Progressing from the hover, where to next?

[Hot Air]

I've got to the stage I can hover all angles including nose-in and I can land with an accuracy of about 15cm (1/2ft). I'm quite nervous about getting into forward flight with my TRex 450 Sport.

I could fly around reasonably well with my Honey Bee cp2 but it had a tendency to resist any motion it built up. For example when I had it flying forward and I wanted to slow down again, as soon as I began to release a little bit of forward stick pressure, it would pitch up significantly, to the point that I had to push more forward stick to stop it from getting really nose high. From that situation I would end up in a hover with forward stick held just to keep it from going backwards. Surely this can't be right? I hope this is just a characteristic of a lesser helicopter. It has however made me hesitant to forward fly my TRex yet. Since this thing has so much more power, if it goes wrong it could do so horribly and i'm scared!

What do the good guys recommend as the next step in building heli flying skills? What flying exercises are good to build up a sound foundation of skills to progress from?

Thanks

A keen newbie

[M52 POWER!]

Honestly if you're that comfortable hovering in all directions either sim it up or just take the plunge. I think you'll find the 450 easier to fly ff since it's more predictable

[Tomy.]

As ideas, 8's and circles sound to be a logical step. Slow, controlled will teach collective management while you can make sure the heli is not going to jump from you (it sounds that's what you're worried about). Also start working on those level hover to ff to hover to bf to hover transitions which gave you hard time before. As yo ucan comfortably hover in all orientation, you can also work on slow controlled piros.

[iflyrc4333]

My question is, should I keep the gyro in Headhold mode or should I switch it to normal mode when I start doing forward flight??

Thanks !

[clicky]

My question is, should I keep the gyro in Headhold mode or should I switch it to normal mode when I start doing forward flight??

Thanks !

There's, practically, no reason to put gyro in rate mode... :)

[Hot Air]

Thanks for the advice guys. Today I took the plunge.

I first practiced going from hover to fwd flight right to left, back to hover, rotate 180, FF left to right, hover, 180 again, repeat. I did this for two batteries worth until I could do it at the same height without ballooning as I slowed down and I learned to feed in the right amount of collective as it transitioned back to hover. Before long I found myself flying around all over the place and having a ball. Fantastic! :thumbup:

[Grok]

Congrats! and have fun!

[slamdance]

MR. HotAir,
It's been a few months. How have you progressed? Crashed? Recovered? Learned?

Maybe you already know this, but for other newbies reading. Forward Flight is not scary, if you really understand this.

1.) FF is not pointing heli down and gunning it like an airplane.
2.) FF for a helicopter is doing this: fwd, stall, fwd, stall, fwd, stall...back and forth like a dolphin swimming in the ocean. Can you visualize that?

Not so scary anymore?

[mejmea]

MR. HotAir,
It's been a few months. How have you progressed? Crashed? Recovered? Learned?

Maybe you already know this, but for other newbies reading. Forward Flight is not scary, if you really understand this.

1.) FF is not pointing heli down and gunning it like an airplane.
2.) FF for a helicopter is doing this: fwd, stall, fwd, stall, fwd, stall...back and forth like a dolphin swimming in the ocean. Can you visualize that?

Not so scary anymore?

Interesting analogy slamdance. I don't quite understand however. When I see videos of people flying around making nice banked turns and figure 8s I don't really see the porpoising that you describe? Can you elaborate a bit more?

One other question. I seem to have a hard time on the sim with coordinating rudder and aileron turns with the gyro in HH mode. I either don't give enough rudder and the heli just wants to bank over to the side and go to the ground or I give too much and spin around. Part of it, I think, is that the sim has no depth perception and in my experience it's harder to see the heli orientation than in real life. Part of it though, is that I'm not sure I'm using the right technique so maybe someone can help me.

As a plank flier, I'm used to trying to make smooth control inputs. I've learned with Helis, at least for things like hovering. that I need to do small little jabs rather than worrying so much about smooth slower motions or else I'll fall hopelessly behind the heli.

When I coordinate a turn on a plank I generally feed in some aileron to bank the wings along with a little bit of rudder, bring the aileron stick back towards neutral (the plane stays banked) and continue feed in rudder to make a smooth turn. I'm not really having any consistent success with this technique on the helis in HH mode in the sim. What am I doing wrong?

[Pigskin]

That porpoising described sounds like garbage to me. It is totally possible and desirable to do lovely banked curves and turns, and very smooth forwards flight keeping your controls smooth.

For upright banked turns I apply a bit of roll and foward collective, followed by some rudder and taking the roll out but leaving in the forward collective, all done smoothly as possible. Reading your approach looks entirely consistent with mine except that I might add a bit form forward collective once into the banked turn.

[mejmea]

That porpoising described sounds like garbage to me. It is totally possible and desirable to do lovely banked curves and turns, and very smooth forwards flight keeping your controls smooth.

For upright banked turns I apply a bit of roll and foward collective, followed by some rudder and taking the roll out but leaving in the forward collective, all done smoothly as possible. Reading your approach looks entirely consistent with mine except that I might add a bit form forward collective once into the banked turn.

Thanks Pigskin, that sounds very similar to a plank. I'll give it a shot and maybe I just have to work at it a bit and get better at concentrating and making the tail follow since with the HH gyro it doesn't do it naturally like a plane or a gyro in rate mode. I Appreciate all the input!

Edit - to make sure I understand correctly. When you say you "taking the roll out", I interpret that to mean that you center the aileron stick and leave the initial bank while you continue with the rudder, not that you actually come back past center with the aileron stick and level the heli out again while continuing with the rudder. Is this correct?

[DKS_ONE]

Ya, I think that's what he means, simply cuz when you start a banked turn, you have to lay off the aileron to keep it from hitting the dirt :D Once it's banked, usually have to start pulling back on elevator and depending on how hard you wanna yank through the turn, add collective. Usually when just starting out, add a bit of collective to keep your speed up or it'll lose speed and drop. Once it's banked and you're starting to pull through the turn, use the rudder to correct altitude. Sounds wierd, but that's how it works. Realistically, with some practice, you can get into a banked turn and once you got the feel and motion happening, the sticks are all but held in one position with some minor tweeks to keep the turn stable. Hope that's of help. :D

[Pigskin]

Yes that is what I meant.