Night/Evening landings

[Loogie]

I have never landed a conventional gear airplane at night, my Maule has pretty good lights, I was thinking of trying a few landings in the dusk/evening transition just to make sure I can do that in case I get delayed or divert etc.
Anyone have any advice on the matter?

[Rezrider]

Just feel your way down as you approach the landing surface and you"ll be fine. Anticipate the fact that your landing/taxi lights may not be tilted correctly so might not illuminate the area properly.

Just go try a few and see how it goes, depth perception gets out of whack on night landings sometimes but you get used to it.
Good luck.
RR

[chris erasmus]

park your plane in front of the hanger with doors closed, see where the light is shining and adjust accordingly. the lights must shine in line with your field of view when you sit in the plane

[pilot]

I would take an accomplished nighttime pilot with me or just go get some instruction from someone. Years ago I flew a lot at night, but to do it again I would want a refresher for landings. I always felt that I needed more light - especially when a landing light failure happened, even on a lighted runway things got different pretty fast. Like Chris said check you aim points and the dusk flying idea might be pretty good too.

[Mountain Doctor]

At night I will sometimes emulate the technique of a glassy water touchdown. Achieve landing attitude and adjust power for a 50 FPM of so rate of descent. Look forward and use peripheral vision for centerline and wait for, do not anticipate touchdown.

I used this recently in my friend's Bonanza when his landing light failed in flight and it was very dark at our destination.

I see no rerason this would not work well for a taildragger.

[Loogie]

All good stuff, between my taxi light on one wing and landing light on the other the transition works pretty good!

[chris.johnson]

I fly early in the morning for night practice. If there is a problem I can always fly around till it gets light

[pilot]

I, like many of you, am based on an unlighted grass strip. I would love to have an option that would light that sucker up like daylight, be faa aproved and not cost a fortune. I suppose about a dozen HID's would suffice - but hopefully the new LED technology will continue improving, I just wonder if they (LED's) will ever have the "distance" of an HID system.

[Njacko]

I have used these as dusk/evening runway edge lights - they're bright enough to be seen from a couple of miles on final:

http://www.solarpowercentre.com/solar-l ... light.html

They don't last forever and in the winter at Lat 55N, the batteries don't get enough charge to run all night every night, but you can switch the light off when not required.

PJ