Too much Flare? To little Flare? Just enough Flare?

[vortrack]

How much Flare should I use with a PMDG 737? The book was no help. I have heard three different points of view.

A.You don't really need to Flare a 737, the AP does this for you to some extent and you really just want to fly it onto the runway.

B.You simply disengage the AP and apply 5-7 degrees of flare at around 150 ft.

C.You just add a little (an extra degree over AP.


I have had problems with both approaches. Any help?

Oh, and one more item for the experts…
Is there an easy way to keep repeating landings in the PMDG 737 without having to keep reconfig the panel and FMC every time. Resetting and doing the entire descent over gets old after a while when all you want to do it try landings.

Thanks,
Tom

[ronzie]

Saving a situation does not save the entire aircraft configuration because it uses items outside of the FS9 application interface protocol in order to model a complex system based aircraft. I believe PMDG rectified this with the 747 series.

A full autoland on ILS will flare the aircraft for you on AP. For a manual flare it starts at about 50 feet according to the altitude callouts but that is my observation. The trick is to know the response delay to control inputs and not overcontrol causing too high an angle causing a tail strike. Proper speed allowing for float is Vref +5 unless in gusty winds. You do not want to stall the aircraft but fly it at about 5 degrees letting it sink in that attitude.

If you wish to manually land airline procedures for the most part indicate disconnecting the A/P at 200 to 400 AGL. One former captain does this at threshold crossing including full throttle retard.

If you are doing an autoland I do not think you should be adding to the autoland angle unless you need it for an extra soft landing due to runway surface contamination. If the runway is hard but slipperydue to ice as soon as the nose drops push the yoke forward to insure solid ground contact. If the surface is soft (only an inch or two of snow is allowed) do not accelerate the nose drop.

Knowing that I am a novice on what you are asking I suggest you post this on the AVSIM PMDG support forum. Some participants are real world 737 pilots.