ccclitz

My Feedback: (1)

I just keep crashing & crashing & breaking & repairing & buying parts. I've been through Radd's lessons. I've tried FMS & it seems useless and unlike reality. I've searched & took a lot of peoples advice by cutting the training gear down to reduce vibration, used li-po's, installed a head stiffener. I'm so close to just giving up, but I really want to learn how to fly. What's the trick? I've been at it for a few weeks now and my longest hover is about 5 seconds and always landing hard.

Any more advice would be great!!

bdphil

My Feedback: (26)

Don't give up! Learning to hover can be very difficult and frustrating.

First off, what heli are you flying? It's been my experience that the micro helis are twitchy and generally difficult to control for a beginner. Not that you can't learn to fly with one, it just might be easier to learn with a larger, heavier model.

That being said, what specifically are you having the most trouble with? Are you having trouble with getting the heli setup, trimmed and responding properly, or is it a matter of overcontrolling and/or making the wrong control inputs to maintain flight?

For a new pilot, an improperly setup model will make learning the controls nearly impossible.

Do you have any local heli pilots helping you? If not, find one. If you can't find one close by, you can still learn on your own, but you'll need to have more patience (and more money).

Ben

ccclitz

My Feedback: (1)

I'm flying a Dragonfly. Mainly stock except heatsinks, head stiffener and the long orange tail rotor from helihobby. It responds like it should and seems to be set up properly. You nailed when you asked "or is it a matter of overcontrolling and/or making the wrong control inputs to maintain flight?" My main problem is I kill the throttle when I loose control. I know I need to break that habit quick. I've tried to find pilots in my area, but the closet I could find are 3 hours away.

crashparry

I found it very frustrating at first, and had the same reaction of cutting the throttle when in trouble. I was going out of my mind until I got annoyed and popped it straight up to about 4 feet, at that height it immediatley leveled out and began to behave itself

ccclitz

My Feedback: (1)

So do you think I should just go for it & take up beyond 2-3 feet? It's seems like one day that it will just click and you'll look back and say to yourself "Duh!"

RickyT63

ccclitz,
I've kept on sliding & crashing & breaking & repairing for a whole 6 weeks also. Then it just clicked one day that I got it off the ground for ... 3 seconds!. Now 3 months later after I've bought my heli, I can hover it (controlled drifting!) up to 15+ mins.
Dont give up my friend.
Regards.

bdphil

My Feedback: (26)

Overcontrolling is very common, don't feel bad. There are a few things that you might try to help you get a feel for the controls. First, do you have some training gear? If not, just find a few arrow shafts and some wiffle golf balls (or something that won't be too heavy for your heli) and wire tie them to the skids. Then find a piece of flat concrete or asphalt. I know what you're thinking, that you'll do more damage crashing on a hard surface, but you won't crash. What you need to do is get the heli light on the skids (not off the ground!) and practice controlling the heli's tendency to drift around. This will also give you a chance to operate the tail rotor without fear of ending up nose in. You should have little use for the collective which should keep you from pounding your heli into the ground. Anyway, take as much time scooting around the ground as it takes to get an instinctive response to the heli's behavior. Once you can control the cyclic (keep the heli from drifting around) and tail you're ready to find some grass and lift off an inch or so. By this time you can keep the heli from drifting around too much and you can practice using the collective to maintain altitude. Work slowly and think about what you're doing. You don't need to set an endurance record for hovering the first day out, just lift off for a few seconds at a time. Before long, you'll find that hovering for 10 minutes is no more difficult than hovering for 10seconds, and 10 feet is no different than 1 inch.

The key is to program your brain to make corrections without having to think about it. It takes time, but if you practice toward specific goals, you'll get it in no time. RC helis aren't mindless entertainment.


Good luck!

Ben

ccclitz

My Feedback: (1)

bdphil,

Thanks for all the advice and encouragement. I hope to post one day that I finaly hovered for more than 3 sec.

bkwh59

Just keep on practising and a lot of research on the internet. I made a lot of modification to the Aerohawk, learned what the adjustment on the gyro board were for and started in the basement with 3 x 6 ft area, hoping I was able to control it, man, I was wrong. Crashed & drifted here & there, broke the tail stand, broke the main shaft.

Moved to the garage, kept on practising. Review why it didn`t work after each flight, observe & learn from errors. Did a lot of adjusment on the knobs. Broke the main rotor. Then one day, after 3 months, magically, I was able to hover and had a prolong control hovering - then the tail motor fried.

Keep on practising is the key. Those mini EP heli does fly!