Events
Events
Events
Events
Events
Events
MY FS FLIGHTS
Flight Score
Departure
Start bringing the nose up as the speed reaches 50 kt, not after it.
What happened: You started the rotation at 76 kt, 26 kt past the 50 kt rotation speed.
Watch for: Airspeed indicator: 50 kt at rotation
See Departure Roll
Arrival
Reduce power earlier on final so threshold speed settles at 54 kt instead of carrying it into the flare.
What happened: You crossed the threshold at 75 kt, well above the 54 kt target speed, and that excess speed was still showing at touchdown. Crossing the threshold fast usually carries straight through to a fast touchdown.
Watch for: Airspeed indicator against 54 kt on short final.
A typical trainer rotates in the mid-50s of knots - a 172 at around 55 KIAS, climbing out at a Vy in the low 70s, though check your own POH rather than memorising Cessna's numbers - and the transferable rule is that Vr sits just above the stall speed in takeoff configuration. Rotate early because "it felt ready" and the aircraft lifts off inside ground effect, where induced drag is reduced, then climbs out of it into more drag. On a marginal-performance day the result is an aircraft that lifts off and then refuses to climb, sagging back towards the runway.
Read more in Improve Your Take-OffsStart to finish · 16 stages, 13 in the score
Events
Events
Events
Events
Events
Events
From brake release to the end of the climb, against time, then the takeoff point by point.
Rotated at 76 kt, 26 kt above the 50 kt target, and lifted off at 87 kt 2.4 s later, the nose coming up at 1.3° a second.
Two traces from brake release: the airspeed on top, and below it the pitch, which is how far the nose is above the horizon. The dashed green line is the speed to rotate at for this aircraft at its weight, and the green dot is where the nose started to come up. The figures at liftoff are the pitch then and how fast the nose came up, in degrees a second.
The takeoff, point by point
Side view from the start of the roll to 580 ft. The distance scale changes past the runway end.
Reached 35 ft with 498 m of runway left; then climbing at 830 fpm on average to 580 ft.
The takeoff from the side: the height above the runway against the distance along it. The numbers along the runway are the speeds reached at each point. Lifting off in the amber last quarter of the runway costs marks for the roll length.
Plan view the roll down the 1,293 m runway.
Rolled from 47 m in, drifted left of the centreline, 7.2 m at the widest, and lifted off 3.8 m left. Airborne 26 % of the way down the runway, before the 75 % line.
The roll from above, with your left at the top. The line is where the wheels went, and "widest" is the furthest you drifted off the centreline. Lifting off before the amber 75 % line gets full marks for the roll length. The arrow beside the runway is the crosswind, pointing the way the air was moving, so it pushed the aircraft that way.
Left-hand, 1,000 ft circuit height. The plan shows your circuit over a textbook one for this runway; the profile unrolls the same path from liftoff to the threshold.
Plan landing direction to the left; in pale blue the textbook circuit for your downwind speed, 1.4 nm out at 137 kt
The lap from above, with the landing direction to the left: the opposite of the runway drawings. The wide pale-blue line is a textbook circuit for your downwind speed - the downwind a mile out for every 100 kt, every turn at 30° of bank - and your track is drawn over it, each leg in the colour of its mark. The numbers are the four turns, the same as on the profile and the cards below. The 45° line from the threshold is the usual point to turn onto base.
Around the circuit height and bank; the turns are shaded
The same lap straightened out, so the height and the bank can be read together. Each shaded stretch is a turn, numbered as on the plan. The green box is circuit height, 1,000 ft, on the downwind. The amber line is 30° of bank, and a turn's steepest bank shows red above 32°. "Turn crosswind from" is the lowest height to start the first turn at.
Good: full marks on the turn and the leg after it.
High on downwind: 1,166 ft against 1,000 ft, 166 ft above.
Downwind. Parallel to the runway, opposite the landing direction, at pattern altitude and roughly 90 kt. The single most important moment of the entire circuit is the point abeam your intended touchdown point. Power back (around 1,700 RPM in a 172 works as a starting value to calibrate), first stage of flap, pre-landing flow, and re-trim. Everything from abeam to touchdown is one continuous energy problem. Arrive at the abeam point high or fast and you'll pay for it ninety seconds later in the flare, which is why analysing only the touchdown so often misdiagnoses the fault.
Read more in Pattern WorkOff heading: 7° from the leg's heading on average.
Bank angle in the pattern is conventionally kept to 20 to 30 degrees, and the base-to-final turn is where that convention earns its keep. Stall speed rises with bank because the wing must produce more lift in a turn. Roughly 7 per cent higher at 30 degrees, about 19 per cent at 45, and around 40 per cent at 60. At 65 kt on base you don't have much margin to spend steepening a turn to salvage an overshoot.
Read more in Pattern WorkGood: full marks on the turn.
The final from 4 nm.
Profile height against the 3° glideslope, with its 2° band in green.
Inside the glideslope band from 1.6 nm, where the final began, to the threshold, never more than 140 ft above the slope.
Your height above the runway against the distance still to go. The glideslope is the steady descent path to the aiming point, 305 m past the threshold: 3° here, which is about 320 ft for every nautical mile out, crossing the threshold at about 50 ft. The row under the distances is the height it puts you at. Inside the green band your path is drawn green; outside it, amber.
Plan distance off the extended centreline, your left at the top, with the 1° band. Sideways distances are drawn 3× larger than distances along the final.
Joined 647 m left of the centreline at 1.6 nm, then inside it from 1.0 to 0.3 nm, then 10 m left of it from 0.3 nm to the threshold.
Looking down from above, flying left to right towards the runway: up the page is left of the centreline, down is right. Sideways distances are stretched so that small drifts show, so a line that looks wild here may be only a few tens of feet. The labels are how far off you were at each distance, amber when outside the band.
Speed against the approach speed. The green band runs from 5 kt slow to 27 kt fast at the 1,000 ft gate, closing to 16 at 500 ft and 10 at the threshold.
Fast from 1.6 nm, where the final began, to the threshold (up to +50 kt).
Your indicated airspeed down the final, against the approach speed for this aircraft at its landing weight. The band allows 5 kt slow and more on the fast side further out, closing as you get lower, because the speed is expected to come off on the way down. The figures are knots above (+) or below (−) the approach speed.
Over the threshold
Touchdown
Excellent landing flare. It lost 3.8 points, for starting the flare at 9 ft agl, below the usual 11 ft agl–45 ft agl.
Little crosswind (2 kt): nothing to correct for. Touched down with the nose 2° right of the track, wings level.
Wind 013° at 9 kt · 9 kt head · 2 kt across
The wind is the one recorded at the landing, split along the runway (headwind or tailwind) and across it. To hold the centreline in a crosswind the nose points a little into wind - the crab - and is straightened with rudder just before the wheels touch, often with the into-wind wing lowered to stop the drift. These are the nose against the direction you were actually moving, and the wings, at the moment of touchdown. Shown for reading; not marked.
From 53 kt at touchdown to taxi speed (30 kt) in 8 s, an average deceleration of 0.17 g.
Your ground speed from the moment the wheels touched until you were down to taxi speed, against the distance rolled. A steep line is hard braking, a shallow one a long, gentle roll. For scale, an airliner's lowest autobrake setting decelerates at about 0.15 g, a medium one about 0.3 g. Shown for reading; not marked.
Side view — the last 1,293 m of the approach.
Began the flare late, at 9 ft; crossed the threshold at 8 ft, 42 ft below the 50 ft target. Touched down 182 m in, 122 m short of the ideal 305 m.
The last stretch of the approach and the touchdown, from the side. The height is stretched so that the last few feet show: 80 ft top to bottom, against 1,293 m across. The dashed line is the ideal, 50 ft over the threshold and down 305 m in. The flare ring is where you began raising the nose, and "descent slowed" is where the sink came off; the figures beside them are the sink rate, pitch and speed at that point.
Sink and pitch — through the flare, lined up with the side view.
The sink went from 280 fpm at the flare to 100 fpm at touchdown. The nose came up 1.7° on the way down.
Lined up with the side view above, so a point on one sits under the same point of the other. On top, how fast you were coming down: 0 is level, and −600 is 600 ft a minute down. Below, the pitch. In a flare the nose comes up and the descent slows towards 0. The figure at the touchdown line is your touchdown rate.
Plan view — the full 1,293 m runway, to the same scale as the side view.
Touched down 5.9 m left of the centreline, and stayed about there down the rollout, 6.2 m left at the widest.
The runway from above, with your left at the top. Touching down inside the green bracket scores full marks for the distance. The shaded part is the rollout, up to where it ended. The arrow beside the runway is the crosswind, pointing the way the air was moving, so it pushed the aircraft that way.
The 182 m touchdown sits inside the full-score zone. The arrival was smooth.
The rest of the report
The JMB VL-3 Sprint departed EDFB Reichelsheim Airfield on runway 36, using a take-off distance of 358 m (28 % of the runway). Rotation occurred at 76 kt. Local weather at departure was 12 °C with wind 10 kt from 013°, a 3 kt cross-wind component and a 10 kt head-wind component.
Initial climb to 400 ft agl lasted 40 seconds, averaging 749 fpm and reaching 142 kt at the top of the climb.
The aircraft entered a left-hand circuit for runway 36. The circuit lasted 4 minutes. The downwind leg was 3 nm, flown in 75 seconds at 920 ft agl. The base leg was less than 1 nm and was completed in 12 seconds.
Final approach descended from 392 ft agl to -229 ft agl in 61 seconds. At 500 ft above the runway the stabilisation checks were: gear down, landing flap, sink rate, on glideslope, on centreline, wings level - all met; speed was not met.
Landing was made on runway 36, whose length is 1,293 m and has a good threshold height. The threshold speed was 75 kt, noted as too high. The flare was described as excellent, although it started late. Touchdown occurred 182 m down the runway at 59 kt with a smooth rate of -103 fpm. The touchdown point was 6.2 m off centreline but no bounce occurred. Total landing distance was 342 m (26 % of the runway) and rollout alignment was very good.
The flight covered 12 nm in 6 minutes and consumed 1 kg of fuel. Local weather at landing was 11 °C with wind 11 kt from 012°, a 3 kt cross-wind component and a 10 kt head-wind component.
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