I think I'm about to retire from flying helicopters. It was fun for the last 30 years but I'm lucky to be here. This is what I've learned from two thousand hours in Hueys, a few hundred in Robies and about 50 in other things like MD-500's, Rangers and a Mini-500. It is how a truly feel:
Anything that screws it's way into the sky flies according to unspiritual principles. You never want to sneak up behind an old high-time helicopter pilot and clap your hands. He will instantly dive for cover and most likely whimper...then get up and kick your butt. There are no old helicopters laying around airports like you see old airplanes. There is a reason for this. Come to think of it, there are no old high-time helicopter pilots hanging around airports either so don't worry about the above. You can always tell a helicopter pilot in anything moving, a train, an airplane, a car or a boat. They never smile, they are always listening to the machine and they always hear something they think is not right. Helicopter pilots fly in a mode of intensity, actually more like "spring loaded", while waiting for pieces of their ship to depart. Flying a helicopter at any altitude over 500 feet is considered an act of boldness and should be avoided. Flying a helicopter at any altitude or condition that precludes a landing in less than 20 seconds is considered a cavalier and unsafe practice. Remember in a Robinson you have about 1 second to lower the collective in an engine failure before it becomes unrecoverable. Once you've failed this maneuver the machine flies about as well as a Lycoming strapped to your back. When your wings are leading, lagging, flapping, precessing and moving faster than your fuselage there's something unnatural going on. You should not attempt to fly. While hovering a Robinson, if you start to sink a bit, you pull up on the collective while twisting the throttle, push with your left foot (more torque) and move the stick left (more translating tendency) to hold your spot. If you now need to stop rising, you do the opposite in that order. Sometimes in wind you do this many times each second. Don't you think that's a strange way to fly? I commonly call an autorotation my "Anvil-One" approach. If all is optimized you get a glide about like an anvil in freefall. 180 degree autorotations are a violent and aerobatic maneuver in my opinion and should be avoided. For Huey's and Robinsons: You never want to feel a sinking feeling in your gut (low "g" pushover) while flying a two bladed under slung teetering rotor system. You are about to do a snap-roll to the right and crash. If everything is working fine on your helicopter consider yourself temporarily lucky. Something is about to break. _______________________ Scott MacLean [EMAIL PROTECTED] ICQ: 9184011 http://www.nerosoft.com
