Events
Events
Events
Events
MY FS FLIGHTS
Flight Score
Know your rotation speed
See Departure Roll
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 · 14 stages, 12 in the score
Events
Events
Events
Events
From brake release to the end of the climb, against time, then the takeoff point by point.
Lifted off at 49 kt with 3.4° of pitch.
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 figure at liftoff is the pitch then.
The takeoff, point by point
Side view from the start of the roll to 234 ft. The distance scale changes past the runway end.
Reached 35 ft with 124 m of runway left; then climbing at 480 fpm on average to 234 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 584 m runway.
Rolled from 113 m in, drifted right of the centreline, 3.5 m at the widest, and lifted off 3.5 m right. Airborne 32 % 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.
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, 0.9 nm out at 89 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.
Rough: the G force varied more than a smooth turn and leg would.
Each lap slightly wider and higher than the last, because you're unconsciously using the previous lap as your reference instead of the runway and the numbers. Invisible lap to lap, unmistakable across ten. This is the failure that only measurement catches, because your memory of lap three is gone by lap eight.
Read more in Pattern WorkTurn onto downwind: scored 42.
The 45-degrees-behind-the-wing cue assumes you can turn your head and use peripheral vision. Downwind spacing cues like "put the wingtip halfway up the strut" assume a fixed, known eyepoint. Neither survives a monitor unmodified. If you fly on a fixed monitor, stop pretending and fly a numbers-based circuit.
Read more in Pattern WorkOne stabilised approach gate for a circuit: six checks where the approach path is 300 ft above the runway. The 1,000 ft gate is an instrument-approach check and does not apply.
At the 300 ft gate: centreline more than 1° off.
When the approach was stable
Never every check met at once: right of the centreline all the way, fast all the way and banked until 0.4 nm.
Each line is one of the gate checks, run along the whole final rather than only at the gates: green where it would have passed, amber where it would not. The glideslope, centreline and speed lines use the bands in the charts beside this card. The sink rate is allowed what the glideslope needs at your ground speed plus 600 fpm, the wings 10° of bank, and the gear and flap are read from when you moved the levers. The bottom line is green where every check held at once, ignoring blips shorter than 0.2 nm, and the sentence above it says from where it held to the threshold. A ring is a stabilisation gate, where the checks in the table were taken.
The final from 4 nm, with the stabilisation gates on it.
Profile height against the 3° glideslope, with its 2° band in green.
Inside the glideslope band from 0.6 nm, where the final began, to the threshold, never more than 240 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. A ring is a stabilisation gate: green when every check there passed, amber with the failed checks named beside it.
Plan distance off the extended centreline, your left at the top, with the 1° band. Sideways distances are drawn 5× larger than distances along the final.
Joined 61 m right of the centreline at 0.6 nm.
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 25 kt fast at the 1,000 ft gate, closing to 15 at 500 ft and 10 at the threshold.
Fast from 0.6 nm, where the final began, to the threshold (up to +28 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
Perfect landing flare
No crosswind: nothing to correct for. Touched down straight, wings level.
Wind 272° at 2 kt · 2 kt head · 0 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 47 kt at touchdown to taxi speed (30 kt) in 5 s, an average deceleration of 0.20 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 584 m of the approach.
Crossed the threshold at 25 ft, 25 ft below the 50 ft target. Touched down 158 m in, 147 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 584 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 260 fpm at 23 ft to 200 fpm at touchdown. The nose went down 1.0° 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 584 m runway, to the same scale as the side view.
Touched down 1.6 m left of the centreline, and stayed within 2 m of it down the rollout.
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 158 m touchdown sits inside the full-score zone. The arrival was smooth.
The rest of the report
The flight began with the aircraft, a Sting S4, taxiing from the parking area to the runway at the LFBJ Aérodrome de Saint-Junien. This process took approximately 2 minutes and covered a distance of less than 1 nautical mile. The aircraft then proceeded to depart from runway 25, with a takeoff distance of 94 meters, which accounted for 16% of the runway's length. The liftoff speed was recorded at 50 knots.
The local weather conditions at the time of takeoff were characterized by a temperature of 24 degrees Celsius and a wind speed of 2 knots from a direction of 272 degrees. This resulted in a crosswind of 1 knot and a headwind of 2 knots. Following takeoff, the aircraft entered a left-hand pattern from runway 25, covering a distance of less than 1 nautical mile in just 12 seconds. The subsequent left-hand pattern crosswind leg was completed in 28 seconds, also covering a distance of less than 1 nautical mile.
The aircraft then proceeded to the pattern downwind turn, which involved a distance of 1 nautical mile and an angle to the runway of 64.6 degrees. The downwind leg itself took 83 seconds to complete, covering a distance of 1 nautical mile. The final approach to runway 25 was made from the north-east, with a heading of 243.0 degrees and an altitude of 198 feet above ground level (agl) at a distance of 0 nautical miles from the runway.
The landing on runway 25 was successful, with a threshold height that was considered good and a threshold speed of 52 knots, which was also deemed satisfactory. The touchdown distance was 156 meters, which was within acceptable limits, and the touchdown speed of 43 knots was slightly faster than desired. However, the touchdown rate of -218 feet per minute was considered fair. The runway touchdown alignment was very good, and the local weather conditions remained the same as during takeoff.
The total landing distance was 229 meters, accounting for 39% of the runway's length. The runway rollout alignment was perfect, indicating a smooth and controlled descent. The total flight distance was 3 nautical miles, and the flight duration was 5 minutes. Notably, the aircraft used no fuel during the flight.
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