well, when I started righting this, I had no idea how big it would get. It isn't easy explaining a helo in a few paragraphs
. I guess its all that mid-term writing test prep that gets gets your thoughts racing.
aeroart, that PDF is what I have been looking for for a long time. I keep forgetting the FAA has that stuff as well as all the statistics and rules. I just need to look harder I guess.
A-10, I am assuming this is your first time ever committing to learning the helo or possible ever flying one, I suggest experimenting with the aircraft first before diving into technical details, becuase I found even with all the procedures and rules, you need get a basic understanding of how the Helicopter moves and hovers, first through trial and error. (at least that's how it was for me)
Its funny really, I learned to fly a helicopter in DCS: Black shark before I could fly one in flight sim. DCS is supposed to be the most realistic helicopter sim ever made (for the public). That actually makes it ironic that the harder sim was easier.
I am not a real helicopter pilot, but as I taught myself, these are the way and rules I started to form in my head after months and months of practice. So if they differ from real life, than feel free to correct me, however they seem to work in the sim.
Hover
I have always been told to fix on a point on the horizon (without looking at the panel), and you will learn to hover. The trick is, no one ever would tell me how. In flight sim I would fix on the horizon and fall out of the sky without my gauges. Well, the Ka50 has a HUD with its physical gauges on the left side of the camera display. That allowed me to look dead ahead. However I still could not hover. No matter what I did. I actually ended up in a vortex ring state a few times becuase I forgot that hovering needs far more power on the collective.
It wasn't until I passed the avionics training and rolling landing training that I moved on to weapons training. With labels off and only a camera based targeting system I was forced to look for targets with my eyes. I was so fixed on lining up the circle on the hud (the FOV of the camera) that 4 minutes later I snapped out of the tunnel vision and to my surprise, I was in a perfectly stable hover.
So I went into flight sim, and went traffic spotting. That's where I fly around a major airport with high traffic and try and spot new airlines I have never seen before. (I have ultimate traffic, but default will work). My goal was to fly around and hover around the gates and runways with the sun settings and flood my train of thought with distractions to try and replicate the situation in DCS. It worked, I found since I was so busy trying to rotate the helicopter to get a good view or follow an aircraft on final I started to stabilize in hover. I actually found it easier since FSX doesn't really have vortex ring states or rpm management problems.
Landing
If you can hover at a few hundred feet then landing is easier. However a helicopter pilot once told me that during a landing at a runway, or open helipad its actually a good idea to be moving forward a tiny bit so you can see the pad. When your about to touch down you pull up a few degrees and brake before you touch down.
Flight
Forward flight is actually very much like fixed wing with 2 differences. Your pitch controls the speed, and your collective(the throttle on your joystick) controls vertical speed, as well as forward movement if your pitching forward a lot. Also from the added lift on the rotor airfoils, you need much less collective pitch.
Takeoff
Takeoff in FS2004 always puzzled me, and still does
. However DCS thought me to pull back on the stick and raise the nose off the ground a tiny bit then move it forward as you increase power, that brings it to a hover quite easily. From then you hover at 5 meters to check if the trim and fuel balance, followed by lowering your hight to 2 meters and pitching forward to gain speed and using the collective to move forward and upwards.
Now the takeoff procedure above is for a dual rotor coaxial helicopter with no rear anti-torque rotor, as well as wheeled gear. It seams to work perfectly with the default bell in FSX however if a real helicopter pilot see's this please correct me for the proper standard helicopter procedure.
I do have a few tips I found. The first one is to avoid rapid movements of the collective. Try and move it in small movements, or large slow sweeps. In DCS the master caution and alarm would go off if I put it over 70% for more than 15 seconds and I would lose massive rpm (eventual go into a vortex state
), so I learned to avoid max rotor pitch when possible.
Once you learn to magically hover by using the horizon reference or if it does not work for you, the best way to enter a hover is to pitch up in 5 degree increments far enough away from the point you want to stop at while lowering your collective in very small amounts to keep your altitude level. As you slow down keep your course straight with the anti-torque pedals. If you must use all the gauges, watch the speed indicator and make sure you don't reach zero before your at your at the point you want to stop. If you feel you are slowing down to fast, increase collective pitch. The goal is to reach zero at the time you reach the point. (assuming there is no wind). When you near the point push forward on the stick so the artificial horizon levels out the same time you reach the point. Now if your airspeed is within 5 knots of zero check if your moving in any other directions and correct.
If you have been flying fixed wing for a long time and your wondering why the throttle is a collective, and the what the stick is called. Here is the fasted explanation I can give. (I know this is probably the largest post I have ever made
).
The collective is the lever to the left of the pilot. Its also the throttle on your joystick. It actually does not control the spin of the blades, but the angle of the blades. More pitch (pulling the lever up or the joystick throttle forward) increases blade pitch. Helicopters also have a throttle which controls the blade spin(RPM) but most modern helicopters use a "Governor" which controls this for you.
The stick, or Cyclic, controls the entire blades angle from the tip to where it attaches to the mast. If one side goes down, the other goes up which directs lift forward and back, or side to side to roll the aircraft.
The pedals control the rear rotor. I forget if its RPM or Pitch. However this can Yaw the helicopter and point the nose.
Now its late, and if I rambled on a little to much I hope it doesn't confuse you. I had trouble with helicopters for a while until I just figured out how to hover, now its second nature.
Aiden
EDIT: I may have overdone this post
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