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Taildragger landings

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rangerider

Member
Joined
Oct 17, 2004
Messages
11
Location
Kansas
I have heard a little about landing taildraggers, and I am building a taildragger right now, but I do not have the endorsement. Maybe someone can enlighten me a bit about the matter. From what I understand the airplane must be lined up straight with the heading during landing because the center of gravity is substantially behind the main wheels which causes the likelihood of turning abruptly on the wheels in a fast 180 on ground contact, which is not good. I would like someone to tell me how critical that issue is when landing a taildragger. You know how people write about these kind of things. "The aircraft must be lined up absolutely straight with the heading when landing...bla,bla...". How straight is "absolutely straight" in this case? I went out and shot a few crosswind landings this afternoon in a triycle gear cessna this afternoon, and had some nice landings where the airplane was not perfectly straight. Maybe 3 to 5 degrees off straight, but in a 7 to 9 kt crosswind it's hard to hold it perfect every time. Is that straight enough? Certainly there is a margin of acceptable error. Are there issues here that I don't know about that make all the diference?
Also, does it reduce the likelihood of spinning on landing if the main wheels are farther apart? How does that change the airplane's landing behavior? Feel free to explain this completely if you are inspired.
Thanks all.
R
 
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