After a couple of weeks of colder weather where I am in Florida—which mostly means wearing long pants instead of cargo shorts—what passes for spring down here arrived earlier this year. It was time to get some landings in. I launched into clear but brisk skies and sought out some of the quieter airports in the area, ones with cheap fuel.
At my home plate, the winds were brisk when I took off, but more or less right down the runway. At two nearby airports, things were quite different, with stiff crosswinds. My little jaunt reminded me of a few lessons I had learned about crosswind landings and takeoffs.
Lesson 1: When To Fold `Em
As much as I’ve tried over the years, I’m a terrible poker player. For one, I have too many “tells.” For another, I often don’t know when to fold my hand. Knowing when to fold a losing hand is the first lesson I relearned on this brisk day.
While the winds at home plate were generally aligned with the easterly runway, the pavement at my first choice for some crosswind practice was oriented north/south. The winds here also featured more gusts. I dutifully entered the downwind, made position calls and configured the airplane. Rolling out on final, I needed a healthy wind correction angle to stay on the extended centerline. Thanks to the gusts, the nose was bouncing around a bit, from left to right and back again. After a few cycles of this action, which showed no signs of abating as I descended on final, I made the decision to go someplace else. Thus, my first crosswind lesson: If you don’t have to land in these conditions, don’t. I went around and proceeded to another airport, where the winds were better.
Your options in this situation include a different runway at the same airport, going to a different airport with a better-aligned runway or waiting for better conditions. You may not have to wait long. For example, if a storm is nearby, putting out some downdrafts, you’re much better off going somewhere upwind from the storm and orbiting while you wait for the bad stuff to move off. This isn’t always an option, of course, depending on your fuel state.
Another thing to keep in mind is that winds tend to die down around sunset. If you can wait that long—perhaps on the ground at a nearby airport—that also can be a good plan. The punch line is it’s likely you don’t have to land here, right now. Go somewhere else and wait for better conditions.
Lesson 2: Configuration
Using full flaps is what the FAA and manufacturers recommend for normal landings. For example, the POH/AFM for my Debonair doesn’t have a procedure for crosswind landings or takeoffs. But landing in a stiff crosswind isn’t “normal” for some airplanes.
For another example, the POH/AFM for a 1979 Cessna T210 Turbo Centurion recommends using the “minimum flap setting required for the field length.” In other words, you’re on your own since its landing performance chart doesn’t consider partial or retracted flaps. The sidebar below summarizes some manufacturer recommendations.
But your choice of flap setting in a crosswind landing really depends on factors other than the crosswind. Chief among them is the runway and any gusts. If you’re dealing with a short and/or narrow runway, going somewhere else might be the best choice. That said, I’ll take a relatively long, narrow runway over a short, wide one. Why? Because to maintain control, I may want to not perform a full-stall landing but gently roll the wheels on, managing directional control, until I’m confident I can keep the airplane pointed where I want, then gradually reduce power to idle and brake. That can require more runway than is available.
If the crosswind is gusty—or if there’s no crosswind, just gusts—the rule of thumb is to add half of the gust factor to your normal final approach speed. As an example, if the winds are 10 knots, gusting 20, I should add 5 knots to my normal speed. In my Debonair, I typically want 70 knots “over the fence” when landing. With 10-knot gusts, I’ll want 75. It’s easy to get carried away with adding knots for the gusts, though. Just remember that every knot you add before the landing has to come off after it and before you stop.
If your airplane’s manufacturer recommends deploying flaps on takeoff, we’d stick with that. Depending on the crosswind and the runway, we likely want to get some air under us as soon as possible, and using the recommended flap setting on takeoff is … recommended.
Lesson 3: Use Your Authority
I’ve noticed more than once when practicing crosswind landings that I’m reluctant for some reason to use full control deflections, especially rudder, to maintain my desired flight path. A couple of bad experiences resulting in hard landings and incomplete directional control mastery got my attention, and I’ve learned that lesson as well.
But muscle memory doesn’t last forever, and it can take me a few moments after rolling out on final to assess the wind, runway and airplane conditions. Add to that a few more moments to realize I need to use all the control authority I have and it comes back to me. That little wiggle you see my plane do at 400-500 feet on final is me finally coming to grips with how much rudder I need to keep the airplane pointed where I want it.
Muscle memory failure is especially pernicious on takeoff, for a couple of reasons. If it’s the first flight of the day or the first crosswind takeoff in a while, you might be slow to realize how stiff it is and what you need to do to compensate.
On takeoff, and once the airplane is airborne with a positive climb rate, we want to relax some of the control inputs we’ve added—aileron and rudder—and allow the airplane to weathervane a bit into the wind. In extreme situations, we might be looking out the side window to see where we’re going. Doing so minimizes drag, maximizes performance and allows you to relax, also.
Lesson 4: Airspeed, Runways
There’s a fallacy out there that pilots should pad their final approach airspeed when there’s a steady, non-gusting crosswind on landing. I guess I get it—a little extra airspeed can boost control effectiveness when it’s really needed—but it’s not always appropriate. When we want to add a notch of airspeed is when the wind is gusty, not when it’s blowing from an inconvenient direction. Too much of a good thing can be a bad thing.
I could easily stay in the pattern at my home plate and practice crosswind landings. It might actually be a good idea with the right winds, since obstacles on either side of the 2500-foot-long runway means crosswinds there rarely are steady in velocity. But 2500 feet is not enough to really practice them in my Debonair. I don’t have a minimum length in mind—maybe triple your airplane’s published over-a-50-foot-obstacle numbers—but you’ll know it when you see it.
More runway gives us more options in crosswind operations. We can apply takeoff power more slowly, helping ensure we retain control on the roll. We also have more room to abort if things get out of hand. When landing, we have an extra margin when gusts force us to pad our approach speed. Remember: Add half of the gust to your target speed.
What’s Missing?
We didn’t discuss the differences and merits of the wing-low approach method or the crab. We’ll let your flight instructor sort out all that with you, but we will add a few choice words.
One, what’s important is that the airplane touches down aligned with the runway. How you get it to do that is up to you. Second, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with combining them. Just don’t touch down in a crab, with the airplane pointed off to the side. That’s just where you might end up.
Taildraggers and Crosswinds
Aerodynamically, the crosswind technique you use in a tricycle-gear airplane should be the same when flying a taildragger, up to a point. That point is when the main wheels are on the ground and airspeed drops. Flight controls lose effectiveness and the pitched-up nose wants to weathervane into the wind, facilitated by the airplane’s center of gravity being aft of the main wheels. In other words, a recipe for groundloops. Yes, tricycle-gear airplanes have groundlooped, too. Neither is desirable.
To me, there are two keys to flying taildraggers in crosswinds. One is to use the ailerons as much as you use the rudder. “Fly” the airplane on the ground as you would when it’s in the air. Turn the aileron into the wind to minimize any lift the wing is producing and the likelihood of the wing lifting. The second key is practice, which we think is even more critical with a taildragger.
So good to see pilot journalists gather here at AVBrief. Thank you, sir
From day one to PPL, nearly every lesson in a 7ECA began on OAK’s rwy 33, which on summer afternoons, nearly always had a 30° 15kt left x-wind and can be higher. I’ve always been grateful.
I was fortunate enough to learn to fly out of what was called, back then Salt Lake #2. I flew mostly in the evenings because of my work schedule, which meant I almost always had a crosswind because of the downslope wind off the Oquirrah Mountains. Good training. My rule of thumb now is that if the rudder is against the stops, time to go someplace else .
For xwind takeoff, a couple more thoughts…at a short field, if a direct xwind yields minimum hw/tw component for either direction, pick the direction that requires less rudder, not more. For US typical (right rudder correction with power), a right xwind means you can go full power earlier (correction req’d doesn’t exceed rudder authority) and you’ll have less drag from rudder input. Same goes for those requiring left rudder with power, left xwind helps.
For a longer runway with no runway length issues (req’d vs available) delay rotation until you can “snatch” off the runway airborne in one quick motion, this will minimize drift as weight transfers from wheels to wings.
Stay proficient in xwind landings and expand your/your acft limits…someday you may not have the option for landing at a better aligned runway.
Landing crosswind in a taildragger was never intended. That’s why so many of the airports of that era had triangle runways, at least reducing some of the crosswind effect. Or grass fields, providing landing in any direction were popular. So, although I’ve been a taildragger pilot for years, I’ve never been a believer of some of my taildragger friends who land , or make an attempt at it, under any crosswind condition. Wasn’t intended. My many Aeronca Champ and Chief hours, 10 kts at 90 degrees were all you needed to try. And be careful with that. My opinion.
When landing, use aileron to shift left and right and maintain the centerline, use rudder to keep the airplane pointed straight ahead down the runway. This is true of every landing whether or not there is any crosswind. In a crosswind this will naturally mean opposite rudder & aileron (e.g. a slip) but thinking about it that way makes it more complex than it really is.
Really good article. Unless you have crosswind gear like a 747, try and hit the ground going straight ahead and not at the weeds. A x-wind takeoff is usually a bit less demanding, but get enough airspeed to keep flying when you briskly leave the ground as RichR has mentioned previously.