Keeping airspeed low while descending

[TaterShovel]

How do you do it? I'm only in the Beginner-level missions so far, but every time I'm supposed to come in for landing in a jet airplane (the A321 or 737), the instructor tells me to descend to approach and keep my airspeed around 180 knots. But, when I'm desceding, I'm speeding up; you know, because gravity. And when I extend the flaps, sure I can reduce airspeed, but then I don't have enough to level out at the end and actually land on the runway.

In prop planes, I can usually finagle the throttle to compensate, but since jet planes need to "spool up/down," there's never enough time to allow these fine-tune changes.

[Ken "Hondo" Gardner]

Have you tried setting auto pilot speed to 180 kts during your decent lower flaps in increments and if needed deploy the air brakes to reduce your air speed don't leave the air brakes deployed all the time

[gspectre]

Having the nose above the horizon is a great way to reduce speed.

[JWNoctis]

Energy management on descent is a big stumbling block, and a big part is starting at the right distance, altitude and speed. Recommend reading: http://code7700.com/descent.html

Also don't forget that these big airliners have spoilers, which can be used to reduce speed in a pinch. Also, managing speeds on an airliner is after all tricky with the throttle delay and momentum - but do remember that less is more as far as throttle went: use small, smooth adjustments.

[Morag]

Originally posted by Azraelle:

In prop planes, I can usually finagle the throttle to compensate, but since jet planes need to "spool up/down," there's never enough time to allow these fine-tune changes.

You might want to spend some time with a 'turboprop' - basically there's a turbine turning the propellor so there's some lag between the throttle and the engine but not as much as a jet. Here's a couple of freeware ones from Iris
http://www.rikoooo.com/downloads/viewdownload/51/518
http://www.rikoooo.com/downloads/viewdownload/62/548

[Thogmar]

Originally posted by Azraelle:

How do you do it? I'm only in the Beginner-level missions so far, but every time I'm supposed to come in for landing in a jet airplane (the A321 or 737), the instructor tells me to descend to approach and keep my airspeed around 180 knots. But, when I'm desceding, I'm speeding up; you know, because gravity. And when I extend the flaps, sure I can reduce airspeed, but then I don't have enough to level out at the end and actually land on the runway.

In prop planes, I can usually finagle the throttle to compensate, but since jet planes need to "spool up/down," there's never enough time to allow these fine-tune changes.

Sounds like you need to refly the actual "basic" flying lessons that you skipped or didn't quite absorb. Those would be the ones with small prop planes, not jet airliners. And frankly, it's worth picking up a copy of the Dovetail flight school as well, since it handles many of these basic flying techniques that FSX does not. (and which Xplane expects you to learn on your own.)

And yes, power DOES have a role in speeding up or slowing down, but it is SECONDARY to your PITCH in most aircraft. Although you CAN and DO "finagle the throttle" a bit with prop planes, and yes spool up can be an issue with jets, your PRIMARY adjustments will be in pitch. And NO, gravity is not something that automatically speeds you up no matter what, YOU are the pilot, so make the proper adjustments to USE gravity as a power source, not as the enemy.

The basic technique is to learn that a descent is NOT pointing your nose at the ground and diving like a sim plane in Battlefield or other games. To descend in a real aircraft or a relatively accurate flight sim, you:
1. Reduce power
2. Keep the nose LEVEL, or even RAISE it (adjusting PITCH), depending on how fast you need to slow down. The combination of items 1. and 2. here should be done in an amount that has you descending. If you immediately start climbing too much, then you didn't reduce power enough or you added too much pitch too soon.
3. ADJUST your power to maintain a moderate descent rate. (-1000fpm or whatever you want) Here's where it gets a little weird - keep your nose pointed up or down to maintain your airspeed, and adjust power to change how fast you are descending.
4. Determine through reference materials (books, in-game guides, websites, videos, experience) how MUCH you need to reduce power and change the pitch. This takes practice - hence using lessons and references to get some basic parameters.
5. TRIM your elevators (pitch) to hold the airspeed you desire, don't just hold the stick/yoke/keys back to hold your airspeed. Trimming stabilizes everything in your flight path nicely and lets you relax your controls to neutral.
6. FURTHER REDUCTIONS: When at a safe speed (see your manuals) to lower landing gear, do so to slow down even more. In jets, you can use the SPEED BRAKES at ANY time to reduce speed, but they should be used like a handbrake - avoid them unless you need them, but use them if you must. Then add in flaps as recommended AS speed reduces - Flaps aren't there to slow you down, they are there to keep you flying AT SLOWER SPEEDS. And yes, that is a difference.
7. LASTLY - REALITY. In reality, it is a COMBINATION of pitch and power that adjust speed and descent rate, as you've experienced. Not just "pitch=speed, power=climb/descent") Depending on the aircraft, weather, location, and even your own technique, you will find yourself playing with pitch for climb/descent and power for speed. It's only a training simplification that insists on the use of them exclusively for one adjustment.

NOTE: BTW, in real life, jet pilots often use power rather than pitch to adjust speed, since the high-speed swept wings of jet aircraft can cause major altitude changes and other issues when you change the pitch even a little. But in sims you can ignore this for the most part until you learn the basics. Most sim pilots I've seen and read don't actually fly jet aircraft as in the real world, but it's just a game so who cares.

[TaterShovel]

Well I certainly didn't skip the earlier tutorials; I guess I didn't fully grasp the scope of their teachings. Either that or the early tutorials are woefully inadequate, since I don't recall trim or speed brakes ever being mentioned, and there certainly aren't any tutorials that cover the use of autopilot (at least, the default in-game tutorials).

Sounds like I might be rushing too far ahead instead of taking the time to really nail down the subtleties of every control option available. Using keyboard + mouse certainly doesn't help much, either. Lately I've been using a PS4 dual-shock controller and it's made flying much easier and more intuitive, but I'm still only using the basic control stick and throttle for in-flight maneuvering.

[Ken "Hondo" Gardner]

Whatever controler you use doesn't enhance one's skills in the game knowing the keyboard short cuts and learning some procedures are more important and you can message me if more info is wanted and yes it seems you may have moved rather quickly

[Slyfox]

Flaps and speed brakes if much needed. If you use speed brakes however, make sure you don't go to slow, check your speeds, if you go too slow you can get into a stall.

[Morag]

Originally posted by Azraelle:

Well I certainly didn't skip the earlier tutorials

It's possible you missed the good ones though, there's 2 lots of tutorials - the ones in the mission screen and the others, the ones by rod machado that really teach you how to fly, are in the learning centre.

This good stuff
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gT5Y5sL6IC4

[gspectre]

Originally posted by Morag:

Originally posted by Azraelle:

Well I certainly didn't skip the earlier tutorials

It's possible you missed the good ones though, there's 2 lots of tutorials - the ones in the mission screen and the others, the ones by rod machado that really teach you how to fly, are in the learning centre.

This good stuff

Thanks for that link. I like that when it finished, You Tube loaded up more of his videos.

[TaterShovel]

Don't know why I never bothered to look in the Learning Center, seeing as it is called a ... learning ... center ... but nice! More stuff to teach me how not to crash! Excellent.

[Nightmare1964]

A good landing is always preceded by a good and stablised approach.

The secret is to maintain the recommended approach speed, usually best glide speed, with power and attitude (up/down). Use flaps and side slips to steepen your approach without increasing your speed, if too high.

If you can't get a stablised approach, power up, go around.

May I suggest you look for real world training videos on youtube for learning the art of landing a plane. The same principles apply in the flight sims. This way you get good advice from qualified Flight Instructors, instead of people who think they know.

Better yet, learn to fly for real, book a TIF at your local aerodrome. Your flight siming skills will definitely get better with every awesome lesson

[Tommy Lee]

I admit i only flied over text here and to me it looks like one beginner mistake lot of new fliers make, coming in descend "hot" so when you get onto final aproach it is just too late to slow down in jet plane. I recomend that when you start to decend use auto throttle first few times..maybe even more becose this will show you how throttle moves up and down durind ascend and descend. If my memory serves me well, default jets was usualy on default descend via AP on lowly 10-20% of throttle max. if that dont help you can start to descend to final aproach earlier and use slallower glidesloope. I was usualy on standard 1000 ft/min and I never got overspeed. And as someone above stated. Extending spoilers do reduce speed greatly and fast and ofc. make sure that you do not stall due to extending spoilers too much.
Few basic lessons in FSX flight school helped me ALOT even ones more advanced. Only thing i do not recomend is taking that "exams" they are badly scripted and might kill your wish to fly lol.
You also have loads of nice reading material in help section. Basicaly it all comes to that basic line that you hear in flight school "Power, atitude, trim" and that is always in that order. it does require practise and it is harder in Jets since jet engines are very slow to spool up and spool down. Cessna 208 from default aircraft might be a bit nice in transition process since it is turbine engine plane and it also needs time to spool up/down but faster than jet so you can get used to it. You can basicaly came in C172 on extremely short final and land almost perfectly, but in jet even 10 mile final can be short if you came in hot and forgot to throttle down before descend. Also as beginner I strongle advise to stay away from payware planes like PMDG and alike, cos they are so complex to handle at first that might get heavy workload onto you and you stillneed to learn how to fly plane propperly. Also ( I almost forgot), on final aproach, power controls glidesloope and pitch controls speed! Do not forget that. you can fiddle in small increments to get more precise but main slow down is done with pitch ( and yea you need to carefullly manage throttle to maintain same glidepath ..keep an eye onto papi lights. that helps).

If I talked you to death with that you already know i am sorry in advance :) but those is alwas the same no matter what plane you fly. Only real difference is in plane weight (bigger weight , slower to response plane) and engine ability to spool up fast or slow (obviously jets sucks at spool up/down speed lol).

Anyway, wish you happy flying

[Nightmare1964]

PAT (Power Attitude Trim) is good for most phases of flight, but not for leveling out from a climb, the sequence is Attitude Pause Power Trim.....

Memorize the checlist for the landing phase for that aircraft....

This is my thoughts on landing a plane:

Aiming point: aim for the piano keys at the closest end of your runway. You are good if the point is not moving up or down in the windscreen. If it is moving up, you are undershooting, so rais the nose a bit and apply power to maintain speed. If it is moving down, you are overshooting so reduce power/apply more flap/sideslip, but maintain speed. In a crosswind, a slight bank into the wind just enough to compensate for drift.

When you cross the threshold, power to idle

When only 15ft off the ground, round out, change your focus to the far end of the runway, raise nose of a/c to horizon and fly straight and level, which should only be a few inches off the runway, use rudder only for directional control, keep wings level, but keep the bank in the case of crosswind. When the nose wants to drop, keep raising it to the horizon. The main wheels ( or the into the wind wheel in a crosswind) will touchdown at the optimum moment. Keep the nose wheel off the ground as long as possible. Apply brakes when nose wheel is on the ground.

A good pilot never lands his plane, it lands itself...

I like a nice high approach, but my priority is keeping my speed stable in the descent. if it is fast, I raise the nose and or lower the power. Too slow, increase power.

Most of a pilots training is doing circuits, that is, take offs and landings, it is our bread and butter. A pilot only goes solo after he/she demonstrates consistency in their flying.

I'd suggest you forget jets for a while, until you get a hang of the basics...