How long to overcome the fear of flying?

[dazzystar]

Hi all,

I was just wondering how long it takes to overcome the fear of flying? I practice when I can but even then will only hover (if you call it that!) for about 2 minutes in total as I'm scared!

TIA
Daz

[tourerjim]

If your not wanting to crash then theirs no rush.

[del19_82]

What kind of fear is it? Are you scared to crash? If it is you eventually get more confident and believe it or not crashing actually helps, it takes away the oooh shiny and new part of the heli and you learn that you can fix it if you break it so its less of a big deal!

HTH

Del

[Smoothound]

Getting over the fear of crashing takes a while. I still clench my cheeks regularly while flying, crashes are far less common now but the squeaky bum moments are still there

[del19_82]

Getting over the fear of crashing takes a while. I still clench my cheeks regularly while flying, crashes are far less common now but the squeaky bum moments are still there

Same here, had major clenching last week after i did my first stall turn, was shaking for ages after lol

[shikari_chaos]

I think the fear bar slowly rises along with repetition/advancing your own flying skills. At first just getting the thing air born is a fairly scary ordeal and then the same with circuits etc. I think anything you try for the first time gives you that fear/ buzz feeling! I remember my first flips/rolls and inverted hovers at the beginning of the year and i was shaking with adrenaline/excitement/overcoming the fear of doing them. I had to land and let my hands calm down lol I would say I've got better at controlling the nerves but i still get a little scared/excited when i see the heli flying at my pretty fast inverted or non inverted tbh lol

[Twisted]

Crashing is all part or the learning process, if you can't afford to crash your learning will take longer due to fear of crashing. No one wants to crash but some times its just unavoidable, my record of crashing is 3 times in 3 days LOL. Then again most of my crashes only ended up (on a 450 size) in replacement of shafts - blades and the odd tail boom and if I was not thinking fast enough the odd gear here and then. No one learnt to walk or run with out a few bumps

get confident with hovering and then maybe try a little forward backwards and sideward movement, and if you own a sim try all your new movements on there first as wont cost you any cash in crashes

Good luck

p.s Yes any new things I try I get scared, and after I done it my hands are shaking like mad LOL

[dazzystar]

maybe try a little forward backwards and sideward movement! I do this trying to bloody hover!!!

Crashing is all part or the learning process, if you can't afford to crash your learning will take longer due to fear of crashing. No one wants to crash but some times its just unavoidable, my record of crashing is 3 times in 3 days LOL. Then again most of my crashes only ended up (on a 450 size) in replacement of shafts - blades and the odd tail boom and if I was not thinking fast enough the odd gear here and then. No one learnt to walk or run with out a few bumps

get confident with hovering and then maybe try a little forward backwards and sideward movement, and if you own a sim try all your new movements on there first as wont cost you any cash in crashes

Good luck

[supamansuper]

I just got over my fear last week.Hadn't even hovered my heli because I was that scared.Then I had a sudden urge to fly,so I took all my stuff out to the garden an said to myself **ck it if it breaks it breaks.To my amazement it didn't break and I ended up doing a half decent hover.

[shikari_chaos]

Yeah it's hard to get at first that's for sure! Just keep at it and every time you fly try and set your self a new goal, 10second hover, 20 second hover, etc then build it up with other moves like gently moving it left and bringing it to a stationary hover again but always stay tail in at first I found this kind of thing really helped build my confidence in knowing i could start to tell the heli to move rather than just trying to just give inputs to keep it in one place! TBH I think a perfectly stationary hover is bloody hard for lots of pilots. (unless your Fly Bar Less hahaha)

[tiddler]

maybe try a little forward backwards and sideward movement! I do this trying to bloody hover!!!

Holding a perfectly stationary hover inst easy at all. Actually, its blerdy hard as the heli will always try and slide off one way or the other, and in some ways, achieving a degree of controlled forward flight is actually easier.

[sacko]

The more you fly the heli, the more confident you are with it..... Usually.

So get out there and get some more stick time

[GravityKills]

yes, as mentioned above: try to get as much stick time as possible:
- find yourself a safe "flying box" with some safety margin outside (see Radd's school of rotary flight)
- try to hover as long tail-in as possible within the box. If it drifts out, put it down, pick it up, start all over => Radd
- You'll notice progress usually after a good night's sleep
- Learn to hover a whole LiPo tail-in, without mistakes.
- then start the other directions, first all four (tail-in, side-in, nose-in), then eight (intermediate angles), then 12 (hours on a clock face)
- then learn to hover a whole LiPo in your box while piroing slowly
You can do this exercise with the cheapest fixed-pitch heli. It will take months. This is where you get your "stick time". Some day you'll notice, you're picking up the heli, it's just another flight. There should be some mild excitement, otherwise you're not challenging yourself hard enough.

[Nick B]

Practice practice and eeeerr,practice.I spent 8 months of hovering around,tail-in and side-on wihile overcoming the fear of nose-in on the sim.once i could hover nose in on the sim with a 450 i tried it for real.that was one year ago tommorow

[D1zzy]

Well, the fear is part of the fun for me! Then again, I'm a bit of an adrenaline junky and that's part of what keeps me coming back to this hobby. As others have said, fear will wear off (sadly!) but new ones come along as you progress further. Fear is a good thing, as it keeps you on your toes. Savour the fear, enjoy it, but don't let it control you.