Helicopter Flight Information
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Helicopter Flight Information |
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YOUR FIRST HELICOPTER LESSON
What to expect Relative to population very few people are pilots (only 1/3 of 1 percent), even fewer are helicopter pilots (about 1 in 25), and fewer still ever master the machine. The helicopter is not forgiving if you exceed its limitations and even less forgiving if you exceed your limitations The success of a pilots training and ultimately his or her career often depends greatly upon the drive; a pilot who is out to impress others usually does not do as well as a pilot who is motivated by a sincere desire to learn to fly and to succeed as an excellent pilot. During your first lesson the helicopter is going to demonstrate to you what seems like a complete refusal to do anything that you want it to do. In reality however it is going to do everything just as you tell it to whether you meant to or not. You must learn that it is a very responsive machine sensitive to even the slightest control inputs. Control anticipation You must learn to anticipate the helicopters reaction to your control inputs. You have to learn to stay one step ahead of the helicopter at all times. Each time you make a control input you must adjust all other controls accordingly. If you are going to increase the collective pitch (manifold pressure), you must be aware that you are going to have to lead that input with throttle, and due to the increased torque you will have to counter a right yaw with left pedal. Likewise if you are going to input left pedal you will have to lead with a throttle increase as well. You must learn to view the tachometer as a trend meter and at the same time you must learn to maintain the rpm always in the top 50 percent of the green arc. Think about the sequence of events if you fail to lead the other controls when you make a simple left pedal input: You input left pedal, the energy comes from the main rotor, and this results in lower rotor and engine rpm which consequently reduces lift, and the helicopter settles toward the ground. Death grips and frozen legs The single most important factor that will inhibit your ability to control the helicopter is your inability to relax. All of the controls move easily and respond the best to relaxed and decisive but small inputs. The collective/throttle grip should be a light one as both controls mover very easily. If you are flying a governed helicopter such as the R-22, you can easily over-ride governor inputs thereby causing associated rpm problems if you maintain a white-knuckle grip on the throttle. Pedal inputs are easy when you relax. If you need to input left pedal, you must relax your right foot or better still, lift it slightly so that the left pedal input is possible. If the pedal is hard to push it is for 1 of 2 reasons; either it is because you are pushing against the instructor, or it is much more likely that you are pushing against your other tense foot. In either case you are doing the wrong thing and you need to make the appropriate correction. In your early stages of flying you should grip the cyclic lightly with your fingers only. Your forearm should be rested on your right leg and there should be no movement of your elbow. Do not try to take the cyclic grip fully in your hand; that will come later, at this point it will only hinder your controlling ability. You have all the movement necessary to control the cyclic in your fingers and your wrist. Manifold pressure and tachometer correlation The manifold pressure and tachometer are directly related. This is difficult to learn at first but as you do control manipulation becomes easier. Increasing the throttle also increases manifold pressure, and decreasing the throttle decreases manifold pressure. If you notice for example that while in a hover your altitude is low, and an instrument check shows low manifold pressure and also low rpm, all three conditions can be corrected by simply increasing the throttle. A slight increase and then wait for the effect, there will be a delay as the engine picks up the speed of the heavy rotor system. If you notice in your instrument scan that manifold pressure is low and your rpm is high, you can raise the collective increasing manifold pressure and this will in turn pull down the rpm. It should be noted however that your ears should be tuned to the tone of the engine in the top of the green arc (rpm), and any change of tone should bring you to scan the instruments. This will all come in time. Attitude flying Learning to fly by attitude and engine tone is very important in progressing with your helicopter training. You must learn to focus on the distant horizon or tree line, do not focus down near the helicopter. You must learn to use your peripheral vision for those things around you and for your position over the ground. As you make a pedal turn in the hover you must keep your focus on the distant area letting your eyes sweep with the turn always looking straight ahead. This is not to say that you can never look down. Actually quite the opposite you should look down periodically to make sure that you are where you want to be, but then return your focus straight ahead and distant. The instructor and you If the instructor says, “I have the aircraft”, relinquish control immediately. You should follow that statement with, “you have the aircraft.” Never argue with the instructor, the instructor is always right, even when he or she is wrong. So are examiners etc. If you disagree with your instructor take it up later not in the aircraft. Never make excuses about the wind causing your problems or any other factors that will remain constant throughout your flying career. If the wind is causing you problems it is because you have not yet developed the skill to deal with the winds. If the instructor says you are tense on the controls and you need to relax; you are tense on the controls and you need to relax; don’t deny this, it won’t help you. Do not concern yourself with whether it is you or the instructor flying the aircraft. Just try to do your best at all times. If you are concerning yourself about who is doing the flying, you are not doing your job. The controls of the helicopter are very easy to manipulate. If you feel resistance in the controls it is the instructor you are feeling most of the time and it is because you are doing the wrong thing. Never fight the instructor, if you feel this resistance you should relax and think about the situation. If you constantly try to do your best flying, in time everything will fall into place and you will be doing what you have dreamed of. Cowboy attitude You must resist the temptation to show-off throughout your career. Those things you have seen in the movies are often camera tricks and they will get you in trouble. Once you make a mistake in a helicopter there is no going back, and you may even live to regret it. A pilot must understand that anyone who knows anything about aviation knows that it takes greater skill to fly responsibly and intelligently than to fly sloppy and show off. The only person that is truly impressed by macho piloting is the pilot himself. Regardless of whether you are flying an airplane or a helicopter, you must realize your own limitations and never exceed them. It is the failure to do this that kills most pilots who find themselves in an irrecoverable situation. Usually it was the pilot’s abilities that were exceeded, not the aircrafts. Even if the aircraft limitations were exceeded it was because the pilot failed to do his or her job. Before every flight a pilot must analyze all of the factors that will affect the flight as a whole; take into consideration all of the risk factors involved, and his or her particular skill level. The pilot must then decide whether to make the flight or not, and with all of these things considered if the pilot chooses to depart then he or she must not exceed any of the limitations involved, especially his or her own capabilities. Learning to scan During flight training the student must learn to complete a visual scan frequently. This scanning process includes both inside and outside of the cockpit. The student should make the instructor aware that they are accomplishing this scan by announcing so. The student should also be well aware that it is unsafe for an instructor to solo a student who does not complete and announce these scans. The student must always clear the area left and right before commencing any turns, and he or she must state that it is clear following the visual check. Many students state that it is clear without making a legitimate visual check. A quick snap of the head left and right while announcing clear is not an acceptable check for traffic and will not be accepted by the instructor or the examiner. Proper examples: “Clear left, clear right”, or “traffic two o’clock high”, etc. “RPM ok, manifold pressure correcting, airspeed ok”, “Carb temperature ok, correcting airspeed”, Etc. Mastering the machine takes time Students often become frustrated when they cannot achieve the desired results immediately. Many students are of the incorrect assumption that they will be able to hover a helicopter in the first hour. When they cannot accomplish this they often think their performance is substandard and this is not true. The instructor must make students aware that no one can hover a helicopter in less than 5-hours and anyone who says otherwise is full of something, usually themselves. Each student has their own level of understanding, but there may be an occasional student who will master the anticipation factor quicker than others enabling steady state flight sooner but this is absolutely no indication of who will be a better pilot Control confusion During the first 20 hours or so of flying student pilots will most certainly confuse the controls. This is especially noticeable between the pedals and the cyclic. When these student pilots want the helicopter to go left, they often input left pedal which introduces a yaw while the helicopter maintains its position over the ground. What was needed was a left cyclic input because the cyclic controls the helicopters ground position while the pedals control only the heading. Some training materials will state that the collective controls speed while taxiing, and this is confusing to students. What determines speed is always a combination of cyclic and collective inputs. If the pilot inputs a collective increase while maintaining a constant cyclic position the helicopter is going to climb, not go faster. To increase speed, the increase in collective pitch must be accompanied by a forward cyclic input (a very small input, but an input just the same). Likewise to slow down, if a constant cyclic position is maintained and the collective is reduced the helicopter will sink while maintaining the same speed. A small aft cyclic input must accompany this decrease of the collective pitch. When learning to hover students must think of the cyclic as the control that makes the helicopter go where you want it to go. The cyclic controls ground position and it works like a joystick. Think of the collective as the control that maintains your height above ground. The pedals are the control that points the helicopter in the direction that you want it to point, always true with the direction that the helicopter is moving unless your instructor tells you otherwise. Fly smart, enjoy the learning experience, and stay safe. ☺
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