Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Lessons : Piroetting / Chaos

Here I got Flying Lesson From www.littlerotors.com, i'm sure this lesson will help you Guys.....

by:
Simon Lockington


Perhaps the most famous and sought after 3D maneuver is the pirouetting flip. It’s a spectacular maneuver when done well and probably one that you might really strive to achieve if 3D is your thing. For some, the pirouetting flip is the ‘holy grail’ of 3D maneuvers and that once you can achieve it, vast riches, glory and supermodels will befall them. Well there won’t be vast riches (infact there’s a very real possibility you’ll be financially worse off!), the glory will only be in your head, and the women will still be as disinterested in helicopters as they were when you were just hovering.

Some people even change modes from Mode One to Mode Two thinking this will help them achieve the nirvana that is the pirouetting flip. This madness will do you no good and I just about guarantee you’ll be worse off than if you had just put that effort in to learning this maneuver on your ‘native’ mode. There are MANY mode one guys who can piroflip VERY well indeed.

A lot of people get confused between a pirouetting flip and a Chaos/Kaos. They’re not the same thing. While they may look similar, there’s subtle differences that distinguish the two maneuvers.

WHEN IS A PIROUETTING FLIP CHAOTIC?
I was once told by Curtis Youngblood who I believe was the inventor of the Kaos maneuver that the difference between a pirouetting flip and the Kaos was that with a Kaos, the axis of the flip changes throughout the maneuver. With a correct pirouetting flip, it doesn’t.

The axis of a pirouetting flip is the same as the axis of a normal elevator (forward or back) flip, it’s just that the helicopter is pirouetting.

With a Kaos however, the axis changes throughout the maneuver and in effect, you get a very compact, pirouetting globe.

For most of us however, the result we get when trying a pirouetting flip, is a mixture between a pirouetting flip and a Kaos.

Don’t think that you can go out to the field and in one weekend pull off perfect pirouetting flips. This can be a long term learning lesson this one. Hell I’ve had some of the top dogs of our hobby tell me it took them upwards of a year before they could do the maneuver correctly, so take your time, do what I tell you, work smart and it’ll come.

If you take the smart route and break a complex maneuver down into simple components, then you will succeed in this maneuver.

As with all maneuvers, before you attempt this one, you should have the prerequisites down.

PREREQUISITES
Before attempting this maneuver on the whole, you should be fully competent in the following ‘sub-maneuvers’. These are:

* Stationary upright pirouettes. You should be competent in controlling the helicopter whilst doing continuous upright pirouettes on the spot, right in front of you.

* Moving upright pirouettes. You should be competent in moving the helicopter around whilst continuously pirouetting. For example, a pirouetting figure 8.

* Stationary inverted pirouettes. You should be competent in controlling the helicopter whilst doing continuous inverted pirouettes on the spot, right in front of you.

* Moving inverted pirouettes. You should be competent in moving the helicopter around whilst continuously pirouetting inverted. For example, a pirouetting inverted figure 8.

* Stationary elevator flips. You should be able to do continuous elevator flips on the spot without the helicopter moving laterally or changing altitude. You should also be able to do this without the engine bogging.

* Stationary aileron flips. You should be able to do continuous aileron flips on the spot with the helicopter moving laterally or changing altitude. You should be able to do this without the engine bogging.

Once you have mastered all of the above components, THEN you can move on, otherwise don’t bother, you’re only kidding yourself!

PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER
So now that you’ve mastered all of the above components, we can now concentrate on attempting the maneuver itself.

As always, you want to give yourself a bit of height for your first attempts at this. However, don’t make the mistake of going too high! Some people think they’re doing themselves a favour by flying really high. They’re not. Instead, they’re only making it harder for themselves because they just can’t see what’s going on.

You should be no higher than three mistakes high. If you need more than three mistakes of room to fix any problem, then you’re not ready for this maneuver. Go back and learn the basics.

1. FLIP WITH PIRO PAUSE
Begin by pirouetting and watching the helicopter. You need to pick a point to ‘key’ off, this will be the point you watch to control the maneuver. Normally this is the nose, or the tail. For the purposes of this exercise, we’ll use the nose of the helicopter and we’ll pirouette to the left.

As the helicopter is pirouetting, watch the nose, as it comes round to face you, stop the pirouette and execute a half back flip to inverted tail in. If the helicopter has started drifting off, correct it before resuming pirouetting again.

Complete two pirouettes before stopping the nose again when it is pointing at you and then execute a half forward flip. Correct any drift before resuming pirouetting again.

Now you’ve completed a full flip. Do another one!

The purpose of this exercise was to get you to get used to the idea of keying off a reference point of the helicopter (ie the nose) and acting upon it when the reference point reached a given area (ie pointing straight at you).

Once you feel happy about step 1, complete it again but this time, after each half flip, if the helicopter is drifting about, resume pirouetting again and correct the drift during the pirouettes. This is an important step!

2. PIRO FLIP WITH FLIP PAUSE
Now that you can key off a reference point on your helicopter, and you can correct any movement while pirouetting we will work on the process of flipping while pirouetting.

Resume pirouetting again, but this time, when the nose comes round to face you, instead of stopping the pirouette, continue it as you give a jab of back elevator. As you do so, continue to watch the nose of the machine only. About now, your instincts (picked up from doing inverted pirouetting circuits) should kick in and give you a good idea of what cyclic inputs you need to get the helicopter inverted.

I’m not going to tell you what cyclic inputs you need because if you have to be told, then you’re not ready for this maneuver.

Don’t expect that you be able to flip the helicopter inverted while pirouetting on the first attempt! Remember this takes time…

Once the helicopter has become inverted, settle the helicopter into a steady hover again before resuming pirouetting. It’s important to do this rather than chase it all over the sky. Simply ‘surviving’ a maneuver is not the same as being ‘able to do it’.

Complete the same process again this time from inverted to upright. Each time, remember to stop at each half of the maneuver and correct any ‘unplanned’ movement.

So, to recap, practice flipping from upright to inverted while pirouetting, then maintain a steady hover while pirouetting inverted, then resume a flip from inverted to upright while pirouetting.

Why pause in the middle? This is important because you need to recognize when the helicopter is upright and inverted. While this may sound really stupid, you’d be amazed how you can lose track of simple things while completing a maneuver! It is also doing this ‘pause period’ where later on, you’ll add the inputs that will let you do tricks such as change altitude or steer the maneuver around in a controlled fashion. That’s why it’s important to be able to pause.

In summary, you should be able to:
1.Complete a flip from upright to inverted while pirouetting.

2.While continuing to maintain that pirouette rate, maintain a stable inverted hover while pirouetting for a duration of two pirouettes.

3.Complete a flip from inverted to upright while maintaining the pirouette rate.

Once you can do all of the above successfully, you can then work on maintaining a constant pirouetting flip where you do not pause between half flips.

VARIATIONS ON THE MANEUVER
Once you’ve got all these steps down, you can then work on variations of the basic maneuver, such as:
* Moving the piroflip around laterally (ie traveling from left to right, right to left).

* Changing the height of the piroflip (ie giving jabs of pitch during the ‘pause’ segments to climb, or reducing pitch in the ‘pause’ segments to fall).

* Fast flip/Slow piro. Change the maneuver combination so that you flip fast but pirouette slowly.

* Slow flip/Fast piro. A combination that looks really good is a very slow flip but very fast pirouette.


WHAT I DID WRONG
This lesson is a result of me trying to learn pirouetting flips the wrong way. I had been trying to learn them in a haphazard fashion that meant that I could only ever do one pirouette per flip.

The lesson described above is a mix of what Todd Bennett taught me while I was in Bali, and what I worked out for myself as a result of that.

I had resisted doing it Todd’s way for ages thinking it was going to take too long and be too frustrating. In the end, I spent more time trying other ways and getting nowhere that I gave up and did it Todd’s way and got much better results.

TIPS
There aren’t really any short cuts to this maneuver, there are however a couple of things that might make it a little easier to try. That is cutting your rudder pirouette rate down on a Dual Rate switch. If you are having trouble maintaining a constant pirouette rate during your maneuvers cause you think your fingers are moving too much on the rudder when they are not supposed to, try assigning a lower Dual rate value to a switch and activating it before you try the maneuver. This will allow you to use full rudder stick deflection and not yield a blisteringly fast pirouette rate which will let you concentrate on everything else.

As you get better, gradually reduce the amount of dual rate you’re using until you don’t need to use it anymore. This should only be used as ‘training wheels’ rather than a permanent fix.

SUMMARY
The pirouetting flip is a great maneuver to execute and watch when done correctly and if you follow the procedure outlined in this document, then it need not be impossible either. It isn’t however the be-all and end-all of maneuvers and therefore don’t get too stressed if you find it’s just not working for you. There are other just as interesting maneuvers out there to be worked on!

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