On 2005-04-07, Andrew Gideon wrote:
When I first checked out in a retract, I kept having these nightmarish
thoughts "did I remember to lower the gear". This was usually as I was
driving away from the airport.

Same here. That nonsensical pang of "did I land gear up???" 10 minutes
after you've pushed the plane into the hangar is very odd.

I'm amazed that people manage to land Comanches gear up. Vle is higher
than Vfe and if you don't use the gear to slow down to flap speed you
have to pull off a lot more power. Every time I've ever gotten my
configuration wrong (during IFR training, for example) the fact that my
performance isn't what I expected led me to figure out what was wrong.

--
Ben Jackson

http://www.ben.com/