Wheel landings are where you do things different with the elevator, that’s where the fun is.

Not really that different. Wheel landings are simply putting it on the mains. Tricycle gear aircraft are always landed on the mains, or should be. Again, not really anything significantly different.

Wheel landings tend to be easier, and offer the most control, especially in a crosswind, and are harder to screw up, and a lot more tolerant if one isn't properly aligned on landing, as some tend not to be. The wheel landing has the greater opportunity to recover if mistakes are made, and gives time to adjust before landing the tail. Easy.

If one makes a mistake when landing three point, one is out of options other than brakes, and with must of the aerodynamic leverage gone, can get into trouble if ham-fisted.

In general, especially in light airplanes, there's not much difference in operating a tricycle gear vs. a conventional gear airplane, and once airborne, zilch. Taxiing, it varies with the aircraft, just as it does with tricycle gear airplanes.

This depends heavily on forward pressure on the yoke after the wheels touch, which is "opposite" of what you've done on every conventional wheel aircraft landing. It causes bounces and crashes in some cases when people try to "teach themselves" how to land in a tailwheel, this has to be "re-wired". This procedure is quite different than what you do when landing a conventional gear aircraft. It's very "opposite" of what you do on a conventional gear aircraft landing.

You're overthinking it. There's nothing to rewire.

It's a bit like the whole dead-foot dead-engine and tail-rises, head-falls bull **** that does little more than confuse people.

One flares into a wheel landing, but just until the fusalge is level. It's no different than landing anything else, but just a bit flatter. Instead of continuing to pull back until the nose is pointing at the sky, one approaches the runway, typically nose toward the runway, and pulls back gently in a flare until level as the mains kiss. That's a wheel landing.

If you're approaching the runway in a nose up attitude and touching the mains, then rolling it onto the mains, that's not a wheel landing. That's a half-baked three point that is cheated into a quasi-wheel landing. In reality, it's just sloppy.

As the aircraft slows, one can keep the tail in the air by maintaing or increasing forward pressure, adding a bit of power, etc, but that's not necessary, and in a crosswind, can prove hazardous if one waits until the stick is full forward and the tail is out of airflow and energy before attempting to transition to a three point attitude. It's quite intuitive: just land the tail; it's not contrary to what one has learned. Simply by applying a bit of back pressure or by not applying forward pressure, the tail comes down, and one can moderate it as needed. Nothing to complicate there unless one tries to teach that it's a new skill...which it isn't.

We land a nosewheel, we land a tailwheel. Same thing. Lower it smoothly to the ground.

If you happen to be flying an airplane with a lockable tailwheel that relies on forward stick to unlock the tailwheel, as many do, then by applying the logic of forward stick, you may develop a dangerous condition in some aircraft by unlocking the tailwheel before the aircraft is slow enough to taxi. Try that in an older Air Tractor 502/602/802, and you're going to be in for a very rude awakening. The tailwheel will spin violently and you can easily end up in the weeds.

If the airplane is treated like any other, then that isn't a problem.

A wheel landing is a round-out that transitions from nose down to level as the mains touch, and little more. Again, if one is in the habit of touching nose up, tail low and rolling it back up on the mains, it's just sloppy, and you'e working too hard to accomplish nothing. If that's the case, you might as well flare just a bit faster, hold it off, and three point it.

You shouldn't have to depend "heavily" on forward pressure after you touch, or pinning the main gear, but if you choose to do so, then it's still intuitive. Push forward on the stick to drive the nose down; works the same in flight as rolling on the mains. No new skill there, nothing new under the sun.

A student can easily get familiar with a flared landing attitude in a tricycle gear airplane by tying the tail down, sitting in the airplane, and looking at the sight picture. I used to do it all the time with primary students. Likewise, a student can see a two-point wheel landing attitude in a conventional gear airplane by putting the tailwheel on a sawhorse or truck bed (depending on aircraft type), and sitting in the airplane. What you see then is what you see landing. No mystery, nothing new.

Why is this going on and on and on?
Jeez, enjoy your time building in whatever you choose.
Tailwheel is fun but there’s no fun column in your logbook.

Do it
 

Completely worth it. Is does require enhanced skill and will make you better. Anyone can be a mediocre tricycle pilot their entire career. You have to have an elevated level level of skill to fly a taildragger and it is directly transferable to flying at the airlines. For those who say it's not important probably are mediocre at best, land sideways and went to Embry Riddle. They probably clapped as a kid while riding in the back of an airliner too. I have a tailwheel collumn in my logbook and have been asked about it at two airlines and several other job interviews. If you have the opportunity do it! Or you could be another of the 100,000 airline pilots in the U.S. who think they're the bestist pilot in all of Atlanta that think through these doors walk the greatest airplane pointers in their own minds...

There it is, the myth at work.

That old "real men fly taildraggers" chestnut.

This is some of the goofiest advice I've heard for years in the airlines...

No, many airline pilots have failed a checkride somewhere along their progression. Don't fear a failure. If you're in the industry chances are the guy sitting next to you has failed something. I mean don't be lazy and not put in the effort, but Jesus this is crap. Just be humble when it comes up in the interview.

I mean they do so...

Those "Sloppy" wheel landings you speak of are the preferred method for landing off airport, in fact my insurance speaks highly of that technique. That technique requires a low energy wheel landing, dumping the flaps with heavy brakes, the tail up and full aft elevator. From your other post your tail wheel experience or the way you learned were basic at best?
A big misconception is that wheel landings offer better control... until you're slow while lowering the tail. I like to land 3 point in winds... the steary thing in the back is on the ground giving much better control than any wheel landing.

Tail wheel does require an endorsement because it is a different animal. Although I agree it's easy, it definitely takes advanced training to learn the new skill set.

My comments are based on several decades of flying conventional gear aircraft professionally, but perhaps I missed something along the way...like the tailwheel endorsement I never needed and don't have.

Whether it's the J3 I learned in or the various horizontally opposed, radial, and turboprop conventional gear aircraft that I've been flying for the better part of four decades now, I'm always happy to learn something new.

I guarantee I won't be learning it in this thread, though.

And yes, if you have to land tail low for a wheel landing and then roll it back up on to the mains, it's sloppy flying. This is true on grass, sand, rocks, dirt, where ever.

No, it's not advanced training or advanced flying.

My tailwheel experience and training is basic at best, is it? How many years have you been flying conventional gear airplanes in formation under powerlines, down into forest fires, flying aerobatics, doing back country flying, pest control, seeding, spraying, and working conventional gear airplanes around the globe? At what point, pray tell and how many more decades, does it no longer become basic? Is there possibly light at the end of the tunnel when school gets out and I can actually start, or will it be basic and unlearned for...another few decades?

Your first three posts, too.