully held off landings, touching down just a fraction over stall speed in a 2 point attitude.

I have a question. Assume strong turbulence such that a 70 knot speed in the pattern is needed to obtain control authority. Once the flair is correctly executed and the glider is flying level in ground effect 6-12" off the ground, does the glider become less vulnerable to turbulence because it is in ground effect, and therefore would control authority be maintained as the glider slows to stall speed?

I understand that once the pilot is flying level 6-12" above the runway at 70 knots (at that point the plane has zero vertical velocity) that he can very gradually lower the center wheel to the runway without 'bouncing". The advantage of lowering the wheel to the runway is two-fold. 1)The turbulence can no longer slam the wheel down onto the runway (it is already there). 2)The pilot can use the wheel brake and full spoilers to stop the glider as quickly as possible, thus minimizing runout and minimizing the time exposed to turbulence near the ground.

If the pilot chooses to reduce speed from 70 knots to stall speed with the wheel off the ground, he has a longer runout, the possibility of being slammed to the pavement by a downdraft, and a longer period of time vulnerable to unpredictable turbulence.

In short, I understand that there are advantages to "landing hot". I also understand that if a pilot touches down with too much vertical velocity, that he will 'bounce'. If the vertical velocity is low enough, you will not 'bounce' not matter how high the horizontal velocity.

(I understand that the 'bounce' is caused by an increase in AOA, caused by rotation around the center wheel, caused by a CG behind the center wheel, too much vertical velocity, and therefore too much momentum pressing the rear wheel down and increasing the AOA. And of course enough horizontal speed such that the increased AOA causes the wheel to leave the ground.)

I want to reinterate that I'm asking a question and just stating my very possilbly fractured understanding. This topic is of great interest to me because I'm in the process of transitioning to a glass ship and I have a lot of training time in SGS (There seems to be some vague correlation between transitioning from SGS to glass and landing related PIOs.)