Any short field landing, where you are slowed to min maneuver under power might result in landing short if your engine fails on final, but it is something that needs to be practiced if you plan to use this technique for real. We should all practice this if we have a destination requiring a very short landing, maybe with obstacles, before we actually need it. This works very well in an RV (especially an RV4). Another thing that we should always practice, and something I see violated too many times, is the plan that I need to keep the airport/runway within gliding distance of my airplane with no power, whenever I commit to land there. If I have traffic in the pattern ahead of me preventing me to do my normal approach, I stay at my initial approach speed, around 100K, until I’m ready to ‘commit’ to a landing, which is the point that I can make the runway if I have a power loss.
When I transitioned from an RV8 with a constant speed prop to an RV4 with a fixed pitched prop, this required a fairly major shift in energy management for me - for the better if you value your time before touchdown (somewhere) in the event of power loss. My RV4 will glide like a sailplane, seemingly, compared with my previous CS RV8, which had a glide range of an airplane with no wings. Sink rate could exceed 1000’ per minute, and I needed some energy to arrest that sink rate in a normal power off landing, without flirting with an accelerated stall. I exaggerate a little here, but the difference is real, mostly because of the FP V.S. CS prop. Crossing the end of the runway in my RV4 at 60 KIAS with full flaps and idle power leaves me plenty of cushion for a comfortable flair to a 3-point, not quite stalled landing. Full stall 3-point usually results in a tailwheel first touch down (and I have the long gear), which I do occasionally, but that’s not what I’m trying for.
OK, I’ve hijacked this thread - flap position integrity in a manual flap RV4 is the OP’s problem. I say, fix those notches. Manual flaps is a big advantage in my opinion, in more ways than one. I’ve had 5 RV’s, 3 of which I’ve built, and this is the first one I’ve had with manual flaps. If I were to build another (never say never), I would build manual flaps. Lighter, simpler, zero maintenance, instant up/down. What’s not to like? Tell your GIB to move his left foot over for a second while you position your flaps. What’s hard/inconvenient about that? For you guys that have never experienced these, you don’t know what you are missing.
