Bonanza crash caught on video

On Sat, 01 Sep 2007 05:42:52 -0700, Jay Honeck
wrote:

Many if not most Bonanzas don't use flaps even for short field and
this didn't look short. As some one from there mentioned it's 4000
feet at 1200 MSL. There is no take off maneuver even short field at
high altitude in mine that calls for any use of the flaps.

That's interesting -- I never realized that Bo pilots didn't need to
use flaps for departure.

I presume there is something about the wing that makes them
unnecessary?

"I think" meaning I don't know for sure, that flaps slow the
acceleration enough that nothing is gained in distance by using them.
That and with gear and flaps it has some very abrupt and demanding
stall characteristics.

Although the Bo is a "relatively" large single, it has roughly the
same wing loading as a Cherokee, or about 17# per sq ft (give or take
a tad). It's big, but it has a big wing with lots of lift and is a
very good short field plane for both landing and take off. The Debs
and earlier F33s had a shorter landing distance than some 172s. With
the larger engines they can also get out of a fairly short field.

One interesting characteristic of a soft field take off is if the up
elevator pressure is not eased off as the nose gear comes off the
plane will rotate into ground effect early and then settle back down
to never lift off again unless back pressure is eased off considerably
to allow the place to accelerate.

On asphalt you can get the plane into ground effect in a very short
distance. Then it becomes a balancing act to accelerate just inches
off the pavement while not touching back down. I'd be a bit hesitant
to try this technique on a real soft or rough field unless it were the
only way out.

I once had the privilege to experience a departure in ground effect
along with a tail wind in the Deb from Goodland KS. The ends of the
one runway are well above the center portion with rising terrain off
the end so you need to accelerate before the half way point. Just as
we reached the low point, the wind switched abruptly by 90 degrees
from a quartering head wind to a quartering tail wind. Too fast to
stop and to slow to fly. I hauled it off in ground effect and hoped
for the best. Fortunately there were no trees off the end of the
runway, but there were a number of large rocks/boulders. We were in
ground effect until cresting the hill. That was one tense departure.

Roger