Backward Landing

[Tosh]

Some day, more than half a year ago, I've started a challenge for a plane landing stern first. There's been no competitors.

Today, I attempted an atmospheric flight to the North Pole to test my new landing gear on ice. After one hour flight, I finally began to descend to landing, only to find that my plane (with its front fuel tanks empty, and CoG shifted to aft!) just did not want to fly straight. I spent several minutes (!) trying hard to level it out -- and after about twenty rounds of coffin spiral I noticed that spin somehow slowed down when plane marker in the NavBall was passing the retrograde mark...

Yep. This one wanted to fly backwards. And finally landed with its stern first. In one piece.

BTW new landing gear performed just fine

Sorry, no pictures yet, I'm out of attachment space.

Edited August 6, 2012 by Tosh

[Vostok]

I made a rocket that flew to the moon (And back!) with the capsule pointing backwards (downwards) the whole way. It certainly made the nav-ball really fun to use, I'll say that much... Although this has little to do with backwards planes

[Tosh]

I made a rocket that flew to the moon (And back!) with the capsule pointing backwards (downwards) the whole way. It certainly made the nav-ball really fun to use, I'll say that much...

Was ASAS functioning properly? o_O

Or you had no ASAS?))

[trbinsc]

One time one of the wings on my plane broke off, and for some reason that made it fly better backwards. I was forced to make a backwards landing, and the crew survived the impact without a wing or tailfin.

[A Fat Pokemon]

With my first succesful spaceplane, I landed backwards, using my engines to slow my decent but kept the forward momentum and landing backwards on a ice lake on Minmus. I must have been going something like 200m/s when I touched down.

[softweir]

... just did not want to fly straight. I spent several minutes (!) trying hard to level it out -- and after about twenty rounds of coffin spiral I noticed that spin somehow slowed down when plane marker in the NavBall was passing the retrograde mark...

Yep. This one wanted to fly backwards.

That happens when the Centre of Mass is further to the rear than the Centre of Lift. When the plane took off the fuel kept the centre of mass forward, but as you burnt fuel the CoM moved backwards, until it was behind the combined CoL of all the wings. It *is* possible to fly a plane like that (modern fighters are designed to fly like this to make them more manoeuvrable) but you need a very sophisticated fly-by-wire system and huge control surfaces to manage it! If you don't have those, then flying backwards is the only way.

You might be able to stabilise your plane by moving the wings further back, or by adding extra empty fuselage sections between the fuel tanks and the cockpit.

[Railsmith]

I've built a spaceplane whose only method of landing was vertically, tail-first... But horizontally and tail-first? Challenge considered. XD

[leopardenthusiast]

Was ASAS functioning properly? o_O

Or you had no ASAS?))

Does ASAS work when the navball shows the exact opposite of what's really happening? The answer is no. In my ridiculously ugly test craft, it made a spin worse rather than countering it, and proceeded to flip the other way. I suspect that its controls are reversed. Thankfully, the insanely brave - and probably also quite stupid - test pilot, Jebediah Kerman, thought to cut the engines BEFORE seperating the capsule and deploying the parachute. I don't know why he did that either. I promised the onlookers fireworks and my lab team had to fire a few solid rocket boosters off the pad.

You can have your thread back now.