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          FLIGHT INSTUCTOR'S MANUAL          71

This is another reason for insistence by the instructor that a constant bank be maintained.
Skidding in a gliding turn, particularly close to the ground, is even worse than skidding in a climbing turn. While the results are the same, the proximity of the ground makes the results in the glide more likely to end disastrously.
In any skidding turn the airplane is forced up away from the ground and away from the center of the turn. Either of these actions results in loss of speed and there is the additional factor of the extra drag induced by the fuselage being on the bias to the flight path. The results of the combination of all three, if no power is available for quick assistance, will be certain and rapid. It tends to leave the aircraft suspended in the air without forward speed. Forward speed can only be regained by falling free until control is regained, and if the ground is too close, nothing can stop the airplane from hitting it out of control.
Still another factor which gives many students persistent trouble, and one which is frequently overlooked by instructors, is the difference in rudder action in turns with and without power.
In power turns it is required that the desired recovery point be anticipated in the use of controls and that considerably more pressure than usual be exerted on the rudder. The amount of this extra pressure depends on the proximity to the desired recovery point and to the steepness of the bank when recovery is started. During the practice of precision turns, it will be learned that a turn can be stopped instantly and the airplane rolled out of the bank without slipping or skidding by proper coordination of the rudder. This requires that considerable pressure be applied very rapidly on the rudder and the relaxation be just as rapid and precise.
In the recovery from a gliding turn, much the same rudder action takes place but without anything like the same pressure being necessary. The actual action of the rudder is probably the same but it seems to be different because the resistance to pressure is so much less due to the absence of the slip stream. The net result, then, is a much greater application through a greater range than is realized; at any rate, the turn seems to stop immediately when the rudder is applied in recovering.
This last factor is particularly important during landing practice since the student almost invariably starts to recover too soon and will either come in cross wind or try to force the ship into the wind with the rudder alone. This results in the landing being made in a skid that is too easily and too often mistaken for "drift," thus confusing the student who can see that something is wrong but is at a loss for the reason. When this happens he is too occupied to give his attention to making the landing and a bad landing results. If he does not notice it, as is often the case, he lands in the skid.
Instructors too often fail to realize this factor and either accuse the student of using too much rudder or of landing cross wind, when actually the real cause is the premature starting of the recovery from the gliding turn.
Particular attention must be paid to the action of the nose in entering and recovering from gliding turns. As in all other turns, it must not be allowed to describe arcs with relation to the horizon