Approach speed

[ChrisM]

If you don't know what speed to approach at, is there a way to 'guesstimate' the right speed

[beaky]

If you don't know what speed to approach at, is there a way to 'guesstimate' the right speed

Not sure if this applies to heavies, but for light aircraft, the recommendation( if no approach speed is specified) is to go with 1.3 Vso (stalling speed with gear and flaps down, usually the bottom of the white arc on the airspeed indicator). Makes sense, as Vso can also be described as the minimum speed for the landing configuration.
You may control how steep your approach is and how fast you descend, without changing this speed, by using power and pitch...

[beefhole]

For jets, shoot for about a three degrees nose up pitch on final (for boeings, I believe airbuses come in with their noses a little higher)

[ChrisM]

Thanks fella's

[OTTOL]

1.3 Vso is used on jets as well. The problem with applying this formula to a jet is the wide variation between Vso(stall speed) at max gross landing weight and Vso at the min fuel weight (as much as a 50kias difference on some aircraft). The dynamics for a light aircraft are the same and therefore for Vso and obviously 1.3 times Vso will change with a fully loaded vs. a lightly loaded 172/Cherokee etc.. The change on a