Hi all, when I’m coming to land in my Cessna 152 I always seem to be at an angle to the runway and is it correct to use the rudders to line up straight? Any advice here would be greatly appreciated. I’m getting better at landing at the correct descent rate and speed but always coming in at an angle
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Yes! That’s exactly what they’re there for!
If you see an instrument that looks like this, you should use the rudder to keep the ball aligned, whether on approach or in Flight.
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Yes of course.
That’s the main reason why rudders are useful.
The only thing I would recommend is when you are landing on the runway, and you are going to use rudders, do not move rudder pedals too fast/ much as this can make the landing much more difficult.
All I want to say is to use rudders gently.
Cheers
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Guys thanks so much and I really didn’t know that and thought they were for just on the ground 
Silly me and this is a great help and much appreciated 
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You dont really use them on the ground except for pre departure systems check.
The ball is important because in real life, if this were to stray from center while flying, your body would feel as if it were moving horizontally side to side. (Almost like horizontal turbulence)
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How about taxying from parking to the runway in a Cessna.
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Nope, does not apply on ground.
Turn coordinator shows bank angle and rudder correction such that a 360deg turn happens in 2 minutes (2 min = standard rate turn).
On the ground, you simply taxi as required, remembering to include your wind corrections (climb into / dive away from the wind so that gusts don’t flip the plane).
If I’m being honest, I included the wind correction above for completeness of response, but don’t really bother in the simulator. In real life I 100% pay attention to this.
In most airplanes you can set up the glass cockpit to show the winddirection, it’s a nice practice to fly over the field and spot a windsock as well to find out what the winddirection is… and inevitably, you’ll have a crooked (sidewind) approach… i mean, yer nose will be pointing left, whilst you are moving forwards towards the landingstrip… Now here’s the kicker… lately i’ve been watching a flightinstructor teaching his students “Cross controls” …
So, in the event of the wind coming from the right, you need to kick the left rudder until you line up straight with the runway, but because the aircraft will tend to roll to the left, you have to correct with Right Aileron… i thought he was mad at first… as normally i’d do a sort of sideways crabbing landing, but amazingly, the cross control method worked. (upto the point that there’s so much wind from the side, that even full rudder deflection will not get you straightened out… that’s actually the point to do either a go-around, or find yourself another strip that actually has a landingstrip with you landing INTO the wind, as yer supposed to.
As soon as your main landing gear touches down (usually the back wheels), you have to try and balance your nosegear delicately, that, as soon as it hits the ground, it will probably grip/bite into the runway, so try and balance it to see where the plane is veering to, adjust with wheelbrakes if as a final option if it starts to teeter. ((skip on two of the three wheels) which might also indicate that you haven’t bled off enough speed yet to stall onto the runway.) It’s a nice balancing act, but if done right, it’s highly gratifying.
Hope this helps your quest.
Woof ~ Woof & Salute!
Steiny
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You guys and this forum has really helped and think I’ve turned a big corner and starting to get a grip of landings now and so chuffed!
All we need now is for me to stop opening so many posts so anti Xbox users and us getting slated left right and centre. I’ve tried hard not to write or comment but can’t hold back. Please don’t tar us all with the same brush and only after a week of launch I’m using sky demon to plan my VFR flights, spent £100 in the marketplace and thoroughly enjoying the whole experience so it’s not an arcade game to all Xbox users, we will spend money and not shy of spending and I will be here forever
Rant over and hope we can all get along here and all pc issues get resolved.
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How much you spend shouldn’t matter.
Welcome to Flight Simulation!
Isn’t that a Forward Slip and mostly used when you are coming in too high?
I thought on Crosswinds you always Rudder into the wind.
No it doesn’t matter and maybe you misunderstood as people suggesting Xbox users afraid of spending money and trust me that’s not me 
Glad to of arrived in the world of flight simulation
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Yes.
Though it can also be used for wind correction in some circumstances. While it can work here, this is not a universal technique. As you know, this is unapproved for some airplanes and even dangerous for some flap configurations lest you get airflow separation.
I agree with you. The forums are an ugly place right now which is why I’m trying to be more constructive. Cheers!
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You’ve certainly been a great help to me earlier and for that I’m very grateful!
Let’s hope things get cleaned up soon which I’m sure they will and then everybody can play happy families 
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Despite some of the maroons (Daffy Duck, 1963) here, you are more than welcome on the forum. Keep the enthusiasm going and keep on learning. You’ll find it very rewarding!
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If your being blown off the centerline by a crosswind, rudder alone is not proper. Lower a wing into the wind and use opposite rudder to prevent turning into the wind. This is also the procedure once you’re at the threshold. To keep on the centerline on final, you should be crabbing into the wind with controls neutral and balanced. As you get down to the runway, lean into the wind and apply opposite rudder to keep the nose from swinging into the turn from the lowered wing.
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The wing-down approach is one correct way of landing in a crosswind; the other is to fly with the wings level, but the aircraft’s nose is offset into the wind so that the flight path leads directly to the runway, this is called the crab approach or crab technique.
Just before touchdown, a little bit of rudder is used to align the aircraft with the runway, with a little bit of opposite aileron to prevent a wing rising. It’s all a matter of timing and technique.
The “big jet” method of landing in a crosswind is to always use the crab approach (because lowering a wing on a big jet might result in a pod strike, i.e. the engine pod touches the runway… it’s noisy, expensive, and results in a hats-on meeting with the chief pilot). Not all the angle needs taking off with rudder before touchdown; the aircraft’s momentum will take it down the runway and the landing gear is designed to absorb a sideways force as it pulls the big jet straight.
There are some great videos by Boeing on youtube showing B747s and B777s doing crosswind landings without the angle being taken out at all.
Edited to add: The “hats on meeting with chief pilot” is sometimes called a “tea and biscuits interview with the chief pilot” - except there will be no tea, and no biscuits…
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I don’t care this post is old I’m doing my PPL (thnx to msfs) and I learned:
If you’re just flying and the slip indicator shows the ball isn’t in the center, you should fix this by applying rudder. Instructor tip: kick the ball
If you’re landing with crosswind its normal you come down at an angle, because to keep the correct ground trajectory you need to fly “into the wind”. Before touchdown (right before flare), you straighten the plane with rudder and apply aileron into the wind. Your wheel to the side the wind is coming from should touch first, then the other (by reducing aileron closer to the middle), at this point you touch down the front wheel. Of course this all happens very fast.
You keep aileron into the wind, so the wind doesn’t catch the underside of the wing and it could blow over (because your wheels are on the ground, your plane will tumble/rolls sideways). I felt this in one of my first landings (of course instructor quickly took control as he knew it was going to happen but he wanted to let me “feel” my mistake a little too, i swear i guess nobody will ever read this but ppl practice is awesome).
Wind from right = right aileron left rudder.
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Unfortunately they have fixed the “aircraft being hard to control on the ground with cross wind” by eliminating the wind component within the confines of the airfield. You can be fighting a cross wind coming into land and as soon as you are in close proximity to the runway, the wind just disappears which is annoying if you want the practice of getting the aircraft onto the runway in these conditions. This is a flight that I set up with a 90 Deg cross wind at 5 M/S, which I think equates to about 10Kts using the C152, and this video is the result and as you can see the cross wind drops away to nothing as I approach the runway. Of note, on take off, the aircraft initially nosed into the wind, but once I realigned with the centre line, no further rudder input was required to keep the aircraft centred on the runway. C150 Cross Wind Landing RWY 03L Parafield Airport, South Australia - YouTube
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Sailplanes also have to crab into a crosswind because of the long wingspan and how close the wings are to the ground at touchdown. We will hold the upwind wing slightly low on takeoff with a crosswind (because obviously you can’t crab during the takeoff roll) but not on landing. And because the wingtip is very close to the ground on takeoff we still have to be very careful not to accidentally drag it.