RADIO CONTROL HELICOPTERS - 2003/10

October 2003 131
AS I’M WRITING this, the flying season
is just getting underway in upstate New
York. It’s ironic that when this is published,
the flying season will be winding down up
here in the North. It is the envy of us
Northerners that those living in southern
areas of the country can enjoy an extended
flying season. Up here, we have to pack in
all of our flying in five or six months.
That’s okay; we get to spend long
months going through our helicopters doing
maintenance. It’s not much of a trade-off,
but we live with it. The rain is curtailing the
flying right now. I promised a review of the
FMA Direct Co-Pilot, but with the weather
and my schedule, I’ve had to put it off until
next month.
A topic that has been discussed many
times in many different helicopter columns
is flying helicopters in traditionally fixedwing
model clubs. You may have read the
war stories of getting the cold shoulder (the
best case) to outright being told not to bring
a helicopter to the field again (the worst
case). There are individuals who will not
tolerate helicopters flying at their clubs, no
matter what arrangements or
accommodations can be made. That will
never change.
However, I’ve had the privilege of a
positive experience with my fixed-wing
club, and I’ve had the pleasure of visiting
several other clubs in my travels that have
made provisions for helicopters at their
fields.
My fixed-wing club, the Syracuse
Thunderbirds Aero Radio Society, watched
me struggle from the beginning, taming the
beast of the model helicopter. I discussed
my intentions with the safety officer before
I even began the adventure, and that was
my first step to success.
I went off by myself in a corner of the
field and burned many gallons just
hovering. Once I was into forward flight, I
made several trials flying at the same time
as the fixed-wing pilots, following the
flight pattern of the day. It worked out well.
It doesn’t seem to bother anybody to fly
with me as long as I’m following the basic
flight pattern.
However, as I approached the 3-D phase
of flying, I waited until there was a break in
activities before flying my helicopter. I am
courteous of their flying, and they
accommodate me.
I’ve come upon several clubs that have
fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters working
together. One is the Bartow County Model
Aviation club, which flies at a field outside
Dan Williams, 27 Treeline Dr., Liverpool NY 13090; E-mail: [email protected]
RADIO CONTROL HELICOPTERS
View from above showing relationship of drift to correct stick movement.
View from above showing relationship of tail movement (yaw) to correct stick
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132 MODEL AVIATION
metropolitan Atlanta in Georgia. It has gone
to the extent of providing a separate
flightline and pit arrangements for
helicopters and an area where fixed-wing
models and helicopters practice hovering
and flying 3-D.
The two flightlines are perpendicular to
each other and there is the potential of
crossing over into each other’s flight
pattern, but the members have worked it out
well. They enjoy each other’s company.
There are plans to completely separate the
flight patterns in the future, providing
exclusive flying areas for each discipline.
Another club in the Atlanta area—the
Cobb County RC Modelers—has provisions
for fixed wing and rotary. This is where
Atlanta Braves catcher Javy Lopez flies
Radio Control Aerobatics. They mix it up
successfully. So you see, it can be done.
Everybody flying model helicopters knows
full well how difficult it is to get through the
hovering phase. New pilots flying fixedwing
models aren’t faced with the daunting
task of hovering right off the bat. Some of
the fliers who are transitioning into flying
helicopters figure out quickly that they can
go into forward flight right away, fly the
model like an airplane, and avoid hovering
altogether.
I’m going to discuss one of the more
difficult aspects of hovering: “nose-in”
hovering. I’ll share my insight into various
techniques of learning it. However, before
Bartow County Model Aviation club from far corner of both runways. Helicopter pits and
flying is off to the right; fixed-wing flying is done off to the left.
you’re ready to learn this, you should be
comfortable with hovering the helicopter
facing “side on” toward you, with the
model facing to the left and to the right.
From a tail-in attitude, rotate the
helicopter 90° to the left or right. Some
pilots will actually turn their bodies in that
direction to help orient the transmitter to the
way the helicopter is hovering. I think of
myself “in the cockpit.” Use whatever
works for you and allows you to build up
the instincts. Practice both ways.
I can’t stress enough about practicing
the various hovering attitudes before
progressing to the next phase. Burn that
fuel!
Before I get started, I’ll share a learning
crutch with you. Using this technique will
allow you to develop the instincts necessary
to successfully accomplish learning nose-in
hovering. The airplane pilots use a similar
method in their flight schools when they are
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teaching you about flying toward yourself.
When the airplane is flying at you, to
level the wings, correct by pushing the right
stick in the direction of the low wing. From
the airplane frame of view, it will raise that
wing back toward level. I’m going to use a
similar technique.
For nose-in hovering, to stop the
helicopter from drifting side to side, push the
right stick in the direction of the drift. That
will stop it. From the pilot’s standpoint, if the
helicopter is drifting to the right, push the
right stick (cyclic stick) to the right. It will
stop the drift in that direction. You are
effectively “raising the low wing” in airplane
terms. The same goes with a left drift;
applying left cyclic (right stick to the left)
will correct it.
The same idea goes for forward and
backward drifting. If the helicopter drifts
away from you (backward), push the cyclic
stick (right stick) away from you. If it’s
coming at you, pull the right stick toward
you.
This may seem like cheating and that
you’ll be stuck with this as a crutch forever,
but that’s not true. You have to build up the
instincts. Once you begin to react
automatically, you’ll find that you don’t even
think of the trick anymore.
I’ve got another crutch for you. It is for
tail movement, or yaw, while hovering nose
in. Think about what you’re doing with
normal tail-in hovering; you’re steering the
helicopter’s nose in the direction you need to
keep the nose where it belongs. If the nose
drifts to the left, push the left stick to the
right to bring the nose to the right again, and
vice versa.
With that in mind, think about this:
you’re steering the nose that is pointing away
from you. Let’s apply the same thing to nosein
hovering. We will be steering what is
pointing away, and in this case it’s the tail.
For moving the tail to the right, push
the left (rudder) stick to the right. To move
the tail to the left, move the rudder stick to
the left. As you progress into more
difficult maneuvers (upright), remember
that you steer whatever is pointing away
from you, just like the nose is when
hovering normally. This really helps when
learning backward flight.
Let’s move on to practicing nose-in
hovering. A simulator is highly
recommended as a start. Once you’re
comfortable with the simulator, put that
training gear back on the helicopter. Before
you start, think about what you’re going to
do if things start to go wrong. You already
know how to hover normally with the tail in
toward you, so you want to get the helicopter
back to a tail-in hover. That’s how you “bail
out.” Rotate the helicopter back to tail in if
you get messed up.
Think that through a few times before
beginning. Remember, I also recommend
that you are able to hover with the helicopter
facing left and right—a side-on hover. That
way it’s only a small jump to nose-in
attitude.
You can start the nose-in hover practice
in one of several ways. The first, the way I
learned because I was a fixed-wing pilot first
and was into forward flight, was to slow my
approach to myself, up high, with the
helicopter nose facing me. I would work the
attitude as much as I could and bail out by
rotating the helicopter back to a tail-in hover
or pushing the helicopter back into forward
flight. I don’t recommend this for someone
who is still in the hovering stages because
they don’t know forward flight yet.
The second way to begin nose-in
hovering is to hover the model, with the
normal tail-in attitude, close to the ground.
Rotate the helicopter until the nose is facing
you. Try to hold the nose-in attitude as long
as possible. Some drifting around is allowed.
It’s just like learning to hover again.
If you have to bail, turn the helicopter
around until the tail is facing you. Gather
your wits and try again. Perseverance will
pay off; keep trying. Make sure there is
plenty of distance between you and the
helicopter while trying this, or whenever it is
hovering. If it drifts at you, you want the
room to spare!
Only practice for a couple of minutes at a
time, then go back to the normal tail-in
hover. This is important. You will get so
caught up in nose-in hovering that if you
don’t give yourself a break, you will have
trouble hovering normally again. Switch
around, going back and forth between
nose in and tail in.
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A third way of approaching nose-in
hovering is to start with the helicopter on
the ground, facing you. Slowly bring it off
of the ground, keeping the drift to a
minimum as you get it up into a hover.
It’s like learning to hover normally again,
huh? Hold the helicopter in a hover facing
you for as long as you can. If you need to,
set it back down and gather your nerves
again.
I was never comfortable learning or
teaching this way because it can be
overwhelming when you’re trying to keep
from tipping the model over. However, try
either method and use whichever gets you
to success.
For next month I’m putting together a list
of helicopters, radios, and gyros to help the
new helicopter pilot get started. I will also
have the review of the FMA Direct Co-
Pilot.
My policy is to let manufacturers see
my reviews before they’re published so
they have the opportunity to correct
anything with which I find a problem. This
is the only way to be fair to them and to the
readers. I know FMA Direct was expecting
a review this month, so my sincere
apologies go out to that company.
That’s it for this month. Success is found
at the bottom of each gallon of fuel burned.
You’ve got to burn it to learn it! MA