A Question of Technique

[Tim Wescott]

I crashed my plane the other day -- thought "up" and gave "down" (dumb, dumb, dumb).

One of the folks at the field suggested that I hold my arm stiff at the elbow for all maneuvers but the square ones, and that I hold my hand level for inverted.  He's a nice guy, but he's forceful, he's the only CL expert in the (otherwise RC) club, and he hasn't been active in competition for about 40 years.

So -- what's the best way to hold the handle for stunt?  I try for mostly straight, with an easy bend of the elbow, a relaxed forearm, and I mostly use my wrist for elevator input whether I'm right side up or up side down.  As far as I know I follow the plane with my arm.  I honestly couldn't tell you how I hold the handle when I'm inverted -- I'll have to try it and see, and hope that I don't crash from thinking about my hand position!

So what position handle-holding technique do you advocate, why, and do you think this is a "keeps a beginner from crashing" technique or a "will get you to the winner circle" technique?

The really right answer would be to make the hike down to Delta Park from Oregon City every weekend for some coaching, but that's too much of a drive for me at this point.  Whine, whine, I know -- but still, there's the field, the folks don't mind the occasional CL plane, there's me and my Nobler...

[Randy Powell]

I don't tend to think of it as up and down. I looks at the planes orientation. I know, based on looking at the plane, which direction I want it to go and give it control to go that direction. Now, this is after a lot of flights and I'm not sure when I made that transition. I do still tilt my hand toward the direction of flight that was then initial reminder.

[Brett Buck]

I crashed my plane the other day -- thought "up" and gave "down" (dumb, dumb, dumb).

One of the folks at the field suggested that I hold my arm stiff at the elbow for all maneuvers but the square ones, and that I hold my hand level for inverted.  He's a nice guy, but he's forceful, he's the only CL expert in the (otherwise RC) club, and he hasn't been active in competition for about 40 years.

So -- what's the best way to hold the handle for stunt?  I try for mostly straight, with an easy bend of the elbow, a relaxed forearm, and I mostly use my wrist for elevator input whether I'm right side up or up side down.  As far as I know I follow the plane with my arm.  I honestly couldn't tell you how I hold the handle when I'm inverted -- I'll have to try it and see, and hope that I don't crash from thinking about my hand position!

So what position handle-holding technique do you advocate, why, and do you think this is a "keeps a beginner from crashing" technique or a "will get you to the winner circle" technique?

     Read the other thread, but straight up and down, bent elbow, right in front, set neutral for 90 degree to the lines. It's very important, and it's far easier to change now (even it if slows you down for a while) than it is later. The least damaging of the usual variations is holding your hand sideways when inverted in level flight, but you are going to need to work that you don't do it in maneuvers.

    I think we have A LOT of national champions who would have a contrary opinion to your local expert.

      Brett

[Brett Buck]

The really right answer would be to make the hike down to Delta Park from Oregon City every weekend for some coaching, but that's too much of a drive for me at this point.  Whine, whine, I know -- but still, there's the field, the folks don't mind the occasional CL plane, there's me and my Nobler...

     I take it you will be going to the Regionals, then? For the "posture lecture" find either Ted Fancher, David Fitzgerald, Jim Aron, or myself. Jim is the poster boy for how much better you can do if you do it right.

     Brett

[Tim Wescott]

     I take it you will be going to the Regionals, then? For the "posture lecture" find either Ted Fancher, David Fitzgerald, Jim Aron, or myself. Jim is the poster boy for how much better you can do if you do it right.

You mean this Sunday?  If I can!

Between kids and work I've been buried for the last decade or so -- now that my oldest is driving the workload has gone way down, but stealing a whole day just to go watch folks fly model airplanes is still a difficult one to pull off.  I'm lucky that we have horses, and that I can go out in the pasture and fly 1/2A above the turds from time to time during the week -- packing off to contests every other weekend would be heaven, but it won't happen until the younger one matures a bit!

[Tim Wescott]

     Read the other thread,

What other thread?

but straight up and down, bent elbow, right in front, set neutral for 90 degree to the lines. It's very important, and it's far easier to change now (even it if slows you down for a while) than it is later. The least damaging of the usual variations is holding your hand sideways when inverted in level flight, but you are going to need to work that you don't do it in maneuvers.

I'm still confused -- do you mean I should be using my wrist to move the handle or not?

The "stiff wrist" suggestion seems a good one for a rank beginner, but I'm not that -- I'm just out of practice, and I was really not in good condition to fly well that day (I went home and crashed my 1/2A plane from another dumb mistake).

    I think we have A LOT of national champions who would have a contrary opinion to your local expert.

Glad to hear that -- I thought it was right for the first time in the air, but not something that would carry me through competition, assuming that I'm granted enough spare time to get to that point.

[Brett Buck]

You mean this Sunday?  If I can!

  No, not this weekend - the Northwest Regionals in May. Check the Flying Lines for details.

     Brett

[Bill Heher]

I believe this is the " other tread"  Brett was refering to :  http://stunthanger.com/smf/index.php?topic=16782.0

[Scott B. Riese]

As a flyer at Delta Park and have some experience I think I can help. This SUNDAY the 18th ...at delta park there is a contest. PA Stunt and Combat is the flavor of the day.

ALSO we fly every Monday, Wendsday and Friday through out the year. Most of the flyer are well seasoned and a few still like to fly the 1/2A planes.

You can Email me at riese5080@comcast.net.
OR...NW Fireballs web page in the NW FLying Lines

Scott Riese

[Tim Wescott]

As a flyer at Delta Park and have some experience I think I can help. This SUNDAY the 18th ...at delta park there is a contest. PA Stunt and Combat is the flavor of the day.

ALSO we fly every Monday, Wendsday and Friday through out the year. Most of the flyer are well seasoned and a few still like to fly the 1/2A planes.

You can Email me at riese5080@comcast.net.
OR...NW Fireballs web page in the NW FLying Lines

Scott Riese

It looks like I missed the precision today -- oh well, I'm to busy anyway.

Weekdays are no-can-do.  I'm self-employed, and self-scheduled, but the kids being on a Monday-Friday schedule makes it pretty hard to steal work time on Wednesday and pay it back on the weekend (like right now, which is what I should be doing).

How's the crowd on non-contest Sundays and/or Saturdays?

[Larry Cunningham]

Tim, I believe you will find that once you start simply steering the nose of the airplane and ignoring any up/down notions, you'll find that you can fly a pattern (or other shapes). Perhaps "pushing the nose" is more apt.

And personally I believe that your arm should not be stiff with only wrist action, you should smoothly move your arm and even lead the airplane through the maneuver. It's a dance.. 

Typically, the flier is managing energy with his movements, smoothly trading off kinetic and potential energies. Another thing to notice is that you can extend your arm when the ship has plenty of kinetic energy (say in level flight), and pull it back smoothly to impart some energy (and improve line tension perhaps) later, when needed (say toward the apex of the flight hemisphere).

Your model will scrub off kinetic energy when you make rough, abrupt maneuvers, and this can be a serious problem, particularly with less power, wind to deal with, etc. My good friend Bill Melton would warn me, "You're dogging it!" when I wasn't flying so smoothly. The smoothness will come, and as it does, you and your model will start to synchronize, and you'll know what the ship can do and learn to trust it. Then your bottoms can be brought down to where they belong, maneuvers can be made smaller, etc - it all will come together, and that's when it really is enjoyable.

As I said, it is a dance, and you have to work out specifically just what is best for you on such maneuvers as overhead eights. Don't be stepping on your partner's toes..

Best of luck,

L.

"Complex problems have simple, easy to understand wrong answers." -Grossman's Law

[Brett Buck]

I believe this is the " other tread"  Brett was refering to :  http://stunthanger.com/smf/index.php?topic=16782.0

    Correct. And there are many equivalent discussions on SSW, and a few here, on the same topic.

   BTW, we had yet another example of the basic concept this weekend. Jim Aron and I went flying after a long layoff (in my case, first serious flights since late October). Mostly we were OK, but Jim had a shape issue where he went up too shallow on the hourglass, had a climbing top, and an OK descending leg. After a few flights to make sure it was consistent, I checked his posture during the maneuvers. Sure enough, he was tilting his head to the right on entrance. So, in his frame of reference, it looked correct. When he went over the top, he straightened his head up to near vertical, and the rest of the shape was OK. Of course, it made the 3rd corner almost a u-turn and much more difficult. I told him to pay attention to his posture and keep his head upright, and in *one flight* it was fixed, very good shape came back.

     Now this is a little exceptional, because Jim is in the top 5% of pilots as far as skill goes, and has exceptional equipment in top trim. And he generally knows what it is supposed to look like. But one minor change added 8-10 points to the flight, which is a HUGE change at the level he flies.

   I can't emphasize it enough - establish a sound posture so you have a stable frame of reference to maintain your orientation, set the handle close to vertical at neutral so you can get equal response either way without a bunch of other compromises, and do the maneuvers in front of you to the extent possible. The whole idea is to *simplfy* the situation. Then all you have to do is stand there and make a figure in the sky.

      Brett

[john e. holliday]

Isn't this where the coach comes into play?  Jim Lee pointed out some stuff I was doing in the old time pattern and have been trying to correct it.  Last year Alan Brickhaus give a critique sheet showing what the maneuvers looked like to him and how to correct it.  But, when you fly most of the time by yourself it is hard as I caught myself in time tonight while flying the Arctic Fox starting to rotate my hand instead of keeping it verticle.  Poor horizontal 8 was an almost.

[Brett Buck]

Isn't this where the coach comes into play?  Jim Lee pointed out some stuff I was doing in the old time pattern and have been trying to correct it.  Last year Alan Brickhaus give a critique sheet showing what the maneuvers looked like to him and how to correct it.  But, when you fly most of the time by yourself it is hard as I caught myself in time tonight while flying the Arctic Fox starting to rotate my hand instead of keeping it verticle. 

   Certainly, but the coach needs to know what to do about it. A lot of coaches can tell you what you are doing, but have no idea why it's happening. The beauty of the posture theory is that it can correct so many problems at once, and can be done by the pilot. Just have to think it, and it pretty well takes care of itself.

      Brett