Have a friend new to a Machen 700 Aerostar . Doesn’t know power settings for approach .
Any ideas on best settings for approach speed .

If your friend doesn’t know the answer to this question.


He doesn’t need to be flying an Aerostar.

I agree with Forrest.

Contact the Aerostar owners association and get the names of the instructors that they list. any one of them can provide good training on how to fly the Aerostar .

the Aerostar is a wonderful aircraft but it must be flown correctly. It has a thin highly loaded wing (very fast and great in turbulence) however if you get too slow in the pattern and stall you end up in a smoking hole. It takes a test pilot 500 feet to recover from a stall and who know what us mortals will need to recover.

it has very little warning that you are getting slow. so it must be flown by the numbers.

I find it is easy to fly if you watch the airspeeds. It flies much more like a jet than a baron.

Agree with above comments, transition training calls for an instructor knowledgeable in the type.

I use 22-squared and 10 degrees of approach flaps to get to an approach speed of about 140. It helps to get slowed down early; this bird does hold speed and you can get pretty far behind it in a busy terminal environment.

Mine is very sensitive to speed, particularly with flaps in excess of ten degrees. If I get behind the power curve, it will lose speed very rapidly while the autopilot holds altitude.

I don't use flaps greater than 20 degrees or let airspeed get below blue line until on final with landing assured. With full flaps it is easy to slow down to 100 over the numbers.

In my 700, it's easy to manage airspeed with power, AOA, flaps, gear, and mine also has the hydraulic spoilers if I want to cheat.

Airspeed is life.

My question to him exactly. Didn’t your instructor show you these numbers ? Very important to a stabilized approach .

My cousin, Kent Larson, does Aerostar transition training regularly. He’s In Longmont, CO.

I don't agree that it gives little warning. My 601P started buffeting about 10kts before wing break and I found it very honest in that regard. You'd have to be asleep to miss an impeding stall in an Aerostar. I wish other airplanes were that honest.

I strongly suggest your friend does not attempt to fly his Aerostar without instruction from a competent Aerostar SPECIFIC instructor and that’s just a start. Lack of Aerostar knowledge and not just flying knowledge is not conducive to a good Aerostar experience.

I agree. You gotta be asleep to miss an oncoming stall in an Aerostar.

If you do happen to be asleep, the violent shaking well before the stall will wake you up.

Rather than publicly shaming your friend for asking you to post the question just have him pm me and I am happy to give him my thoughts without a lecture.

Public shame?

Some folks have no shame.

There’s no shaming here Eric. Not sure how you got that idea. What there is, is a deep concern for anyone operating an Aerostar without proper knowledge, or, being instructed in an Aerostar by someone who does not have adequate knowledge specific to the Aerostar.

It is instructive to look at Aerostar accidents. It appears that at least 1/2 of them end in a smoking hole in the ground. when you get slow, for what ever reason, low time inexperienced pilots and some very high time pilots seem to auger it in a lot. it is high drag when slow and it slows very fast in that situation and it takes a lot of altitude to recover compared to the other fat wing aircraft in its class. we have lost far too many of them in situations where there would be no problem in other aircraft.

you must fly it by the numbers. and if done so it is very safe.

I have done initial evaluations in my aerostar of pilots that we were looking at to go through training. we would take a short flight and I would tell them to keep it above 120 no matter what in the pattern until established on final. many of them had 1000s of hours.

at least 1/2 of them I had to take over when they went from 130 or so and decreasing fast to 110 in the turn to base or to final. they never noticed a change and were not watching the airspeed. they were used to other twins with fat wings where the drag did not change much.

the other half kept it at the airspeed required and it was not problem and we sent them on to training.

It has plenty of control authority to do what every you need to do but an aircraft that takes at least 500 ft to recover from a stall is not forgiving of getting too slow.

inattention will kill you very quickly in the Aerostar.

Maybe I am missing something. He is asking about power settings, not airspeeds. He probably wants to know RPM/MPs that are best on final.

Power settings are not absolute on an approach. Winds will require you to adjust power.

As others have said, get proper training.

As far as power settings are concerned, I can't speak for the 700 specifically. But this should work for the airframe regardless of the power plant. Find a nice power setting that will allow you to maintain 130kts with flaps 20, gear up, straight and level. Keep that power setting and you shouldn't have to touch the power at all during final approach. Lowering the gear abeam the threshold will give you 500 fpm. Then props and mixture forward while turning base and full flaps and full props on short final will bleed off the rest of your speed. Throttle back to idle as you clear the fence or even in the flare will give you a super-smooth touchdown.