how long will this kind of improvement last?

[eroedega]

Im very new at flying heli, and i notice a improvement of flying on every pack i fly, im still at the hovring stage.

But how long will this fealing of learning on every pack last?

And when im good at all direction flying, (flying like some birds do), when shall i try to fly inverted?

[soneebee]

if you can do it go for it...

[Magenta]

Originally Posted by eroedega

But how long will this fealing of learning on every pack last?

I'm hoping on every pack I fly. Just depends on what you're learning

[inmidair]

you can progress on every battery pack for a while. you can be doing all hover orientations (nose in, tail in, inverted) but it still takes a while to get it down solid. so while you may not learn something new every pack, you still get better even if you dont notice.

one thing i can say is learning nose in hovers will let you progress faster.
i was doing ugly figure 8's before i was nose in hovering. now that im nose in hovering (as of yesterday, with some sim practice) i do much better figure 8's. but i still have to get better at nose in hovering.
next step would be inverted. im not so good at yet. :? a sim helps massively.

what i like to do is play with the heli. jump it up, side to side, shoot it forward and back, and so forth. its a matter of knowing what it takes to command the heli to react like you want it to. like automatic reaction, or muscle memory.
im rambling... im not trying to tell you how to fly though. sounds like you doing great!

keep up you good progress and keep us posted! :glasses2:

[steve28]

After a year into it Id say Im still improving on every pack , but thats just me and I notice small improvments like better collective control or smoother rolls or whatever .

[cudaboy_71]

just like anything, with *dedicated* practice you get improvement. i've been flying helis for 2 years and still get improvement out of every pack that i work on specific maneuvers. now, if i just want to go up and screw around for a pack, it's great fun---but, i'm not working on anything in particular--and, don't get any real feeling of accomplishment...just the rush of flying

[Brent@paradise]

its the no pain no gain rule for me.

no money for crash repairs.
don't get to fly enough (winter, dark, windy,cool,rain) at the moment

I got to do a bit of nose in in my garage the other day. only took a year after hoving, but then again it was the first time i tryed it.

[txflyer]

Originally Posted by inmidair

what i like to do is play with the heli. jump it up, side to side, shoot it forward and back, and so forth. its a matter of knowing what it takes to command the heli to react like you want it to. like automatic reaction, or muscle memory.

doing just that has helped me out so much after getting tail in hovering down. im now working on doing that but from side in. then i will switch to the other side, then move on to nose in. after learning to hover in a new direction. before i try fig 8's or anything else again.

the sims do work, my first side in hover was almost perfect in my eye's. didnt drift around to much. i knew exactly what to do and in what way.

[oldschool269]

i feel that improvment occurs until you find the limit of the Chopper.

once you run out of grunt , then smooth collective control can only get you so far .

Jason

[dodgey]

It's also worth mentioning that some of the learning process comes in great big dollops! Nose in is one of them, but another aspect that I rarely hear mentioned is this:

Recognising/"feeling" which way the heli is leant/pointing - without having to think about it or focus on a specific part of the heli. This was a HUGE hurdle for me. Everything I tried usually ended up with moments where I'd be thinking "Is it banking left or right? I can't see!!" - So I'd wiggle the stick left and right to find out.

Now, I see the heli as "one" object and I instinctively know which way it's leaning. This takes your flying into a new dimension as you relax a whole lot. I can fly circuits of all sorts while chatting to a friend and only glancing at the heli here and there. I'm still strictly amateur as I don't get much time to fly but that step was a massive one for me.

I remember the lesson I had where the instructor said (on doing side-on hovers) - don't look at the langing legs to get orientation, look at the heli as a whole - you'll get a natural feeling for it in time. He was right.

[rdlohr]

It tapers off. In the begining you learn big new things that drastically change how you fly every 5-10 packs or so. After that big changes come farther between. You do get better and better with every pack though. My $.02


Rick

[vetterick]

Yea Ricks right the changes are farther between, but the charge you get when you can do something new never changes!!!!

Rick

[inmidair]

Originally Posted by rdlohr

It tapers off. In the begining you learn big new things that drastically change how you fly every 5-10 packs or so. After that big changes come farther between. You do get better and better with every pack though. My $.02


Rick

this may just depend on what you are trying every flight though.
but i guess i can see what you mean.. once you get good control over your heli doing a new trick may not be that big of a accomplishment like it is in the beginning stages. im sure alan szabo does new ticks/trick combinations every day.
but melding body/mind to heli is the ultimate accomplishment. the more you meld together the more you are free.

[dodgey]

I'll add another thing. Everyone is right when saying it slows down. When it does (for me this was a stage when I simply hovered everywhere, did some FFF but always returned to tail in to bring it back, and never completed a circuit - was stuck like this for ages and ages) - chose a goal and attack it.

I attacked nose-in. I put my training gear back on . Best thing I ever did (apart form paying for a lesson)

[Brent@paradise]

i got a T600 a few months back.
then the T450 got a whole lot easyer to try new things with.

[cudaboy_71]

for me this was a stage when I simply hovered everywhere, did some FFF but always returned to tail in to bring it back, and never completed a circuit - was stuck like this for ages and ages

well, i think you bring up a good point. getting complacent will stagnate your improvement like nothing else. i guess there can be a tendency to get FF or FFF down and just stop trying new things because you finally feel like "hey i'm flying now".

but, depending on how much you want to improve and what you want to improve on there are SOOO many areas to work on that you should never 'get stuck for ages'. in fact, if you feel like you are not progressing in one area, move on to something else. you'll be surprised when you come back to it later that it will have improved.

i don't feel like i have any 'special gift' in the area of rc like some have. and, maybe that's why i feel like i'm improving steadily. i'd say there hasn't been a week go by in my 2 1/2 years of heli flying that i havent made a dramatic improvement. you just have to constantly push yourself. the sim and/or a good bit of altitude can protect your investment. but, there's no reason not to constantly set new goals for yourself.

and, i'll also say this about the 600: not only did it make it easier to try things with the 450, it made it easier to try things at the field for the first time on the 600, too. the added size dramatically helps orientation. and, the 600 just seems to float in the air giving you an extra 'mistake' or two worth of time to recover that you just don't get with the 450.

[Rigalo]

For me, I learn every flight, 7 months on from my first solo. Getting into piro-flips now, but it costs. 3 crashed in the last 1.5 weeks. (Last one was technically not a dumb-thumb, but tail rotor strike mid-air. Wow, it was impressive though.)

For me, a rough rule of thumb is about 2 crashes for each new manouvre, and a few long hours on the SIM. (This rule will be broke for inverted piro figure eights. This is serious hard stuff for small mind.)

So, one of the first things I learnd on the SIM was nose in, flying, hovering and landing. I never (almost never) land or take off tail in. Why? Well, I saw some chaps fly like that, and it also mekse sense, cause the rex is so small and I loose it rather quick in flight visually. So, I learned this nose in jobby with a visible canopy, and this helps me to recover and to have a visual at all times, especially when far out. If I can see the canopy nose-in in the distance, I know where it is, and it's state.

Quick! On recovery, nose in, and Visible!!!

Now, for the rest, I go more or less with this:

http://www.littlerotors.com/flyinglessons/index.aspx
(Still stucked at piroing for next couple of months to come.....

I find it very valuable. Been training the pirouetting for a while, and his training steps makes very much sense.

In short, every damn pack is a steap learning curve for me. But, that's up to you and you alone. Most off all, enjoy every moment! Heli flying is not a destination, but a journey to be enjoyed with other like minded freaks. To love each other, and to have some fun. Pretty much like life! (Did I mention to get away from the wife for some cave time?)

Hope this helps!