Large Tailwheel AC

[Hutch]

I was hoping someone could shed some light on the handling characteristics of larger conventional gear aircraft ( eg. DC-3) in comparison with their smaller counterparts, say for instance a cub. The difference between the two is night and day of course, but are there any similarities in handling experience which one might take from the smaller plane to the larger?

[swordfish]

The tailwheel on a DC3 is fully castering but it can be locked fore-aft for takeoff, and long (straight) taxis. The cub doesn't have that. Also, the cub is shorter-coupled than the -3, so it is more squirrelly on the ground, but the longer-coupled DC3 develops "momentum" if it starts to yaw, as it has lots of weight behind the main gear.

However, the -3 has tremendous rudder authority, and even at low speeds, you can stay on top of it easily. In fact it's easy to 'over-correct' in a -3. You rarely need full rudder, even in a crosswind (also, you can land with differential power in a crosswind in the -3).

The principles of staying straight can be carried over... Plus your willingess to assertively handle each taildragger with full control movements.

On the similarity side, the DC3 is an amazing aircraft, and will haul out of short, rough, or sandy places easily. The tail comes up fast at low speed (watch the yaw if you do that!) and you can lift off between 60 -70 kts with the beast just trembling on the stall. Also, you CAN get stuck in sand or 'soft' places if you use the brakes too suddenly or sharply in a turn and bury 1 wheel. Sometimes, you can simply land short, unload, and take off from there (unloaded) so you don't have to turn around at all.

Just make sure you keep your turns wide, try not to use brakes at all, and use differential power.

On skis, the DC3 is slow getting started but finally lumbers off. You can have your wheels partly down on skis to get rolling. You MUST MUST MUST taxi round a bit on skis to cool them off after landing, so you don't get stuck in the snow on a 1-hour turn. It's hard to get logs or branches under the skis of a DC3, because of the danger of the prop, and picking them up as you taxi forward onto them. I'm referring to relatively deep snow, here; it's best to taxi round in circles, and park in your tracks.

Incidentally, it's easy to heat up your engines on a -3 while taxiing on snow; you have to watch your cyl heads, no matter how cold it is.

[Hedley]

Technically it's not a large aircraft (max gross is less than 12.5k) but I fly and instruct on a Beech 18 which is sort of a mini DC-3.

Just as the above poster noted, there is a feeling of momentum with the heavier aircraft, and I would not want to experience the kind of yaw excursions that are survivable in lighter tailwheel aircraft, and are usually demonstrated during tailwheel training.

Main thing I notice about the Beech 18 is the gyroscopic precession of those 3-blade metal props. Tail comes up, the nose goes left, so you twist a little more left throttle in during takeoff. Tail comes down, the nose goes right, you'd better be prepared for it. As a result, I try to raise and lower the nose very slowly. And I wouldn't fly it without good brakes.

I wheel land the Beech 18. Some people say they 3-point it but I don't know why.

Flies just like any other airplane. It's when the tires are on the pavement that it can get tricky.

If you've flown some tailwheel, and some nosewheel twins, it shouldn't be a big deal.

Don't believe all the crap you may read here (and elsewhere) from hairy-chested heroes that a particular aircraft is a "fire-breathing dragon". What nonsense. Any airplane has strengths and weaknesses. Learn them both. Use it's strengths and be careful about it's weaknesses.

In recent years I have checked myself out on (ie first flight is solo) in the PT-22 Ryan, PT-19 Cornell, 450hp PT-17 Boeing Stearman, clip-wing Harvard, Beech 18, and many other homebuilt types. They all fly pretty much the same: the have a wing that pushes air down, and an engine that pushes air back.

[frozen solid]

A couple of good posts.

I agree especially with one thing Hedley said, about raising the tail slowly. While it's important to be alert to unexpected things, usually the slower you do something TO an aeroplane, the slower it will try to do something back to you. I add power slowly, I raise the tail slowly, and I rotate slowly. Like Hedley, I like to run the mains on first, I sometimes practice three point landings but I see little practical use for them. Interestingly, I read recently that the RAF encouraged three-point landings on the Lancaster, and guys who did wheel landings regarded this as a personal technique not in keeping with S.O.P. This is likely to ignite debate, as there are many opinions on "wheel" vs. "3 point" landings. I used to three point all the time in little planes, but this is because I wasn't very good at wheel landings and every time I tried to teach myself to do one in the bouncy-legged C120, I chickened out. This embarrassed me when I found out how much easier wheel landings were, once I started working and recieved some actual instruction from the chief pilot on a C185.

The biggest tailwheeler I have flown is a single Otter, but I imagine it's somewhere between a -3 and a supercub in terms of handling. So I don't have anything to say about flying the big ones, but I think I get what swordfish means about the aircraft being less twitchy, but when it does decide to bite, it will do so with greater commitment. When I flew the Otter, I always felt that, unlike some small planes which will swap ends right on the runway, the bigger Otter was more likely just to slowly cart you into the ditch if you lost your grip on it. Of course this doesn't happen very often, and the Otter is still a "small" aeroplane. It's quite easy to take off and land. I've heard/read that the DC3 is very nice to handle during takeoff and landing, but the C-46 is quite challenging. I've also heard that the Goose is quite challenging. If you look at these aircraft, the distance from the tailwheel to the mains, relative to the distance between the main wheels, seems shorter than aircraft that are allegedly easy to land, like the DHC-3 or the DC-3. I wonder if this has something to do with it.

This too will ignite debate, but: I have always felt that anyone who proves incapable of handling a conventional-geared aeroplane is probably lacking in other abilities and probably shouldn't be flying at all. What I mean by that is that people shouldn't avoid tailwheel flying. It's fun and easy. It's challenging to learn but so is anything else worth learning. There are definite advantages to a conventional undercarriage in some rough field work. Having said that, I moved on from the single Otter to the twin Otter, and at first I lamented the loss of the tailwheel, but soon found that there were plenty of other things to focus my attention on from day-to-day. It turns out it doesn't really matter to me if I have a tailwheel or a nosewheel. Still, a Twin Otter with a tailwheel would be one cool-looking machine.

[Hedley]

anyone who proves incapable of handling a conventional-geared aeroplane is probably lacking in other abilities and probably shouldn't be flying at all

+1

Fundamental stick & rudder skills - the kind that you learn flying tailwheel - is what allows a pilot to make a precise crosswind landing in a nosewheel aircraft.

Oh yeah, another (sorta but not technically) large tailwheel aircraft I once flew: Piaggio Royal Gull. It had to get down to Belize in a hurry. A geared, multi-engine pusher tailwheel amphib. It was so bizarre, I fell in love with it. First flight was PIC - as usual, nobody around to check me out. Felt a bit like a Seabee. It had wings that pushed air down, and engines that pushed air back (shrug).

[swordfish]

Still, a Twin Otter with a tailwheel would be one cool-looking machine.

AND performing!!

Now you're talking about creating a serious airplane from a toy.

And putting mechanics out of work...no more station-60's

[Caracrane]

The Lancaster C-GVRA is my favorite, u can see her in YHM. By the way one of the 2 in airworthy condtion in the world.

[Buschpielot]

Anyone with some C-46 PIC care to chime in on this one?

[TG]

Sorry Buschpielot, I know nothing of the C-46.


I ferried once a Piper cub. Its only draw back in my view was the tail wheel. Sort of 'bungee' locked all the time.
To be honest, I flew it right after doing a few hundred hours on Beech 18.
And like the DC-3 the Beech is fully castering and can be locked for takeoff, landing and long straight taxi.

The Cub was really easy to handle right away versus the Beech who took me a good 50hrs to get used to its ground's characteristics, 100 to be comfortable. In the air no problem!

So for the D18-S:
-When used to it, no problem handling it on the pavement. I learned very quickly to leave my feet out of the brakes during touch down!
-Clear forward view.
-Two engines to play with if the crosswind get touchy.
-Empty, I could easily 2 points landing it inside 1500' without touching the brakes (no winds)
-But like Hedley said, I wouldn't go if the brakes were not top shape.
-Don't swing it on a dime on gravel, stones will cut deep the inside turn tire.
-Not good with its rudder authority at the start of a take off run, end of landing (low speed)
I would never dear doing a 3 points landing with it. A recipe for disaster with this particular type of aircraft. Absolutely no room for errors if you don't end up doing it perfectly.

What caught me was unprepared runways. Back in the time, I did all my 5 hrs of training on concrete.
Nobody warned me that a taildragger could bounce and bounce and bounce again on take off if the rwy wasn't even.
The trick was pushing the elevator fully forward and back to neutral very quickly and at a good timing to stop the oscillations.


Overall a super Aircraft that I somehow miss, remember radials are only good for noise.



And pretty much all the scary things I had with it was during training..... given or received




The ones b!tching about Beech 18 are usually those who never flew it or had below 50hrs on it.

[Hedley]

Like most later model Beech 18's, the one I fly has a locking tailwheel, which I set after lining up for takeoff. I am told early ones did not, and were prone to swapping ends.

I would hesitate to fly a Beech 18 without a functioning locking tailwheel. IMHO it really helps keep you straight after you lower the tail, but maybe it's just psychological.

[frozen solid]

That was the other thing about the Otter. The electric lock, which would fail, and if you were on skis the tailwheel would turn sideways and give you a nice surprise after touchdown. Sometimes even without the tail ski the wheel would just sort of drift around back there. I understand early otters just had a castoring tailwheel with a rubber friction-y thing to make it behave after takeoff.

TG, I love your picture of the Twin Beech with the guy hanging from the propeller.

[Double Wasp]

While I do not have any PIC in the C46 I do have nearly 1500 hrs in one, it was quite a few years ago but I'll give it a go.

The main issue with the 46 was the crosswind capabilty or lack there of. 13 knots max demonstrated if I remember correctly. While this is not legally limiting I do remember anything greater than 10 was a work out and 15 was the unspoken max. This is on gravel of course, different numbers for ice. The reason for this is obvious for anyone who cares to compare the tail of a 46 to that of a DC3. The 3 has approx 2/3 rudder and 1/3 vertical stab. The 46 is the inverse of this with 1/3 rudder and 2/3 vertical stab. This large vertical stabilizer gives the 46 an increased weather cocking tendancy with less rudder available to correct it. Proper crosswind controls are a must, as with any tailwheel airplane, and differential power was used regularly for both take off and landing. An understanding of what the airplane will do during the roll out was essential as that much mass creates a lot of inertia, in essence it is easier to prevent the airplane from getting out of hand than it is to get it back again. The 46 also has a locking tailwheel for take offs and landing. One other main difference to the 3 is that without a tailwheel lock the 46 was not able to retact the gear as the tailwheel retracts and without the lock the wheel slowly rotates which can damage the tail wheel doors.

The hardest part of landing the 46 was the fact that there was a limited visual reference, it was like sitting in a bay widow and the landing "picture" was significantly different than any other airplane I have ever flown. We used to three point the 46 regularly since she had a tendancy to bounce the idea behind it was that if done properly the airplane was done flying and there wasn't 106' of wing flying to amplify any bouncing. One other benefit of the three point landing was the ability to pin the tail down to help keep the airplane straight during the landing roll as the rudder lost effectivness through about 40 knots and this also allowed the aircraft to be stopped shorter. Pinning the mains down, as done when landing a DC3, only amplified the bouncing. The brakes on the 46 were bladders and were definately a little touchy but once you got used to them they were not too bad, they did have a tendency to fade away though if you used them too much.

The 46 was the most challenging and the most rewarding aircraft I have flown to date. It took a long time to get use to her but once you became competent she could out perform a lot of newer aircraft.

Hope this helps
DW

[Cougar]

Wasp, your post makes me want to go fly.

Thanks.

[Hedley]

The hardest part of landing the 46 was the fact that there was a limited visual reference

Indeed. This is a significant hurdle for many pilots learning to fly an "interesting" taildragger such as the Pitts, Stearman, Waco, etc.

Once you get used to landing (and taking off) any forward visibility, it's no big deal. Just make sure the runway is clear - ask Bill Finnegan about that

I remember I jumped in the back seat of a Harvard and wondered what the big deal was about - it was a pussycat, despite the fact that I had been told it was a "fire-breathing dragon" on the runway.

We used to three point the 46 regularly

Wow - I find that surprising. I would have expected a wheel landing in any of the DC-3, C-46 or Lancaster. Whatever works for you!!

[Double Wasp]

[quote="Hedley

We used to three point the 46 regularly

Wow - I find that surprising. I would have expected a wheel landing in any of the DC-3, C-46 or Lancaster. Whatever works for you!![/quote]

Hedley

The rudder became inneffective very quickly in the 46, we ref'd at 75, on short strips 85 on longer ones, and the rudder lost authority at around 40 kts. The locked tailwheel does help keep you straight so the sooner you got the tail down and settled the better off you were. For example you could taxi a 3 in most cases with the rudder and very little braking. At 10 kts in a 46 when you push the rudder to the floor nothing happened, one TC inspector said its like the pedals are not connected to anything. Contrary to the 3 the 46 was very comfortable in a 3 point landing attitude in fact sometimes, when you got good at it, the tailwheel would touch first. We did try to avoid this due to stress on the tail.

I am sure there are other ways to operate it.

Cheers
DW

[warbirdpilot7]

I cant imagine a 3-point landing in a Beech18, DC-3 or even the Lanc. The visibility is far better off the nose in these aircraft, compared to flying the harvard or flying the stearman from the back seat. Having said that, the "wheel" landing is more common in the bigger airplanes.

I usually wheel the Cornell, Harvard, and the single engine trainers........Except the chipmunk. 3 pointing it makes me think I'm in a spitfire.

[sstaurus]

From pictures on Airliners and Ice Pilots I always thought the 46 had such great visibility, never really considered how odd the sight-picture would be! Interesting thread.

[Double Wasp]

From pictures on Airliners and Ice Pilots I always thought the 46 had such great visibility, never really considered how odd the sight-picture would be! Interesting thread.

The limited visual cues I was referencing is just the opposite to that of the Harvard and the like. The difficulty I found in the 46 was in the flare there was very little to reference the horizon to. There was very little nose to see out the front, unlike almost every other airplane, and without this it is difficult to judge both attitude and sink rate of the aircraft in the flare. In short the landing "picture" of the 46 is quite different to many other airplanes however with experience this is learned. Once this challenge is overcome the 46 proves how capable she truly can be.

With regard to the three point landing it is my understanding that the 46 is one of the few large tailwheel airplanes to do this. For example it is quite unnatural to three point a DC3, in fact there is a pretty good chance you could break the airplanes back if you do it wrong.

I am also sure there are as many ways to fly these airplanes as there are Captains.

Cheers
DW