OK am I kidding myself here and setting myself up for an expensive fall?

[PeteStewardson]

OK so the last few days I've been hitting the sim and learning to hover inverted. I used the hovering training a bit on Saturday night and then Tuesday night I just went for it in the normal flight section. OK I crashed a bit but I'm nearly there, did get a hover quite a few times then flipped out when I started to chicken out a bit ( trying to replicated how I want to react in real life. )

Anyway the thing I'm wondering is am I kidding myself that it's that easy? I'm actually finding it easier than nose in, even on the sim, at the minute which is odd. I've tried the 700E 3G model mostly but did try the Rave 450 but that was a bit too quick and skittish even though I managed I had to bail out a bit sooner.

I'm worried I'll try it in real life and write off the heli in seconds because the sim isn't as accurate. For reference I can hover upright much better in real life than on the sim, but I seem to be finding inverted easier on the sim

[zoombolt]

It's not as hard as you think, but it is nerve wrecking. Why not do loops & hold it inverted longer each time at the top of the loop till the old confidence builds up.
Worked for me, as I found going straight into a new orientation can go wrong quite quickly with the usual outcome.

And height really is your friend on this one.

[PeteStewardson]

Well I'll probably use the MCPx first anyway to try it. I haven't even done a loop in real life yet, although in phoenix I'm doing really big loops quite confidently so I need to grow a pair and try that.

[bikerflier]

Always get the bailout move practiced, perfect and set in your mind before you go for it.
It's amazing how stable inverted is, and if you can practice letting go of the sticks for a second and not fighting a recovery it often sorts itself out well enough for you to regain it.
Try it on the mCPX, let go of the sticks with that inverted and it is beautifully stable, no need at all to fight the sticks.

Still gets the knees knocking though.
Good luck.

[darrens]

The MPCX is probably one of the more difficult helis to learn to get inverted, it lacks the power or tail authority to flip over easiliy and required some well practiced and well timed pitch adjustments. Are you a member of a club, could you not use a larger heli and have a good pilot on a buddy for the first few times?
The key thing is the bail out.......if you can do that reliably without panicking then you are where you need to be, but the sim is a reasonable representation of what its like, just without the nerves due to the risk of really crashing.

[rachel]

Ok reality check here !!!!!!!!!!!!
Absolutly no offence intended (no honest) lol
The real question is ???????

Have you sorted your orientations the right way up ? Nose in , both sides on ? hope so because you will most likley be presented with an out of control heli that you will need to sort out almost from instinct.

In the words of Yoda,

To be a master you must , practice must you !!!!
In other words too much haste to perform the inverted grass cutting party trick can be to the detriment of your learning curve .

my advice would be if you can get someone to either buddy box you or just stand with you then thats a good thing.

Also loops are good practice as you get to see the model up side down.

I hesitated in posting this because its good to have goals and fun ! So I dont want to put you down In fact if you can make it you are welcome to come and have a go at my club (just off j12 M6)

Of course if you are 9 and have a sim none of the above applys PMSL .

Keep us posted and good luck
x Rachel

[simon1]

Combining the sim and mcpx learnt me inverted hovering, the mcpx I found that you need to sort of catch it once it flips to inverted you need to be quick on the negative but not to much or the tail will blow out
Once you are there only very fine inputs are needed, i use the 3d blades for flipping/inverted it just flips easier and feels lighter once it is inverted.
if you can do it on the sim you can do it for real

[PeteStewardson]

Ok reality check here !!!!!!!!!!!!
Absolutly no offence intended (no honest) lol
The real question is ???????

Have you sorted your orientations the right way up ? Nose in , both sides on ? hope so because you will most likley be presented with an out of control heli that you will need to sort out almost from instinct.

Yup they're sorted, bit shaky nose in at times but I'm almost there on that. Side on one way is stronger than the other but I think most people have that, but I'm happy doing either. I'm just rubbish at nose in on the sim for some bizarre reason.

I'm not after doing any grass cutting, just getting it upside down and holding it there for a bit

On the sim I've been doing a forward flip into inverted and seem to be getting there now. I'm not quite ready to try it with anything but the MCPx but I'm surprised how quickly I seem to be getting close to being able to do it that's all. I'm working on doing a very slow box around myself in phoenix which I know I wont be doing in real life but it's a great way to learn all the stick movements in all orientations as you see the heli in all of them during an entire circuit.

[moyesboy]

most peole hover invertewd nose in to bwegin with - then as you are unlikely to get the elevator wrong you wont fly the heli toward you by mistake. Sideways errors are not so dangerous.

I recommend practicing flipping the heli and flip[ping it over, pausing and flipping it back again rather than loops. Then you have the heli momentarily hovering anyway.

If you flip it over from til in to nose in inverted, and then back again the opposite way thats ther bail out sorted pretty much. Then its just a case of prolonging the hover and learning to relax while still avoiding the brown trousers.

I found after nailing it on the sim I was uncomfgortabler for real until it was really quite low!

In the ewnd you have to learn all rthe orientations and I don't think it really matters which order you learn them in. The sim is the ulimate tool for learning those crash avoidance controls as it starts to go all wrong.

If you practice on the sim and can manage a minute without crashing - remmeber that might mean that for real you will crash after 1 minute - which doesn't sound so good! Often though flying for real you manage to concentrate better and then it seems easier.

[acwman]

Never had a crash going inverted. For me, I felt more comfortable perfecting inverted tail in hovering and then onto inverted circuits on the sim before doing it on the real thing.

Get all your orientations sorted the right way up, and then if you do bail out in any situation you are completely covered.

[cjcj1949]

It is not as difficult as you think. But, speaking as someone who has just had their first inverted crash there are problems. For me it's very much like starting again with hovering when you had to think about it. It is ok until things go wrong, then as someone said you have an inverted heli in a position that you can't automatically correct that is heading to the ground very rapidly. It's hard to know what people mean by difficult as a lot of things like hovering are easy when you can do them and impossible when you can't. I can hold inverted on the sim for as long as I want, but, I've recently noticed that I take about ten minutes to get the feel of it and this often involves a few ground contacts. I am getting better, but I think I need to be able to save inverted out of positions before there's much point in real practice. I would see how good you are in variable wind conditions as well as this is a good check of ability to deal with the unexpected.

[unwind-protect]

Nearly all my crashes from inverted have been just after the transition. Either you end up trying to fly an upside down helicopter the right way up; or you flip it out and try to fly it as if it was inverted. Either way it's messy unless you fix it quick.

Also, depending on how good your set up is, there can be a trim offset in inverted that isn't there normally, which isn't what you want.

[mark_w]

Just go for it!

whats the worse that can happen? - you might end up with a repair bill

[debrooker]

I started my inverted journey on the N5. The larger heli has that hang factor giving you an extra moment to sort yourself out. I have found the MCPX the hardest, and you really need to be quick on the sticks.

[trillian]

It seems when it comes to some things everyone is a bit different because it gets into the
area of how your brain works and perceives things.

For me, the first time I ever held a hover inverted was using a big heli (Robbe Futura) and going
up high enough to have plenty of time to bail out and then doing a backflip and just holding it
inverted a bit before continuing on back to level. I felt more comfortable doing that than trying
it lower with a 450. Then when I got into doing aileron rolls it was pretty easy to just hold
the inverted portion of the roll a while before rolling back upright.

For me there has always been a huge sense of tension the minute I go inverted and I know
it's mostly psychological. I have to really make myself think calmly and realise that I know
exactly what the controls are doing, the aileron is still the same and dealing with the
elevator being reversed isn't too big a deal. What took me a while was doing circuits
and remembering to move the tail the opposite way in the turns, this is where you
can get in a gnarly position really fast. I think doing inverted has helped me a bit
with backwards upright, which also used to totally do my head in. But in summary
I think the advice about holding it at the top of a loop or a gentle backflip is the safest
way to ease into an inverted hover.