Arrrgh..........Spitfire Ground Loop as it comes to rest

[Weegie]

I played the game back in the early days so I know the ground looping coming to a stop has been an issue since day 1 and the topic done to death.

 

It has improved considerably IMHO since the early days when everything ground looped.

 

Now at least the wider undercarraige aircraft don't seem so prone to it.

 

The Spit however Arrrrgh, I've never flown anything but watched a lot of footage of Spitfires landing and just don't understand the game behaviour.

 

I can come to halt straight sometimes, the others, I'm fine until I'm all but stopped then the slightest side force just causes the loop.

 

It's as if below a critical low speed the side force becomes locked in and no amount of rudder correction negates it.

 

It's so frustrating and why it hasn't been addressed long ago is just beyond me.

[Asgar]

#CantRelate

[Raptorattacker]

1 hour ago, Weegie said:

It's so frustrating and why it hasn't been addressed long ago is just beyond me.

'It' is a very common thing with the real Spitfire, purely from the braking system and airflow over the rudder.

I would suggest that 'it' isn't an it but an 'I'...

Practice makes perfect (and it still happens on occasion, trust me!!).

 

Rap

 

ps This isn't meant to sound nasty, believe me! I'm only speaking from personal truck with this exact thing. 

Edited April 15, 2022 by Raptorattacker

[Cravis]

2 hours ago, Weegie said:

I can come to halt straight sometimes, the others, I'm fine until I'm all but stopped then the slightest side force just causes the loop.

 

It's as if below a critical low speed the side force becomes locked in and no amount of rudder correction negates it.

 

Yea that is one thing I haven't been able to stop from happening to me. After touch down you come to a certain speed and when there is any off-setting force it goes into un-correctable spin. It is only after landing though basically when transitioning from slowing down to taxi speed.

Honestly I would assume rudder to do nothing, I mean at those low speeds rudder has probably little to no authority. What bugs me is that it seems like neither do the brakes?

 

What I found works sometimes is getting the Spit straight and true and then braking thru this "black hole of control" to a complete stop in one go and after coming to a complete stop then starting to taxi.

 

AI seems to have an issue with it as well as I see AI Spitfires ground looping after touch down all the time... 

[Shakey60]

I found that if I apply a little power on touchdown and leave it there then control direction and braking I can stop straight. Power must be enough to provide air flow to the rudder untill a complete stop then taxi as normal. Landings in the spit don't scare me any more!

[BMA_FlyingShark]

Maybe this vid from our friend Sheriff can be of help:

 

 

Have a nice day.

 

[unlikely_spider]

8 minutes ago, Shakey60 said:

I found that if I apply a little power on touchdown and leave it there then control direction and braking I can stop straight. Power must be enough to provide air flow to the rudder untill a complete stop then taxi as normal. Landings in the spit don't scare me any more!

Yes, sometimes my power setting is like a U curve. Little to no throttle on final approach, but the after touchdown I counter intuitively add some as I am braking and slowing to a stop. Not sure if it's torque or air over the rudder, but it works for me.

[SCG_Wulfe]

Key is to keep some power on right to the end. Especially if it starts to let go, give it a quick bump of throttle (while doing all of your correcting on the rudder/brakes). Doing this, I don't ever ground loop the spit, before I figured it out, it was a pretty constant problem for me. 

Edited April 15, 2022 by SCG_Wulfe

[JimTM]

While a bit of power can certainly help you avoid a ground loop, note that power is not necessary for a normal landing and I never use it. Instead, do the following:

1. During the first part of your landing roll, use short stabs on the rudder to correct any left or right turning as soon as it starts.
2. During the later part of your landing roll, use short stabs on the brake to correct any left or right turning as soon as it starts.
3. Keep correcting left or right turning with the brakes as in step 2 until you are stopped.

If the plane starts to turn too much, apply the brakes for a longer time but stop braking as soon as the turning is reduced and then brake gently to get you back on the proper path.

 

Important! Don't wait for a turn to become obvious before correcting; by then it may be too late. If you think the plane is wandering in the slightest, go ahead with a quick stab on the rudder/brakes.

 

The only time that I ground loop now is when I don't follow the above procedure (especially step 3) or if I don't land reasonably straight to begin with. Once you practice a bit with this technique and use it diligently, landing becomes quite comfortable.

 

Edited April 15, 2022 by JimTM

[Trooper117]

Remember, in real life, young pilots would transition from a training aircraft and then end up flying a Spitfire... also, there wouldn't be a dual cockpit version for that young pilot to get an instructor sitting behind and giving advice. That young man would get a briefing from a pilot on the ground and when it was thought he had got the information into his head he'd be off on his own and hopefully got it all right when he put his knowledge into practice.

If the real Spit was as iffy as the GB version, just about every young pilot would mess up his first landing and maybe kill himself... and yes, I know all about the need to be careful when landing a real Spitfire before the fun police start, but I still think landings with the Spits in this game are all about 'gaming the game' to get a successful landing.

[Raptorattacker]

24 minutes ago, Trooper117 said:

the Spits in this game are all about 'gaming the game' to get a successful landing.

A great point well put!

[AndyJWest]

22 minutes ago, Trooper117 said:

Remember, in real life, young pilots would transition from a training aircraft and then end up flying a Spitfire... also, there wouldn't be a dual cockpit version for that young pilot to get an instructor sitting behind and giving advice. That young man would get a briefing from a pilot on the ground and when it was thought he had got the information into his head he'd be off on his own and hopefully got it all right when he put his knowledge into practice.

If the real Spit was as iffy as the GB version, just about every young pilot would mess up his first landing and maybe kill himself... and yes, I know all about the need to be careful when landing a real Spitfire before the fun police start, but I still think landings with the Spits in this game are all about 'gaming the game' to get a successful landing.

 

Got to agree with this. If the real-life Spit handled that badly, they would have done something about it. Sadly, ground handling in general isn't one of IL-2 GB's better points. To be fair, other sims have had similar issues, and I suspect that the physics involved are more complex than might seem obvious.

[unlikely_spider]

3 minutes ago, AndyJWest said:

 

Got to agree with this. If the real-life Spit handled that badly, they would have done something about it. Sadly, ground handling in general isn't one of IL-2 GB's better points. To be fair, other sims have had similar issues, and I suspect that the physics involved are more complex than might seem obvious.

To GB's credit, in DCS the Spit posed more difficulty to me to land successfully than most other warbirds too.

And I think that even if the characteristics were modeled perfectly, we simmers would still have more difficulty than real life pilots because of the lack of feedback from our butts in the seat and our equilibriums. (But fortunately for us we can simply restart after a mistake of course)

 

[Trooper117]

3 minutes ago, AndyJWest said:

To be fair, other sims have had similar issues, and I suspect that the physics involved are more complex than might seem obvious.

 

You are probably on the money with that mate!

[ShamrockOneFive]

13 minutes ago, AndyJWest said:

 

Got to agree with this. If the real-life Spit handled that badly, they would have done something about it. Sadly, ground handling in general isn't one of IL-2 GB's better points. To be fair, other sims have had similar issues, and I suspect that the physics involved are more complex than might seem obvious.

 

Try landing it in DCS. It's even more unruly. I think most sims struggle a bit with the interaction been flying dynamics and ground dynamics.

[AndyJWest]

22 minutes ago, unlikely_spider said:

To GB's credit, in DCS the Spit posed more difficulty to me to land successfully than most other warbirds too.

And I think that even if the characteristics were modeled perfectly, we simmers would still have more difficulty than real life pilots because of the lack of feedback from our butts in the seat and our equilibriums. (But fortunately for us we can simply restart after a mistake of course)

 

 

You are almost certainly correct about the butt-equilibrium physics issue. There's a thread on the DCS forum somewhere, where a real-life jet-jockey comments on air-to-air refuelling being made harder in DCS because you can't feel the subtle changes in acceleration as you move the throttle. Flying by the seat of your pants isn't just a metaphor.

[Weegie]

Perhaps I've not been succint enough, I can land the Spit fine in IL2 and only have trouble when almost at a complete halt where no matter how much rudder or brake is applied, if out of plane forces are present I'm going to ground loop no matter what happens.

 

@Raptorattacker if you've any hints I'm all ears...................no offence taken

 

As to the DCS questions I can land the DCS Spit without any difficulty. I find the DCS model much more predictable, but never having flown anything, let alone a Spit, I'm not going to say it's more realistic.

 

In the ground loop the Spit appears to accelerate into the loop and IRL I'd imagine airflow over the tail would not be much of a factor, combined with the fact that jamming on the opposite brakes does absolutely nothing.

[BlitzPig_EL]

One of the  BlitzPigs was an aerobatics instructor, has lots of hours in tail draggers, and vintage racing planes from the pre WW2 era, and still owns a tail dragger.  He constantly observes that the sim is harder than real life, and that if these aircraft were as hard to land as they are modeled, that they never would have been accepted by their various militaries.

 

[jollyjack]

How (un?)lucky we gamers are ...

[JimTM]

23 minutes ago, Weegie said:

Perhaps I've not been succint enough, I can land the Spit fine in IL2 and only have trouble when almost at a complete halt where no matter how much rudder or brake is applied, if out of plane forces are present I'm going to ground loop no matter what happens.

...

 

Try to determine why those "out of plane forces" are present in the first place:

• Are you landing straight enough or are you a bit sideways at touchdown?
• Are you correcting any deviations from a proper landing path right away, with rudder or brake (as pointed out above) ?

29 minutes ago, Weegie said:

...

As to the DCS questions I can land the DCS Spit without any difficulty. I find the DCS model much more predictable, but never having flown anything, let alone a Spit, I'm not going to say it's more realistic.

...

 

Funny, I find that the DCS Spitfire requires more attention to avoid a ground loop, but is still OK as long as I use the proper technique. Also, I notice that you can taxi the GB Spitfire with just rudder and gentle throttle, but that does not work in the DCS version.

[Requiem]

From touchdown hold brakes continuously until you stop, using rudder for directional control / differential braking. Engine on, engine off, it doesn't matter. There's no need to add excess power. Gaming technique only.

Edited April 15, 2022 by Requiem

[jollyjack]

Requiem is right ... IMO

[oc2209]

2 hours ago, BlitzPig_EL said:

He constantly observes that the sim is harder than real life*, and that if these aircraft were as hard to land as they are modeled, that they never would have been accepted by their various militaries.

 

*Except for the 109, ironically.

 

The Spitfire feels like the 109 should. The 109 with the tailwheel locked can get away with murder; but if all its ground handling issues could've been solved just from locking the wheel, it never would've developed the reputation it did.

 

Likewise, if the Spitfire handled as poorly as it does in the sim, they surely would've added a locking tailwheel at some point. The fact that it never was added, implies to me that there wasn't a strongly perceived need for it.

 

*Edit:

 

I took this screenshot yesterday, not for this thread (which I hadn't seen yet), but just because I found it funny how many times the Spit darted on me.

 

Spoiler

 

Edited April 15, 2022 by oc2209

[oc2209]

5 hours ago, Weegie said:

Perhaps I've not been succint enough, I can land the Spit fine in IL2 and only have trouble when almost at a complete halt where no matter how much rudder or brake is applied, if out of plane forces are present I'm going to ground loop no matter what happens.

 

I think this is what you're describing:

 

Spoiler

 

 

Here's an example where I don't loop:

 

Spoiler

 

 

What Requiem said is essentially what I did in the successful outcome. But I didn't ride the brakes immediately on touchdown; I waited a fair bit.

 

When I looped, I initially tapped the brakes (unevenly) rather than lay on them, which probably turned my tailwheel so much that by the time I did lay on them, it was too late.

Edited April 15, 2022 by oc2209

[Strewth]

Don't worry. I sometimes still mess up trying to taxi the spit with a heavy bomb load.

[JimTM]

3 hours ago, oc2209 said:

 

I think this is what you're describing:

...

Here's an example where I don't loop:

...

What Requiem said is essentially what I did in the successful outcome. But I didn't ride the brakes immediately on touchdown; I waited a fair bit.

 

When I looped, I initially tapped the brakes (unevenly) rather than lay on them, which probably turned my tailwheel so much that by the time I did lay on them, it was too late.

 

In your first video, you corrected a left turn properly at 0:18 and 0:21, but then at 0:23 you corrected again when you did not need to (or at least not as strongly). Also, I'm not sure if you had the stick pulled all the way back on the roll out, which you should have.

Edited April 16, 2022 by JimTM

[oc2209]

42 minutes ago, JimTM said:

 

In your first video, you corrected a left turn properly at 0:18 and 0:21, but then at 0:23 you corrected again when you did not need to (or at least not as strongly). Also, I'm not sure if you had the stick pulled all the way back on the roll out, which you should have.

 

Right about my overcorrection, but then you have to ask if the Spitfire should be darting off course so many times in quick succession. That would be exceptionally bad behavior even for a 109.

 

It's also true that I wasn't pulling back, but by the time of the loop, I had no ground speed left to make the elevators effective. I was down to less than 30 MPH or so.

 

The end result is that you need to ride the brakes to give yourself some margin for input error because it's arguably far too unforgiving to begin with.

[oc2209]

Here, this is a slight refinement of my earlier successful landing:

 

Spoiler

 

 

This time I applied the brake evenly to both sides, well before my speed was reduced to the point where the random darting begins.

 

Once you're fully laying on the brakes, any darts that do occur are so mild that it's trivial to correct them. At no point was I in danger of losing control. So the longer you wait to apply brakes, the more likely your tailwheel will go squirrely, and the harder it'll be to correct; even if your speed is low.

[jollyjack]

5 hours ago, JimTM said:

 Also, I'm not sure if you had the stick pulled all the way back on the roll out, which you should have.

 

Sounds a little like instructions for how to get off at Redfern properly ...

[Weegie]

@Requiem Thanks I'm going to give that a try & @oc2209 spot on that's exactly the issue I'm referring to and thanks to you too for the suggestions.

 

I don't find having to land dead straight is an issue, I can easily come in at an angle prior to touchdown with rudder applied and straighten up after touchdown, it's just when I'm almost stopped that I experience the loop. The issue starts at low speed, nothing corrects it and I usually lose a flap.

 

Talking of flaps, I seen a video IRL and the pilot flicked up the flaps the second he touched down stating that it settles the aircraft and it ran straight without much issue. Also seen cockpt video where another pilot was applying brakes and these were short sharp and frequent stabs.

 

On "the other forum" somebody posted about the tailwheel stating contrary to the almost verbatim claims that the wheel was free castoring. He stated that this wasn't the case and the tailwheel was held in place when  straight ahead by a spring and it took a little force to unlock it from the straight position. I have no clue if that was true or not.

 

One more thing that I do in DCS but less in IL2 is application of rudder trim. I wonder if trimming the rudder neutral would help

 

Many thanks to everybody, it's very much appreciated.

 

Ultimately though I'm going to just have to keep pratcing until I'm used to the game behaviour.

Edited April 16, 2022 by Weegie

[KevPBur]

Sounds like your issue is more similar to mine in several planes but most notably the spits.

Braking to the shortest possible stop is fine and works but runways are generally much longer than that so the issue is more transitioning to the roll out to taxi phase.

As others have said, in this case I keep a little power on, 10-15° so keeping a bit of speed and rudder authority to the end of the runway then ether stop first or try to exit to taxiway directly if I think I have control!

 

[Weegie]

Well I now have what appears to be a workable solution for me anyway, 4 landings in a row no loops (although sometimes a shimmy)

 

On takeoff I trim full left on the Spit XIV, and on landing recenter the trim then add in elevator trim to pretty close to full nose up (tail heavy)

 

I'm not 3 pointing but keeping the aircraft as level as I can and let it settle, although 3 pointing works too, then stick smoothly full back.

 

The critical trick is keeping just a smidge of throttle in, or add as speed decays and get onto the brakes early.

 

Tried stabbing the brake, but for me the best approach is smoothly (using an axis for the brake) increasing and holding, then just use the rudder to counter the swings until I come to halt. If required after that I can taxi, revs to 1500 to get moving then back to 1300-1200 and swings aren't too bad at all.

[FeuerFliegen]

the easiest way I handle it... once you drop below 50mph, push the throttle to about 11-12%, while hitting the brakes.  That completely solved the problem for me.

[=420=Syphen]

I found the Spits a bit unruly when I had the Warthog stick where the pinky lever was a simple on/off button. With the pinky lever now being an axis for me, it has made the Russian and British aircraft with differential braking systems much easier to taxi and ground handle.  Being able to feather the breaks while running the rudder instead of jamming it on is quite helpful on the rollout. Helps prevent any odd side-loading or oscillations that could bite you as you slow down and loose rudder authority. 

[Dagwoodyt]

Taildraggers I've tried in GB all seem to land pretty much the same. Hit the optimum touch down speed, pull back on the stick, apply brakes (analog lever) and sometimes small amount of throttle. That applies to all Spitfire variants. If you can get the spitfire to touch down at ~80mph that is a good omen. The Spitfire in that "other" sim is at a higher level of difficulty altogether, especially on many of the Nevada map airfields for me, making all GB Spitfires seem tame by comparison.

Edited May 2, 2022 by Dagwoodyt

[VA_Kamicosmos]

The Tempest is my Ground Looping Nemesis!  109?  No problem. 110?  Very rarely will I ground loop it, and usually I know it's going to happen cause I'm jacking around.  I've landed 110s with an engine out or a tail half missing, no issues, other than stress. Landed a P-47 last night, for the first time, oil covered wind screen, no problem.

 

But the Tempest?  Every other take off has me spinning out of control, and landings are more like 80% chance of that "ah, made it...nope, there's the spin".  The other 20% of the landings I manage to ding up the prop!  I love the Tempest otherwise, but ground handling gets me (nearly every time).

 

I've rarely flown the Spits, only in QM to be honest.  I'll have to do some Pattern Practice in one, see how I get along with it.

[Lusekofte]

On 4/15/2022 at 5:50 PM, ShamrockOneFive said:

 

Try landing it in DCS. It's even more unruly. I think most sims struggle a bit with the interaction been flying dynamics and ground dynamics.

Ground handling in DCS and GB is very influenced by wind. And it is no doubt there is a lack of believeable torque effect in flight we get ten folded back and yet again not realistic while on ground.

There are no doubt something wrong. Except in some cases those difficult was in real world too.

If you look at the JU 88, you are better off looking at the indicator instead of the window in order to keep it from going anywhere.

What puzzle me is the P 47, showpilots today say it is a tricky one both on takeoff and landing, I can't say I have more respect for it than any other.

It had to be treated with respect in low speed like the Corsair, and if you forgot tailwheel lock it would ground loop. P 47 was a brute

 

Edited May 2, 2022 by LuseKofte

[LukeFF]

Take it for what it's worth, but I have found with the Spitfire XIV that setting the rudder trim to neutral before landing helps greatly with ground looping. Ever since I've made that change, I've not had any problems with nasty ground loops.

 

On 4/16/2022 at 5:48 AM, Weegie said:

On takeoff I trim full left on the Spit XIV, and on landing recenter the trim then add in elevator trim to pretty close to full nose up (tail heavy)

 

I'm not 3 pointing but keeping the aircraft as level as I can and let it settle, although 3 pointing works too, then stick smoothly full back.

 

The critical trick is keeping just a smidge of throttle in, or add as speed decays and get onto the brakes early.

 

Tried stabbing the brake, but for me the best approach is smoothly (using an axis for the brake) increasing and holding, then just use the rudder to counter the swings until I come to halt. If required after that I can taxi, revs to 1500 to get moving then back to 1300-1200 and swings aren't too bad at all.

 

Or, what he said. ? 

Edited May 2, 2022 by LukeFF