Landing a Mooney

How tall are you? If you are not a very tall person you may be having a hard
time seeing over the cowl. The seats are very low in the Mooney since the
plane was designed for 6' + individuals.
What I like to do with students is to pull onto the runway and sit there
lined up with the runway (make sure the CFI is watching for traffic you have
your back too!). Really take the time to get used to the picture down the
runway with the plane on the ground. Notice where the runway edge intersects
your head (probably above your ears). Although some runways are more wide or
narrow the runway edge will always intersect your head at the same point
(its based only on your hight above the runway).
Also, when landing the Mooney understand that if the stall horn isn't even
going off you are far, far from landing speed. The Mooney will float and in
the begining you can use the stall horn to help determine when you should
allow the plane to sink below 3 feet. Anything faster than 65 knots or so
should be kept above 3 feet. The Mooney gets very upset if the nose wheel
touches first because there are no shocks. Because of the donut's
characteristics the nose will push back rather hard and bounce you back into
the air. You get 2 bounces for free, the 3rd will cost about $15,000.
As long as you control your speed in the Mooney, plan your decents far
enough out, and keep ahead of the plane you will find it a very nice, rather
easy plane to fly. It does not deserve the neg reputation it has for being
hard to fly.

-Robert, Mooney CFI


"Jon Kraus" wrote in message
...
We just purchased a'79 M20J 4443H. I am in the middle of getting my 10
hours with a CFI for Insurance purposes and I have to tell you that this
thing is a lot different to land than a Skyhawk. So far I am glad that
my CFI has been with me because 75 percent of the landings have not been
pretty. They are safe (mostly) but nothing you'd want the wife to film
with the video camera. I've got the speeds down good (100 on downwind,
90 on base and 80 on final) but getting it to the runway smoothly has
been a challange.

I've never flown a low wing plane before the Mooney and I am having a
problem with the sight picture working out for me. Is this a pretty
common issue in transitioning to these planes or should I just resign to
the fact that I'm not going to get as nice a landings in my Mooney as I
did in the Skyhawk .

Right now any stories would help out tremendously!! Thanks.

Jon Kraus
PP-ASEL-IA
Student Mooney Owner
'79 M20J 4443H @ TYQ

"Robert M. Gary" wrote

Really take the time to get used to
the picture down the runway with the plane on the ground.

Robert, I go one step further, I get out and hold the tail
down in order that the student can see (and hopefully retain)
the landing attitude.

Bob Moore

Excellent idea but I'm not sure if I'm strong enough to do that. I've never
noticed the Mooney tending to tip (unlike a 172). You must be a large muscle
type of guy. You aren't by chance the governor of California are you?

BTW: I find that for tailwheel training its really good to have the student
sit in the plane while we lift the tail. Students tend to think that they
will hit the prop on a wheel landing (some times you can though). They don't
realize that most tailwheels will "tuck" the prop under the plane before it
hits the ground. You generally have to tip MUCH more than students think to
hit the prop in the tailwheel.

-Robert

"Bob Moore" wrote in message
. 122...
"Robert M. Gary" wrote

Really take the time to get used to
the picture down the runway with the plane on the ground.

Robert, I go one step further, I get out and hold the tail
down in order that the student can see (and hopefully retain)
the landing attitude.

Bob Moore

BTW: I find that for tailwheel training its really good to have the student
sit in the plane while we lift the tail. Students tend to think that they
will hit the prop on a wheel landing (some times you can though). They don't
realize that most tailwheels will "tuck" the prop under the plane before it
hits the ground. You generally have to tip MUCH more than students think to
hit the prop in the tailwheel.

Do you deflate the tires a bit too, to account for flexing during a bounce?

Jose
--
for Email, make the obvious change in the address
note - replied to r.a.piloting, r.a.student, and r.a.owning, but I only follow r.a.p

Jose wrote in message .com...
Do you deflate the tires a bit too, to account for flexing during a
bounce?

I'm not too concerned about that since my students know to add full
power and climb out of a bounce. The mental challenge for students is
to feel ok about pushing forward on the stick after the mains touch to
"stick" the wheel landing. Some feel that any forward rotation will
result in a prop strike. A bounce is a different thing.

-Robert, CFI

I'm not sure I'm strong enough for the tailwheel trick - I guess that
applies to Cubs and such. No one is picking up a Maule tail like that.

OTOH, there is much advice warning against wheelies in the Maule. I can do
'em but don't because you don't need 'em. You can fly it on 3 points quite
nicely with reduced or neg flaps. Still don't know exactly why but make and
model wise, it just doesn't need to be in your kit.

Wish I could operate a Mooney off my grass....

"Robert M. Gary" wrote in message
...
Excellent idea but I'm not sure if I'm strong enough to do that. I've
never
noticed the Mooney tending to tip (unlike a 172). You must be a large
muscle
type of guy. You aren't by chance the governor of California are you?

BTW: I find that for tailwheel training its really good to have the
student
sit in the plane while we lift the tail. Students tend to think that they
will hit the prop on a wheel landing (some times you can though). They
don't
realize that most tailwheels will "tuck" the prop under the plane before
it
hits the ground. You generally have to tip MUCH more than students think
to
hit the prop in the tailwheel.

-Robert

"Bob Moore" wrote in message
. 122...
"Robert M. Gary" wrote

Really take the time to get used to
the picture down the runway with the plane on the ground.

Robert, I go one step further, I get out and hold the tail
down in order that the student can see (and hopefully retain)
the landing attitude.

Bob Moore

"Maule Driver" wrote in message . com...
I'm not sure I'm strong enough for the tailwheel trick - I guess that
applies to Cubs and such. No one is picking up a Maule tail like that.

OTOH, there is much advice warning against wheelies in the Maule. I can do
'em but don't because you don't need 'em. You can fly it on 3 points quite
nicely with reduced or neg flaps. Still don't know exactly why but make and
model wise, it just doesn't need to be in your kit.

The Maule is one of the tailwheels I've not flown. 3pts are nice and a
plane's behavior in a 3pt often is related to how close (or far) from
stall it is in a 3pt attitude. In the Swift it is recommended that you
NOT 3 pt it because the 3pt attitude is so far beyond stalls, most
pilots just end up dropping it in (notice that most Swifts have
wrinkles on the top of the wings). In some planes you are still
totally flying at 3pt attitude (Citabria for example).

Wish I could operate a Mooney off my grass....

My Mooney does fine off grass and even beaches (I've flown off a
couple in Mexico). The grass just can't be too deep or the holes too
deep. Our local grass field (C14) has big gopher holes all over it so
I've never taken a nose wheel plane in there. I love taking the Swift,
Aeronca, and C140 into that field. The runway threshold has powerlines
over it and a giant oak tree hanging over the runway. You can't go
below these because its backed up against a levy. Some people land the
other direction but then a go-around is suicide. When my kids were
young they referred to C14 as "the airport where the planes live in
the grass".

-Robert

"Robert M. Gary" wrote:

Students tend to think that they
will hit the prop on a wheel landing (some times you can though). They don't
realize that most tailwheels will "tuck" the prop under the plane before it
hits the ground.

My Maule has 9" of ground clearance for the prop tips. The mains are a bit more than
5' behind the prop, so that prop isn't going to "tuck under". The 180hp version has
6" of clearance.

This is one of two reasons I've heard for the fact that Maule discourages wheel
landings in the MX-7 series. As Maule Driver says, you don't need them anyway.

George Patterson
If a man gets into a fight 3,000 miles away from home, he *had* to have
been looking for it.

G.R. Patterson III wrote:


My Maule has 9" of ground clearance for the prop tips.

Really, that's it? I've got 13" on my 182 and I have a two blade prop.

Don't forget that, as with any airplane, stall speed and thus approach speed
vary with weight. If 70 knots works well on short final at max gross weight,
then to get the same flare and float characteristics, you must be slower at
lighter weights. If the plane is 20% below max gross, then approach speed
should be 10% less.