Flight School

Basic Flying

• Introduction to Flight School
• Lesson 1 - Starting the Engine
• Lesson 2 - Hovering
• Lesson 3 - Sideways Hovering
• Lesson 4 - Nose In Hovering
• Lesson 5 - Moving around.
• Lesson 6 - Forward Flight
• Lesson 7 - Flying Around

Advanced Flying

LESSON 7 - FLYING AROUND

I won't call this a lesson, as there isn't anything new to learn, except to take all that you already know, and having fun flying around the sky.

As you do your previous lesson on figure 8. Try flying higher and further away each time you practice. As the heli goes further away from you [see picture], disorientation can easily take place, and sometimes, you cannot tell if the heli is facing you or facing away from you.

This is when watching the rotor disc from a distance now becomes important.

If you suddenly loose orientation, do not do any large stick inputs. Instead, perform the following:

1. Release cyclic control. Don't worry, the heli won't crash immediately, unless you're already in an unusual position.
2. Swing the tail around so that you're either tail in or nose in. At this point, you may still be confused.
3. Move the Cyclic Left, then Right, then Left a few time. Observe the how the rotor disc tilts left, right.
4. If the rotor tilts left (downwards), when cyclic left, and right when cyclic to the right, then the heli is now in tail in position.
5. If you see the opposite, ie: Stick left, rotor tilts right, and so on, then the heli is in hose in position.
6. Apply forward cyclic to get the heli into forward flight, and either turn the heli around (if it was tail in), or do an approach (if nose in).

Have fun! We will move on to auto rotations in the next lesson.