Quote from Hangar45 Admin on December 15, 2017, 8:34 am

(Original thread started on 02-26-10 by Eric Tomlin)

Okay, so many of us have real-world performance info available for our flights. We know from various resources that the approach speed neighborhood in the real aircraft is somewhere around 113-125 KIAS or so, depending on weight, temp, flap configuration, etc. but what is your typical sim approach/landing speed? (BTW, the 113 KIAS comes from an article about the LJ45 written by J. Mac of FLYING magazine when they tested the then brand new LJ45).

 

I have found in FS9 that with my weight at 2800+/- lbs of fuel plus Standard weather (15 C/no Wind) I can safely approach and land between 113-119 KIAS w/ 40 degs of flaps.

 

If you are not aware, Per Alm created a nice modified .air file to deal with the nose high angle on low speed approach and it does help. Although it's a bit too high at approach speeds, I read in the same article that the LJ45 does land 'nose high' compared to other similar aircraft in real life. Good stuff to know!

 

(Posted by Tom Goldberg on 02-26-10)

Hey Eric, it is interesting that you bring this up. I too have read many articles of real pilots test flying the LJ45 and they give a step by step list of everything they have done during the flight and you are right, most of them are landing around 113 to 115 flaps at 40, so apparently that is correct.

 

(Posted by Mark L. on 02-26-10)

With a full load of fuel I usually come in about 130-135, I probably could come in slower still but probably not too much, maybe drop another 10. Lighter loads, usually around 120-125.

 

And yes, I've dropped in occasionally at 140-145 (poor planning), but seems to stop just fine, longer run, but haven't gone off the end yet. If way too fast, gear up landings slow her down real quick!

 

(Posted by Alaxus on 02-26-17)

I run about 130 in the approach and touch down about 120. On my airfile anything below 120 and it starts wallowing.

 

(Posted by Rick Trantham on 02-26-10)

I try to keep it around 120, but that's easier said than done a lot of the time.

 

(Posted by Aristedes Bichara on 02-27-10)

Just to make a contribution to that discussion (I am not pilot of jet, but pilot of an ultra light) when flying in the FS I use to landing speed in the Learjet, around 135/140nós.

 

However, there are some other procedures I do on the approach which are:

When doing an ILS approach, (flying around 160KIAS with the FD and AP mode engaged in the course of the runway) as soon as the plane “enter” in the descending slope, (in accordance with the local Instruments Approach Chart), I use to establish the following pattern:

 

1. Quickly squeeze the APP button; (the HDG and NAV buttons will get off automatically)

2. Speed: 135/140KNOTS;

3. Flaps: Full (40 degrees);

4. Gear: Down;

5. Immediately adjust the ALT button for the altitude of that airport established in the approach chart (for example, 2100FT in SBSJ). What I am doing whit this procedure? I start the slope at 4200 FT for instance, but I want to touch the ground at 2100, right?

 

NOTE 1: When doing that, the airplane immediately get the “nose” down and establishes automatically a descent of -1.800 feet/min.

 

6. I adjust also this descending for -600/700 feet, to make a soft slope as possible.

 

NOTE 2: The aerial charts (IAC) generally at the low part have this table with several feet descending marks for various speeds (each airplane is different, of course).

 

7. When approaching to the 100FT, (depending on the category of the ILS- for example: in Brazil all of them are CATI, CATII, there is no CAT III which means that after 100/200FT (DA - decision attitude) the landing is mandatory to be made by VFR. At this point if the pilot do not see the runway must proceeds a missed approach, according the chart.

 

8. Then at this altitude I disengage the FD, AP and take the “bird” to the ground “by the hand”.

 

Until the moment I did not break anything!

 

(Please turn it off the speed control YAS as well – if you do not disengage that the airplane will not accept the command of reverse).

 

(Posted by Eric Tomlin on 03-01-10)

Some of you guys like to land like your flying an F16 or something! It's a good thing that brake wear and tear is not modeled in our current version of our Learjet45's

 

Here's the flap schedule as prescribed by Learjet:

 

Jeff- You mentioned it wallowing. I know what you mean. Ive found that if I plan properly I can slow it down to between 115-120 and be safe. That was one reason I also posted the photos of my airspeed in the original post. Below that, it wallows for me too.

 

Aristedes Bichara- good reminder that you mention about turning off the auto throttle/speed hold but remember that the Learjet does not have this in real life (auto throttle). The speed hold only works for vertical modes. The MS version has an autothrottle installed which of course is up to the individual to determine if they will use or not.

 

Also Aristedes, don't forget that you can edit the autopilot section of your airfile to prevent that automatic +/- 1800 FPM dive/climb by changing that value in the VS section from 1800 to 0. This way when you engage your VS mode, it will remain level until you adjust the VS rate to the desired rate. This is how the real FGC works too.

 

(Posted by Tom Goldberg on 03-01-10)

Hey Eric, I was playing around this weekend with various settings in the Lear45 aircraft.cfg file. I have FSX so not sure if these will work in FS9 but these settings made a huge improvement in keeping the nose down and the speeds to what they should be during an ILS approach the nose stays below 5 degrees and I hit the deck at approximately 110kts. Give them a try.

 

[flight_tuning]

cruise_lift_scalar = 2.0

parasite_drag_scalar = 1.0

induced_drag_scalar = 4.0

elevator_effectiveness = 0.8

aileron_effectiveness = 1.0

rudder_effectiveness = 1.0

pitch_stability = 1.2

roll_stability = 1.0

yaw_stability = 2.0

elevator_trim_effectiveness = 1.0

aileron_trim_effectiveness = 1.3

rudder_trim_effectiveness = 1.3

 

I would start with a clean aircraft.cfg file also in case you had other entries in there that may effect these entries.

 

(Posted by Per Alm on 03-01-10)

I think the speed range on approach and landing is quite broad in FS. You get higher AOA on lower speeds but you can touch down at around 100-105 kts, no problem. However approach speed around 135 kts and landing speed around 115-120 is probably more realistic.

 

I believe there are many "short cuts" in FS concerning weight, altitude (airport) and speeds. It could be more realistic but from what I learned over the last years, Microsoft was interested in pleasing the "average" flyer/gamer. Hopefully these matters will be dealt with in the simulator to come from Aerosoft.

 

One example of this is the default aircrafts in FS over the years....FS98 - FSX, they barely improved them apart from enhancing the shine and glow. My opinion! It's very different with addon-aircrafts like PMDG etc....

 

As you all know there is no accurate Learjet 45 aircraft out there. Also If a company like Eaglesoft would make a Learjet 45 they would need to take a lot of new parameters into consideration. It should be compatible with hardware and interface products. They would have to plan such a project with this in mind. It´s not just an FS aircraft.

 

A home made real flightsimulator with a network of computers, different hardware and software installed and working together is like a "grand orchestra" (with small kids) and everyone must play the same song and hit all notes correctly.  I learned this when finishing our flightdeck. Bugs will occur, both software and hardware and its darn disturbing. Hopefully things will get easier as the field of cockpit building develops.

 

(Posted by Eric Tomlin on 03-03-10)

Hi Per, I see it a bit different. This is where I always never quite understood why folks had such issues using PMDG 737 NG with their NG sims. We have perfectly good interfacing of all the basic needs with even a default aircraft and the addition of JET45 (which has all the logic) and even with PMRJ if you don't want a dedicated LJ style avionics package. This said, if ESDG (or any other group) were to create a high quality LJ45 add on, then yes of course they will go the extra mile and create all the subsystems that we desire for our projects and want to be able to interface to those subsystems, but since JET45 is on the road to providing the vast majority in they way of avionics logic's, then all I personally really care about is the flight dynamics. It'd be nice to be able to connect to what I consider non-essential sub systems like AHRS, pressure, etc. but over-all that doesn't make or break my simulator experience. Again, this is just my opinion. But, I really just care about having a quality flight dynamics for the aircraft so that it flies on the numbers as published in the real world documentation. At the worst case you just disable their autopilot if you have a custom autopilot available for actual interfacing. The next best thing would be if FSUIPC macros could be used to control the FGC/AP for a 3rd party aircraft but then as you say you run into other issues, like maybe the CDU.

 

This is why I would love to learn how to create a brand new LJ45 aircraft that is suited for cockpit builders and contains little more than a decent visual model and an excellent air file.

 

I think Ive flown the default LJ for so long (with my own tweaks plus some others', like yours Per) and learned to deal with the short comings for so long that I'm almost afraid to fly a nice 3rd party aircraft like I used to all the time as a desktop simmer. I would be spoiled again!

 

(Posted by Per Alm on 03-04-10)

Eric! I think there can be compatibility issues with PM and third party panels. Project Magenta is mainly compatible with default panels and PMs own systems. I think there will be compatibility issues if you combine PMDG and PM - I'm not 100 % on this but I think it's stated in the PM manual!! Anyway I tried to use the default 737 panel on PMDG 737 which went bananas - nothing worked. I don't remember why I tried this but I remember it was a short flight - and it was nasty!!

 

I agree with you fully that not all systems in cockpit need to be functional to get a good sim experience. We focused on all systems concerning flight, navigation, basic electrical functions, FLAPS, Spoilers etc. I don't care to much that we skipped the pressurized cabin buttons in our pit.

 

The sim will of course be limited to the systems simulated and that's the strength/weakness of the default Lear. I flown the PMDG and other detailed aircrafts for MANY hours and eventually got bored with all the switching just to get the engines started. I like simple solutions better nowadays and the default Learjet 45 is a good choice.

 

Also I would like to mention a related topic that could be the base for an interesting discussion!  I guess we all see our simulators as" lesser copies" to their real counterparts/original aircraft or multi-million dollar sims. This is of course true in many aspects. However flightsimiming has many advantages. In our pits we come close to the feeling of actually being in a real cockpit. Most of the visitors to the Learsim pit are fascinated how "real" it looks.

 

But in our simulator we can do things that's impossible in real life. We can for example try difficult approaches in mountainous areas in bad/ impossible weather conditions that could never be done in real life. In our pit we have a switch for" reset flight" so we can, with just a flip of a switch, restart that final approach, take off or whatever situation that's loaded and practice that part of the flight over and over. We have also, since our pit is somewhat custom, taken the advantage (my opinion) of using different aircrafts like CRJs, ERJs and different bizjets. There are numerous options in our sims not available in real aviation!

 

(Posted by Eric Tomlin on 03-04-10)

Hey you just gave me an interesting idea...what if you could find a biz jet that has similar LJ45 qualities but NOT an LJ (since no quality 3rd party ones exist) and you could fly it, much like how you fly different aircraft in your sim, and really enjoy the experience. However, because I KNOW that it's not a 'Learjet' it'd be best if someone snuck into my sim and changed the aircraft without me knowing it!

 

It'd be a placebo effect- OR you could just find an excellent biz jet and stick the flight file guts into a default LJ aircraft to get the good of the 3rd party plane, but it still looks like the LJ.

 

That's a bit silly, but it might give interesting results. I don't condone this, but it's interesting and I might be inclined to do some 'plane bashing' to see how it turns out.