Can't slow down after landing

[MerlinsMaster]

Hey guys,

So I noticed that ever since 1.0 came out, my planes take FOREVER to slow down once they touch down on the runway. I lock the brake, hardly any effect. I even increase the brake torque to maximum, nothing. It was not like this for me pre-1.0. Is anyone else noticing this?

[X-SR71]

I find it funny that you can actually brake harder if you go in reverse with powered rover wheels. Brakes are a joke.

What you need for plane wheels is air brakes to go along with them. Works ok then.

[SalehRam]

This is happening to me as well, and I started to put 2 radial chutes on the back of any large plane I have to slow it down before the end of the runway (if I did not make my landing in the beginning of the runway)...

However, since 1.0 I started to use the aerodynamics and the physics of real planes, I usually touch the runway with my speed below 80m/s and I use flaps to allow the plane to fly on such low speeds (below 100m/s)

If everything goes well, and I am aligned to the runway, I usually touch it in the first quarter, and I take my time then slowing down until I fully stop... the 2 radial chutes on the back are for emergency only, so I don't usually deploy them unless I doubt I'll stop before the end of the runway...

Also, the airbrakes are very useful now, since they help my control my speed during the landing process.

[Claw]

I find it funny that you can actually brake harder if you go in reverse with powered rover wheels. Brakes are a joke.

That's because there's a bug with the tweakables for rover wheels. If you right click on the wheel, you've basically ruined it's braking action.

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As for airplane wheels, their brakes seem to be more effective. So I'm not sure specifically which wheels and/or how much mass you're trying to stop. Keep in mind that high speed landings can also impact the braking action quite a bit. If you have a picture or .craft that might help us out.

Cheers,

~Claw

[cantab]

Try setting up spoilers. The elevons have a "Normal" and a "Deployed" state, and an option to flip the direction. Make it so they deploy upwards for spoilers, and then bind it to the brakes action group. That will hopefully reduce your lift when you touch the brakes, increasing the weight on the wheels and therefore increasing braking effectiveness.

[Alshain]

The biggest problem with this is people try to find new ways to slow down after landing, while that does work and many designs (including the NASA STS) use that kind of idea, your best bet in KSP is to find ways to slow down while in the air. The simplest way is to configure Flaps. Basically the same process cantab described but they should deploy down. This puts more lift under the wings and allows you to reduce your speed without nose diving for a nice smooth low speed touchdown.

You can do spoilers as well but a lot of people don't understand spoilers will do almost nothing if placed on the trailing edge of the wing like flaps and elevons. The idea is to remove lift to keep you on the ground and also create drag. If you put them on the back of the wing, they will create drag but do very little for lift. Real spoilers are placed in the rear ~1/3 of the top of the wing typically. What they do is create a stall over part of the wing to reduce lift, but if there is no wing behind them to stall, it doesn't do anything. As lift dumpers, spoilers are typically only deployed on the ground to keep you firmly on the ground.

In 1.0 you can use airbrakes to create drag similar to spoilers, even on the ground. Airbrakes are typically distributed in such a way as they do NOT dump lift, unlike spoilers.

In 1.0, you will find parachutes can be used as drag chutes to be deployed after touchdown (again, like the NASA STS). Personally I think this is the most visibly pleasing option.

Edited July 20, 2015 by Alshain

[Vegvisir]

Great pointers here, interesting to read. I've had troubles slowing planes down, too, but have since just tried throttling down further out so my plane is simply slower when coming to land. I think that's what real pilots do, isn't it? Haha. But making use of flaps, and emergency chutes, is what I'll do in future

[Vanamonde]

Claw is being modest, and didn't point out that his bug-fixing mod deals with this brake issue.

[Edax]

In my early Spaceplane builds using early tech, I'd just deploy a parachute in the rear of the plane when the wheels touch down, that slowed it down real fast. (I think the space shuttle does the same thing)

Edited July 20, 2015 by Edax

[mrclucks]

Whenever I land my aircraft I always start bleeding off speed at least 1km away so I'm barely maintaining levelish flight even with a bit of throttle. Then once I go in for the kill/landing, I throttle down to 0 and try to touchdown with an angle of attack 5-15 degrees up which should have you drastically losing speed safely.

I've never had an aeroplanes/ssto design that wasn't able to land and stop using this design(except for the ones that spun out of control after the first minute)

[imaspacestation]

Try to land slower. A proper landing would see you at near stalling speed when touching down. In fact, the final touch down should be a stall, but that's actually pretty hard to accomplish in KSP, so just try to go as slow as possible, but be sure you're well lined to the runway, because you won't be able to do much maneuvering at low speeds.

And then add drag-chutes