The circuit was empty at the time 
Good fun! I recently flew to Drachten EHDR and when calling for PPR I was told that landing on 08 is prohibited. On the VFR arrival chart it shows that flying over the city of Drachten should be avoided so that will be why. On initial contact I was told runway 08 in use with a left hand circuit. I had to confirm landing on 08 considering what I was told the previous day. The wind was from the east at 10kts, which will explain why 08 was in use but then I wouldn’t call it “prohibited”. Not overflying the city requires a fairly tight base to final.
I went in to this with a bit of trepidation (being inexperienced and only my second flight in a new type to me, yes I know it’s only a PA28…) but of course it turned out to be a non event. Anyway, here’s a video a friend of mine took.
Excellent
Did you retract the flaps during the roll out 9EP?
That’s a “normal circuit” where I come from :-)
Most retracts are pretty good at doing tight circuits, with the wheels down, every retract I’ve flown tends to have the glide profile of a safe with the door open.
Landing 08 EHDR is indeed not permitted
There is a hospital on the 26 extended centreline/final 08
Is their an argument for a really tight circuit being flown with a different configuration? I would be inclined to have all the flaps out (except landing), gear down and much lower than circuit height – maybe 600 feet from crosswind. Would that not ensure there is a lot less energy to dissipate (important in a slippery aircraft) when turning final and enable a much less steep profile? I think in most types in should be possible or nearly possible to fly a bad weather circuit within the boundaries of the airfield with good energy management. I would think that to keep it really tight you pretty much need to be fully configured from crossing the numbers and at the correct speed as there will be little time to do much else and then you will also not need to worry about energy management.
The advantage of being higher is that you can trade the height for unloading the wings, by accelerating downwards. This is useful if you are flying a downwind leg close to the runway.
Peter – what do you have in mind?
If you wish to keep it really tight I had in mind crossing the numbers at say 600 feet, flying an orbital circuit as opposed to square and as you are late downwind turning base coming down to less (whatever you are comfortable with) so as you roll out onto final you are fully configured and on speed with very little height to shed.
How does this compare with being higher and unloading the wings?
I am obvioulsy not suggesting any turns that are either so tight or so low speed as to place you close to a stall.
Neil wrote:
Did you retract the flaps during the roll out 9EP?
I did. I flew with a friend who used to do this and it struck me as a bit strange the first time I saw it. It didn’t seem the safest thing to be leaning forward and sideways at that stage of the flight but I read somewhere that it improves braking (though now I think about it, no flaps = less drag). What is your opinion?
Peter_Mundy wrote:
Landing 08 EHDR is indeed not permitted
I spoke with the guy in the tower after landing and he said yes normally it is prohibited for GA to land on 08 (he specifically said GA. I’m not sure what he was getting at) but the alternative was to land on 26 with a 10 knot tailwind. All other traffic that day also used 08.
