Skittles wrote on Nov 29^th, 2009 at 1:00pm:

I was talking more about judging your glideslope rather than alignment, but no, if you focus only on either end, you will not do very well. The entire runway, initially, has to be considered... and the same rule applies to some extent: the two ends of the runway should not be moving laterally relative to each other. Approach end should be going down, departure end should be going up.
Just keep the two ends aligned vertically... it's that simple.

Again, it's a matter of practice, and there's no sure-fire trick to guarantee perfection. It's like trying to describe in words exactly how to juggle three balls, or something like that... can't really learn how to do that from someone else's description.

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Exactly. It's harder to describe something happening in three dimensions.

Brett_Henderson wrote on Nov 30^th, 2009 at 6:51am:


...anyone with three balls...(slippery of not)...is truly a very lucky Man......

...trust me!... ... ...!

Paul..G-BPLF....and Breeding-time again!.... .... .... ....!

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LOL   

Actually, that's not far from true.. It's an extremely complex task, and if you make a mistake, it can get ugly..

This type of thread comes along often. While forums (especially this one), are great places to seek answers.. the question  "How do I land a jet?"  .. is akin to,   "How do I make an FSX model?" ..   It can't be answered in a single post, or even a long thread.. or even ten threads.

The biggest obstacle that  "Instant Airline Captains" face, is that they try to "joystick" a jet to the runway, as though it were a big, StarWars X-wing fighter. They try to aim it at the runway, and fly it all the way down.

A good landing (even in a C172), happens well before you're near the runway, and that's even more true, with a jet. You need to be all but landed on final approach.. and then just wait on the runway to come to you, making small pitch/power adjustments.

A small, slow airplane lets you get away with all kinds of mistakes, as you get a feel for flying a stabilized approach, and that's where you drill the concept of, "pitching for airspeed, powering for vertical-speed".. so that it's something you don't even think about.

If you have to think, for even a second.. "Hmmm.. I'm a little low, better add power" , in a jet.. that second of thought will probably ruin the approach.

Then, there are the pre-flight aspects to a landing. Many Instant-Airline-Captains, just hop into the jet..fly for an hour and try to land.. giving no consideration to the fact that they started with a fully-loaded, fully-fueld jet, and are WAY too heavy for a landing. The pre-flight aspect to landing includes not only starting with an appropriate amount of fuel, but also knowing the prevailing surface winds (and weather in general) at the destination airport, as well as runway length, and a good understanding of any published arrivals and approaches.

In many ways, it's just like real-life. You need to take your time.. learn piloting basics,slowly and carefully, if your aim is to fly ANY sim airplane realistically.

They don't have to guess. It's all published in the POH.

And you can buy one too if you search long and diligently enough. Most casual simmers don't care about such things.

Some e-Bay stores sell these on discs and sometimes a hard copy from the aircraft comes around now and then. The hard copies aren't usually cheap, but they are invaluable for operating the aircraft correctly.

You can get away with jumping in a Cessna and flying it off with little trouble to check any figures, but you don't do that in a 70 ton aircraft. You had better know how much you weigh at any point in the flight for what speed you need for various configurations at those weights.

I see this question around the various sites. "How come my nose is pointing up at 15° at cruise and I can't maintain altitude or airspeed?", not bothering to check the weight of the aircraft and their altitude for that weight.

i'm only thirteen but I started to try setting up the ils and handflying that and then once i got used to that i moved to an airport without one say witham field [ksua] and laerned how to do it like that

...as a last resort I generally close my eyes and think furiously of England... ....

....always works for me!... ....!

Paul...G-BPLF...FS 2004 ...and a Wing and a Prayer... .. ... ...!

I have started to "handle" the aircraft more manually. When i rotate i have manually controll via my joystick to the aircraft is clean. Before i hitted the AP button almost instantly. I also disengage the AP long before my touch down and look more at the runway then the glidelsope dots on the screen. It has worked out but one time when i forgot the landing wheels . I have more feeling of how the aircraft handles. I usually flies the 747 - 400, 777, A340 or A380. Why start with a Cessna..