How do they do it ?!

[BrontoRaptus]

I've recently started going up the learning curve to fly my heli, and am currently flying 'lazy 8's' and trying to keep control of the beast when it is anywhere near head on to me.

I thought I was making reasonably progress, until recently I saw a video of one of the top 3D flyers at a comp.

WELL ............ !!!!! I have watched the video many times now, but I still have great problems in just keeping track of the orientation of the heli a lot of the time ! I actually found it a bit demoralising, if I couldn't even follow a heli doing 3D - how the hell could I ever expect to fly them ?

I would love to hear from a 3D wizzo - did you struggle like most of us when you started to learn to fly a heli ? And how on earth do you keep track of the orientation of your heli all of the time ? Is it just a case of endless practice, or is it a gift of the few ?

Oh well, back to my lazy 8's and trying not to crash

[Raptorite]

Hi Tony,

I assume you have been watching the 3D Masters videos available in the movies section of this site, if so bare in mind that they are some of the top flyers in the world and have been flying for a long time.

One of the most important parts of flying at that sort of level is practice, both on a simulator and at the field. As one top flyer told me some months ago, that sort of flying is not someything that comes overnight, it takes many months of practice. The same person also told me he burns approximately 70 to 80 gallons of fuel a year, which on a 50 size model is allot of flying.

Once you are comfortable with the model, flying it becomes second nature and instinctive, much like driving a car, for the first year or two of driving, you are far more likely to be concentrating on which gear you should be in and what the instruments are reading. As you become more experienced, you are far less likely to be thinking about controlling the car as that will be "automatic" and will be far more concious of your surroundings, which is why experienced motorists are far less likely to be involved in accidents.

The same principles apply to flying model helicopters. Hovering will seem at first to be very difficult, then one day you will be able to hover with ease and wonder why you found it so difficult in the first place. As your skills and experience build up you will find that no matter what orientation or position the model is in you will instinctively know the stick inputs needed to correct it, or get the model heading off in the direction you want it to.

As far as some of the more advanced 3D manouvers go, you will know what stick inputs you need to complete the manouver before you enter it, and what position the model is going to be in before, during and after the manouver. Take a loop for example, you know that you need to put in back elevator to get the model to start the loop, and you will also need some negative pitch when it goes over the top, keeping the back elevator in as it goes over from inverted to right way up agian, you also know that you will need to feed in some positive pitch as the model returns to upright, so to a certain degree, you know what the model is going to be doing at different points throughout the manouver and and what stick inputs are required from that point on to complete the manouver, so there are no surprises in orientation.

One of the other biggest keys to performing an impressive 3d manouver is to break it down into component parts, take a pirrouetting loop for example, this can be broken down into 4 different components, first is a normal forwards loop, second is a backwards loop, third is a sideways loop with the model tail in and finally a sideways loop with the model facing nose in. Once you have practiced all these to the point that you can do them without having to think about what you are doing, you then just do a quarter loop of all four in the same loop if you see what I mean and hey presto you have a pirrouetting loop.

One of the first things you will need to be very comfortable with before you move on to the more advanced 3d is to be able to hover the model with it facing in any dirrection both tail in and nose in and each of the 45 degree angles between. Once you can do this both right way up and inverted, you are ready to move on to advanced 3d.

I hope this helps.

Cheers,

Pete.

[BrontoRaptus]

Hi Pete

Thanks for your comments - not sure if they improved my morale, as even the thought of flying inverted seems a far off dream :? !!! But I get your point, in that I do wonder now why I had so much trouble just hovering the beast when I find it quite easy now - at least as long as it isn't head-on !

Does keeping track of the orientation of the model also improve with experience ? For eg I find that even when my heli is furthest away from me doing my lazy8's, I ocassionaly find it difficult to determine which way it is banked (paticularly when it is side on) - and if you make the wrong correction the model can get away from you so damn quickly !!! I tend to look at the landing skids, is that correct ?

I'm fortunate to have my own fields to fly in, so don't see others learning to fly their heli's - perhaps I should visit a club and it might encourage me to see others struggling ?!!!

Having said that, I really do love learning to fly my heli, which is what it is all about really - but I now understand the amusing saying I read a while ago ...... "the only people that fly planes, are those not good enough to fly heli's " !! Perhaps a bit unfair, but I certainly found it a lot easier to fly models that didn't have a big fan on top of them !!!

Rgds .............. Tony

[mo]

Hello Tony.
A lot of people will envy you having the good fortune of a back door flying site,but unfortunatly you are missing a lot of what it is all about.
I had thought in my case which was similar to your own, that I was on to a good thing,my field was just 5 mins away and athough my club has quite a high membership,those flying helli's were in a great minority.
In fact I can tell you that in eighteen months of my using this field, I have only once been accompanied by one other helicopter flier.
At first all was well and I had a good crash bang experience trying to get the hang of the things,I will say crash bang, but in reality I was quite successful from the word go,I had the occasional mishap and then began to realize that being on ones own had its great limitations.
I previously flew fixed wing with the club many years previously, and could still remember the fun I had in those days,this was now missing, and it was not only the fun that was missing,but also the friendliness of the other fliers of the club.
They had allocated me after much argument, my own little patch as far away as possible from the fixed wing area for their own percieved safety,
And after a time this got to me, and coupled with the non existant help that would have been forthcoming should other helli boys have been flying with me,began to kill off all the enjoyment the sport should have given me.
Almost every time I came home from the field was going to be the last time,but I soldiered on trying to make the best of a bad situation.
Then I happened to visit a nieghbouring club that had a high contingent of helli fliers and the difference was fantastic.
This was what flying was all about and I only wished I had joined that club instead of my local one.
This has been a long post Tony',but the moral of this story is that if you would like to know what flying model helicopters is really all about,please take my tip, and join a club in your area, but first make sure that the model helli is welcomed and that there is in fact a healthy contingent of helli fliers belonging to that club.
You will then find your learning will be far quicker, and also you will not only be able to fly a helicopter, but you will also have some great times to boot.
BEST OF LUCK.
GOOD FLYING.
Mo.

[Raptorite]

Hi Tony,

Mo is right in what he says in joining a club with a healthy heli contingent, you will find it so much easier and fun learning to fly a heli, I also suspect the inverted hovering wouldnt be anywhere near as far off as you believe it is now.

In terms of orientation, I had the same sort of problems when I first learnet to fly circuits, I too would get in a knot on orientation by looking at the skids. I found that by only looking at the rotor disk and body of the model it was much easier to get the orientation right.

The biggest thing is to practice, as you said you can now hover with relative ease and are wondering what all the fuss was about in the first place, so the same will be true of circuits, nose in and inverted in time.

Cheers,

Pete.

[mo]

Hi Pete.
Your post has given me a bit of advice as well as Tony,I have always looked at the skids on the helli,I though this would give you the best indicator of a helli's intention.
As Tony has I have also at times been completely fooled, and in one instance went straight in doing a low fast pass,weather permitting I will give your suggestion a go today, and let you know how I get on.
GOOD FLYING.
Mo.

[antsis]

A little tip for helping with orientation.

The problem with pod and boom is that there aren't many reference points to look at as opposed to a fixed wing model. I used to watch the horizontal stabiliser in the turns. I also have this habit of looking at the skids when hovering sideways on and get confused as to which way the heli is drifting. It got worse with my raptor 60 as this has the carbon 3d stab and fin which all but disappear in the circuit.

An easy solution was found and you may see this on some 3d models. I got myself some day-glo orange vinyl, (any day-glo colour will do),
stuck a strip on the outside of each front LG strut, the tips of the stab and fin and also along the top of the boom.

Hope this helps.

Ant

[BrontoRaptus]

Hi Ant - wot a brilliant idea !! 8O

The orientation problem certainly seems worst when side-on, and your suggestion will give several visual clues as to which way it's banked. I'll let u know how i get on.

With ref to flying clubs, I can quite understand the attraction of being amongst like minded nutters - and do miss the company - but when you balance this with my advantage of being able to fly, literally, 20 paces from by back door whenever i want, the choice is not so simple. Perhaps a bit of each ? I will visit the local heli club however, and see how I feel about the whole scene.

Thanks for all your interesting responses

HAPPY HOVERS

Rgds ...... Tony