Advice sought on flight training 'dead stick' landing

I’m having difficulty nailing this lesson successfully. I’ve done the others up to it with (eventually) an A.
I seem to be able to control the glide path on about 50% of the attempts but the flare is the problem. The instructor explains what’s necessary and what the flare is and then later says, ‘we are coming up to the flare [ten feet] but resist the temptation to pull up early’. I’ve tried this a couple of times but crash into the runway almost before the instruction is finished, so in order to keep the aircraft airborne, I’ve pulled up a little. Then when the time comes to ‘look at the end of the runway pull up gently’ instruction, one hears the engine noise drop as the software presumably takes cont ol of the throttle and at that point efforts to make an accurate pull up don’t work for me. It seems as though the softwate and AI voice is ahead of where my plane is and that after I pull up nothing that I do has the effect that I expect. If anyone can give me assistance on this I would be grateful.
Trevor.

Keep an eye on your airspeed, and make small corrections on the controls. As long as your airspeed is above the stall speed, you should have control. If your airspeed falls to far, you will not have lift for the flare. Don’t worry too much about where you are on the runway.

Thank you OldpondGL, I’ve just checked and I am meeting the runway at 65 knots and lined up, with the two objective bars green. I just can’t understand why the instructions are out of sync with the plane’s height. I can only judge by sight when to flare because I don’t know a way to get the altimeter onto the cockpit screen.
Trevor.

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Have you set your altimeter to the correct barometric pressure?

Hello again and thank you for your reply.
I don’t think that you can reset the altimeter in the training lesson and that’s because all the parameters are set, even the time is always the same whenever you try. Anyway, I finally managed it by 2 points this afternoon. For anyone else with the same problem, I dumbed down the sensitivity on the pitch and roll and kept higher for a little longer so that I was not about to crash into the runway. I was then further along the runway when the message ‘resist the temptation to pull up’ came. At this point I could follow the instructions.
So thank you once again.
Trevor.

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I tried this lesson “Deadstick Landing” and if I do respect the 65 knots until the end, I arrive at the runway at a too high altitude, so at some time I have to plunge down quickly, or the runway will not be long enough for a complete stop. Doing so, I exceed the 65 knots.
Other times, I tried to use flaps but putting the flaps during this particular flight disturbs the glide slope and the alignement with the runway, so I lose score. Also the flare is very difficult. I keep getting low score on flare, but I don’t know why: I flare too early? too late? too hard? Not enough? I don’t know…

This one is tough for me too - I have managed most of the other training scoring an A but this one I can’t get above a B. Also I know the weather is meant to be consistent but I feel like it might change slightly.

The pre-requisite is simple: use joystick or yoke for control. Adjust the sensitivity, since the default MSFS setting is super twitchy. And if you are used to it, please use the cockpit view as much as possible. You’ll get better sense of how quick you are descending to the surface that way, since you can’t feel the G-force.

In recent updates, I can feel that Asobo now simulates “ground effect” - hence the instructor saying “resist the temptation to pull up early” or if I may add “pull up too much”. Otherwise you’ll float over the runway or bounced after the first touchdown. C-152 is a high wing plane, thus has a less pronounced ground effect, and this is also taken into account in MSFS as well, which is super nice. You need to get used to it.

I landed all the way in the middle of that Sedona airfield runway, and still gets ‘A’. Of course you will have to brake frantically after touch down.

The key is to control the speed as many others have said above.

  • You can use flaps to help to slow down further near the end, and feel how the plane reacts to it. Use trim. Mine can get as low as 58 knots to make it a more controllable descent. Flaps increases drag, but also lift, your plane will have less descent rate if you maintain the same speed with more flaps, thus to maintain the ideal glide path on dead stick landing, just time it properly
  • The flare should be gentle, not abrupt, as the momentum from abrupt yoke pull might throw off the airspeed and thus dumping some lift into imbalance causing the misalignment. Hence you probably need to adjust sensitivity if you notice erratic yoke behaviour

The weather is indeed the final factor that you probably need to brush it off with your skill.

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I remember having similar problems with the deadstick landing. I’m no expert at all, but my opinion is that if you try enough times, you will do it. I must have tried almost a hundred times, 4 or 5 times a day for nearly a month, then I gave up, re-visited at random and bingo - A. I encourage you to try all the above advice first though, it’s almost certain to be more scientific than my opinion an it might save you time. Anyway, good luck, keep trying.

I’m finding that my “best” landing scores (mid 7000’s) are the ones where I either get off track and have to do major adjustments that shed lift, or where I follow the instructions and wind up 80% down the runway with no room to stop, do a go around where I can put the plane down at a lower point and then slow it down. I’m pretty sure that the tutorial’s starting height is just too high. It seems you can game it by following the recommended glide slope till the markers tracking speed and alignment disappear something like 150 ft above the runway… then do your own thing from there.

Also FWIW I got A on every tutorial up to this one within 1-3 tries (ok 5 for taxing but of flight related ones prior to this were easy). Virpil stick/throttle, logitech rudder. Following the instructions to the letter is guaranteed treebranch/fence encounter.

Whelp, got my A on a go-around. I suppose in one way it is realistic… not following bad advice into a crash and flying like it’s a plane & your life not a game.

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I have the same trouble, actual flight dead stick landings are much easier IMHO.
I’ve done Go Arounds because the session starts out way too high with four white PAPI lights, and since the throttle is out (deadstick), trying flaps at various times doesn’t help to get good PAPI lights. The Sim ground-effects acts like I flying a low winged plane. But in doing a Go Around I can control the glideslope, use flaps, & land more like normal at 65 kts; but I still can’t get better than a “B” score. I’ve lost count of my attempts, and various setups, so I’m at a loss on what the secret to this secession is.

I’m brand new to MSFS and flight sim in general. I also could not get better than a “B” after many tries at the dead stick lesson. If I maintained 65 knots, I invariably ended up way down the runway. Then I saw this YouTube vid:

I found that if I add flaps 5 seconds or so after the instructor says, “Pitch up if you’re going too fast”, I can maintain 65 knots throughout the approach and I end up positioned at flare just after passing over the runway threshold. After a few more attempts, I finally got the “A” I was looking for.

I know that this post is a few months old, but I just got to the point that I can A-grade this landing almost every time, and so I thought others might benefit from my experience.

It sounds to me like the OP is actually overshooting a little, and therefore has too steep attitude when arriving at flare point, leading to too dramatic a correction. When I began these missions I was consistently overshooting, in a more severe way (having to go around having overshot the strip).

I have never yet piloted a real aircraft, but have intention to begin lessons soon, so I bought MSFS to practice when I can’t be in a lesson. I am fortunate that I have a highly experienced pilot friend to give me simulated lessons online. My first lesson with him got me to the point that I understood enough to land this mission.

These tips are mine, based on his advice, but my own findings…

  1. My online instructor explained to me that this mission starts “too high”, in reality, if he was in the position that the mission begins, he would not attempt a landing in this plane. Instead he would go around to reduce altitude on approach. I can’t really take this advice because the sim is quite particular about awarding your score, but in efforts to dive more quickly, I discovered …

  2. The speed gauge isn’t exactly precise. Whether this is an accurate reflection of a real aircraft, or just a consequence of rounding-math when rendering pixels, there’s a considerable band of the gauge which the simulator will read as 65 knots. You want to remain on the higher-speed end of this band, which means you are nose down a little more, for the entire descent. If you do get up too fast, level for a moment until the instant that the 65 knots criteria is met, then nose down a little again to maintain it. For most of the approach, above your control panel there should be about an inch before the strip begins.

  3. When you reach flare high, wait around a second, and gently begin pulling back towards level. You’ll achieve “almost level” and the craft will want to glide, at which point your mission instructor tells you to put the nose above the end of the runway… do so, just slightly above, which will further reduce your speed, and you’ll touch down.

  4. Watch the PAPI! If you don’t know what a PAPI is ( I didn’t, like I said, I didn’t even start lessons yet ), look up how to read it online ( this forum doesn’t allow links ) - The PAPI will tell you if you are too high or too low at any point along your glide path. Now, ideally you’d be on target with the PAPI of course, however, I’ve found that I’m often still a little high - yet still stick the A-grade landing. Part of this circles back to my first point, this mission is essentially having you approach from a position of being too high to begin with, though the landing is doable.

I hope my experiences help you! Enjoy.

In addition to what JudsonGrove posted, I’m about to go watch that video - My online instructor had me using flaps to reduce speed also, which makes sense. Ultimately however, I’ve been able to stick this landing without using flaps (because the in-sim instructor doesn’t tell you to use them, I decided to try not doing so).

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