General Need help with Orientation

[sts41]

I am starting Tony's training course for flying heli's... But here is an issue that has plagued me most of the summer....Has anyone else had this problem?

I have the training gear on my heli (and I think this is part of the problem), and if I move it away from me, tail in... and start to gain altitude.. I "see" the the copter kinda flip.... I does not flip, and I know it doesn't flip... but my eyes see it as an odd attitude. A lot of times I can compensate by ignoring my eyes input, but boy it is hard to fly and ignore what you are seeing. It looks like an Optical illusion, once the training gear bars reach a certain angle....I lose the ability to determine if the heli is nose down, or nose up, and at that point, the elevator becomes my enemy.

I have been told that white blades instead of black would help.. Tony mentions bright colors on the canopy, however, in this attitude, I don't see much of the canopy... but maybe if I crab the copter a bit... this may help.

Maybe I just have to go a bit slower... Practice landings and get rid of the training gear and then move on to moving away from myself after that... I will be checking this theory on the sim....




Any recommendations would be greatly appreciated

Thanks Steve

 

[Slobberdog]

If you are comfortable getting the heli off and back down onto the ground then consider taking the training gear off,

If you feel that you can have the heli at a slight angle in front of you so you can see the boom then as you say this would give you a reference, don't turn to much and while you are on the sim always practice getting the tail back to you as quick as possible if you start to get into trouble this is bailout practice, it's like a comfort blanket.

I found it difficult going from having the heli a couple of feet off the ground in front of me to getting more altitude, once I got past that it was no problem, I now feel that altitude is my friend,

 

[treff]

Orientation is one of the hardest things to learn in flying rc helicopters. There is always some angle your brain will not recognise instantly. The trick there for
is what Kev suggested learn bail outs. Practice these bail outs time and time again so they become automatic. It's all about training the grey matter and to
do that most folk have to repeat actions over and over until it becomes second nature. It will come with lots of practice. Just remember helicopters do not glide.
Good luck, have fun.

 

[Tony]

I know what you are saying with it getting too high. The helicopter pretty much turns into a silhouette. And when it does that, it looks the same from the top to the bottom. However, there are small items on the heli that can help you such as the tail rotor. When upright, it will be on the right. When inverted (tail in) it will be on the left.

One thing that can help is brighter skids. I run white skids on my heli's and it works quite well.

And if the tail rotor and skids don't do it for you, then I would suggest keeping it under 10' off the deck. Practice your side in and nose in and once you have that, start into FF. Once you start moving the helicopter nose forward, things will "click" and you will know what orientation the heli is in. It sounds cliché but it's true. Just keep at it and you will get it.

 

[Derek]

yep...I know how this issue feels. Every now and then I like to make big loops and sometimes try to hold my helicopter at a higher altitude...at the top of the loop...then try to bring it into a hover and then lose altitude. Sometimes, not often, I can't really tell if it is nose high (so it would drift backwards), tail high (so it would drift forwards) and so on with the left and right but I just work on remaining calm and focused and so far so good. It's just a "practice makes perfect" thing, I guess. The more and more that I do this, the more and more I find myself successful and sometimes even with some measure of gracefulness, lol.

Here is a tip that I worked on, and it pretty much echoes what Tony said. Keep your helicopter under 10' off the ground, or even 15'. Move it up and down, left and right, forwards and backwards. Take your time and progress further at your own pace.

 

[sts41]

Thanks everyone... I will try some of these suggestion as soon as it stops snowing and the weather warms up a bit

Steve

 

[Graham Lawrie]

Hi Steve, as someone relatively new to this (2years), any change I do to my helis I ALWAYS put training gear on.

The problem I have found is that the gyro will always compensate for the wobble created by the training gear.

Now the transition from gear to none is night and day, but, and it's a big but, the risk of crah and damage is higher.

But...but....I was once told, when you thought about buying a helicopter, you've crashed, when you got one you've crashed. Before you flew you crashed. ........unfortunately it's inherent to our hobby......hence Flight Sims

 

[Tony]

Graham, the training gear is actually a 3 axis gyro's enemy. Think about it. As the heli moves, because they are flexable, they will stay put until so much movement is reached. Once that happens, then the training begins to catch up but by that time, the gyro is trying to compensate for the first movement. And it just keeps getting worse. Think of a tail wag. It starts off very small, but then gets larger and larger.

IMO, I would take the gear off if you can land a helicopter.

 

[murankar]

Some things I have done to help me.

1) Ditch the training gear as quickly as possible
2) Blades; Went from black to Green and white and I see little difference in aid.
3) Use bright colors on the canopy and accents.
4) When you start going beyond tail in you will want to select a point to watch as you fly. I use the skids and rotor disk.
5) practice practice practice.