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General control line discussion => Open Forum => Topic started by: Han Slaats on August 28, 2009, 09:42:04 AM
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Having lost my Vector on its 9th flight I want to share my experience and a possible hypothesis for the crash.
I flew stunt a long time ago and picked it up again just recently; I never doubted I would still be able to fly. A very dangerous attitude !
I built a Vector 40 with an Evo 36 in it.
To get the engine running properly (the Evo has a very high spray bar location) I had to elevate the back of the tank by 1/4 inch and I changed the Bolly 11.25x4 into an APC 11x5: that gave me a perfect engine run and the plane was hanging on the lines beatyfully.
Initial maneuvers had not shown any aerodynamic problems, other than some sluggishness on outside loops. I attributed that to pilot inexperince, and never gave it a second thought...
Full of confidence I went into the wing over and crashed it on the transition into inverted flight: obviously pilot error, but I was left with a feeling that the plane was not responding fully to my "down" control.
In a phone call with Randy Smith he asked me what kind of handle I was using: a Tom Morris handle with wrist bias. His immediate reaction was to stay away from such handles because they cause insensitivity to "down" control!
Has anybody had similar experiences with such handles ?
HAn Slaats
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Having lost my Vector on its 9th flight I want to share my experience and a possible hypothesis for the crash.
I flew stunt a long time ago and picked it up again just recently; I never doubted I would still be able to fly. A very dangerous attitude !
I built a Vector 40 with an Evo 36 in it.
To get the engine running properly (the Evo has a very high spray bar location) I had to elevate the back of the tank by 1/4 inch and I changed the Bolly 11.25x4 into an APC 11x5: that gave me a perfect engine run and the plane was hanging on the lines beatyfully.
Initial maneuvers had not shown any aerodynamic problems, other than some sluggishness on outside loops. I attributed that to pilot inexperince, and never gave it a second thought...
Full of confidence I went into the wing over and crashed it on the transition into inverted flight: obviously pilot error, but I was left with a feeling that the plane was not responding fully to my "down" control.
In a phone call with Randy Smith he asked me what kind of handle I was using: a Tom Morris handle with wrist bias. His immediate reaction was to stay away from such handles because they cause insensitivity to "down" control!
Has anybody had similar experiences with such handles ?
I haven't crashed from it, but yes, of course, having the grip or handle with significant forward bias tends to create slow outside turn response. It's been extensively discussed here and on SSW over the years. There are those who use a significant handle bias successfully, but from doing it myself for years (until I learned better) and diagnosing other people's problems, I think it's a mistake. In fact, if asked, I suggest *everyone* to break themselves of the habit of the "relaxed grip".
Brett
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"His immediate reaction was to stay away from such handles because they cause insensitivity to "down" control!""
Han
My statement was not directed only at Tom Morrris handles, but at "any " handle that has a large overhang difference either ,top\bottom or bottom \top, As I told you this will make for a big difference in "stick pressure" that you feel. And will make either up or down harder to turn, especially in the winds. I can notice 1\8 of an inch movement as a huge added, or subtracted , pressure difference on inside vs outside turns when I move handle overhang.
Best thing you can do is keep everything as equal as possible.
It is not a deal breaker to have a little tilt ,up or down in your handle, but having one leg moved out much farther than the other is. worse thing you can do is have differant overhang top to bottom, the plane will simply NOT turn when wind loads it up on the leg that has more overhang. So stay away from that type of setup on your handle and keep the overhang as short as you can get comfortable with.
Regards
Randy
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I was having the same type of problem on outside loops when I came back into control line. Finally figured out that I was not following the plane with my hand and arm, I was just using up and down movements with my wrist. On an outside loop, the close to the ground the plane came, the less down I was giving. My hand and arm was still at about 45 degrees when the plane was at say 20 degrees. Does that make sense to anyone but me?
Lee TGD
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I used a handle canted forward for years without issue. The pivot of the handle was perpendicular to the lines and so the fulcrum for line movement was the same as a regular vertical grip, EZ-just type layout. I've since gone to a vertical handle, but I never had any problems with the 10° or so canted forward unit.
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Yes, I had the same experence with my Twister.
There are some people that swear by them. I say fly what feels right for you.
I no longer fly with a bias handle just because they do not feel right for me.
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Flew my entire career with an 8 deg handle and never noticed any bias. Maybe because I grew up with it. Also. my handle had equal length posts with the grip tilted 8 deg. If the posts are different lengths maybe that causes the bia feel. ??
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Up is up and down is down....The plane don't care.
It's all muscle memory...OR handle time.
I fly with bias about 6-8 degrees.
EVERYONE should find their own feel or comfort zone.
If I fly someone elses plane, I always use one of MY handles. HABBIT
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Hans:
First off WELCOME to Stunt Hanger!
You mentioned that you are a returning flyer; is your new handle similar to your old?
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Up is up and down is down....The plane don't care.
It's all muscle memory...OR handle time.
I fly with bias about 6-8 degrees.
EVERYONE should find their own feel or comfort zone.
If I fly someone elses plane, I always use one of MY handles. HABBIT
Stated much clearer that I did. H^^
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Baloney. The Morris handle is biased in the grip, not in the overhang.
Make a fist with your hand right now. You'll notice that your knuckles
are not straight up and down. I have flown many a plane at many a
contest with a bias grip handle, and I have also flown many without.
In this case it is very doubtful the handle would cause a crash.
Later, Steve
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Up is up and down is down....The plane don't care.
It's all muscle memory...OR handle time.
I fly with bias about 6-8 degrees.
EVERYONE should find their own feel or comfort zone.
That's what I used to think, too. Until I finally listened to people who were consistently beating me, changed, and suddenly, I noticed a lot more trophies in the back of my car. And if you need "handle time" to adjust to something, you are making a big mistake.
Brett
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The human body adapts beautifully, and trains to work with what it has. But it takes awhile.
This is why when you pick up a friend's handle to fly his ship, it feels so clearly foreign. If your
neutral position gets tweaked slightly without your knowledge, you'll insist that your ship is
suddenly trying to climb or dive on you.
For awhile, I was getting weekly cast changes on my foot and lower leg. Each new cast was somehow
different, and some of them were just terrible (say, wrong ankle position). In every case, in a day
or two, I adjusted and could walk (with difficulty) and get around. Each cast change, including
removing the cast, left me barely able to walk, with my previous adaptation "programming" in place
for awhile. (I can imagine how well it works for a young, fit, healthy person with decent reflexes.)
That said, my personal opinion is that what's perfect for a pistol grip may not be ideal for a control line
handle. Just operate your wrist vertically, and you'll see that it is less symmetrical with your palm tilted
forward.
Bart Klapinsky (a guy who can instantly adapt to almost any handle) once told me that the best handle overall
was the simple old EZ-Just.
L.
PS - Brett, you keep your trophies in the back of your car? Where do you keep your model airplanes? ;D
"Gigantic Bloated Gluttonous Greedy Grasping Maw of The System" -memo on my tax penalty check to NM IRS last April
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The verticle grip handles is what I learned CL on. Even the little fibre board handles that used to be in 1/2A kits. I have tried the biased handles and don't like them. It just doesn't feel right. Everyone has there own feel. DOC Holliday
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Thanks everybody for your thoughts; the handle is obviously an integral part of trimming, something I did not appreciate fully, but certainly do now !
My old handle is a flimsy affair (no bias) that almost disappers in my hand. Since belcranks are much larger nowadays and full up-down travel is much farther than on my old ships I decided it was time to join the modern world and get me a fully adjustable handle. In doing so, I apparently missed all the discussion about handles that can be found on the forum; my mistake...
Han Slaats
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From some of the previous discussions online, I got the impression that whether you need a bias handle or not depends on where you hold your handle. If you hold it high...like so you can sight down the lines, you do NOT want a bias handle. If you hold the handle low. say near your waist-line, you should be using bias.
By holding your hand in YOUR normal flying position, while holding a stick, you can see if you need bias by moving your wrist so you can get equal movement of up and down, then note if the stick is off from verticle. Of course, this assumes that you have a normal range of hand movement.
I hold my hand a bit low and like the Tom Morris handle...but then, I'm not a great flyer either. :-\
George
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Here's my 2 cents--and please don't take it wrong.
I think you crashed your plane. :'(
My guess is that you simply tried to do a "rule book" wingover, and didn't quite make the pull out. This was due partly with being unfamiliar with the equipment, but also your plane itself may not be turning outsides as well as inside (that's a flap and elevator trim issue). Yes the handle biases against the outside, but that's also because a lot of us are built towards an outside bias in the first place.
My advice (for next time) is to take it a little slower, do your first stunts a bit higher up, until you regain the familiarity with CL flying. Heck, even for me (by no means a "great" pilot), my first flight every spring is with pull outs much higher than even my normal high pullout!
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I didn't see anywhere in here where anyone advised the gentleman to adjust his "down" line to tighten up his outside turns. Thats one of the reasons we have all of these adjustments...
Did I miss something?
W.
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Or more likely, trim in some down elevator (relative to the flaps) to improve outside corner. In any case, trying to push a model (fly at 100%) to do what it cannot do is always a mistake. Don't try to compensate for the model...adjust the model to improve it. Adjustments/trimming includes everything between the prop and the handle... y1 Steve
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This thread has come to the point where I can enter it. Keep in mind I am a nobody in our sport. I have what you would call an extremely biased handle. I designed it for me! You see my right wrist does not deflect very far in the upward direction but in the down direction it goes almost to horizontal. So my handle is biased. I set the angle of the bias of the handle to be the half was position between the up and down motion that my wrist can make. Flying now became easier for me. I never fly anyone Else's airplane with there handle. Picture my handle as a figure D with the top part short and the bottom part long. There is an aluminum bar from the handles ends connecting the vertical part of the D. My lines are connected to this bar and can be moved closer or farther apart. The line length is adjusted by changing the length of 4/40 eyebolts that I got from all my Tom Morris handles. I set neutral elevator by having someone watch the elevator while I adjust. When I am done the lines and the bar on the handle are 90 degrees apart. As you might imagine the pull testers look at my handle and shake there head. They finally inspect the handle attachment to the bar and then do the pull test from the handle bar. Not all do it this way some do it on the back of the handle in the normal fashion. The spread on the pull tester hooks has to be set so as to keep the controls in neutral for the pull. When I flew in the late 70"s Used a Bob Hunt handle it was biased. Before that most everyone used an Ez-just mostly the large one. Only Tom Dixon uses the small one and he tells me he always has. I do not think the handle caused the crash of the model. It was pilot error.
Chuck
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Most outside crashes I've seen were caused by the pilot simply quitting flying the airplane on the down leg of the outside. A bias handle could contribute but it isn't the root cause. You have to continue giving it down through the whole loop or you see posts like this.
I can fly with either straight or biased, in fact I really love the old Hunt handles but also fly several airplanes with hard point straight handles, just depends on the airplane and what works. Looking forward to when Brodak receives the small Rock Crusher in quantities it fits my hand as well as the Hunt handle and I'll be able to buy enough to eliminate switching handles at all.
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Anytime I crash, I always blame it on a radio hit. (The right people will get it)
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It could also be the line spacing was set too narrow on the biased handle.. D>K
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Just one question.
How many who feel a biased handle has no effect on your control system or your ability to fly accurate maneuvers would mount the bellcrank at a 10 or 12 degree bias?
oh, heck. Make it two questions.
If you biased your handle down 90 degrees at neutral elevator how much down elevator do you think you could get to pull out of that wingover?
Ted Fancher
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If you biased your handle down 90 degrees at neutral elevator how much down elevator do you think you could get to pull out of that wingover?
Ted Fancher
Same as if you hold your hand hold verticle.
Figure an "T" with the lines connected to the verticle leg.--- Now, holding the horizontal leg, give a downward movement to the end of the "T" thast you are holding and you will see that the verticle leg now tilts forward thus giving "down" to the lines.
I think that as long as the line attachment points are verticle (or 90 Degrees to the lines) It matters little (if any) the position of the portion of the handle the hand is positioned on . I think as long as you have equal number of degrees of movement in each direction from the relaxed position then you will get equal degrees of movement from verticle on the line attachment points.
hope this has confused everyone too.
Bigiron
PS I actually made an T shaped handle to try this
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Many of my friends use a "Hot Rock" handle, or a clone thereof. Notice it has no bias, and can be hooked up either way with the same "feel". I use a home-brew handle similar to a Hot Rock (with cables, no less).
Floyd
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Just one question.
How many who feel a biased handle has no effect on your control system or your ability to fly accurate maneuvers would mount the bellcrank at a 10 or 12 degree bias?
oh, heck. Make it two questions.
If you biased your handle down 90 degrees at neutral elevator how much down elevator do you think you could get to pull out of that wingover?
Ted Fancher
Actually the target angle is 7.5 degrees - like the natural angle in your hand.
OK now I'm really going to sling it: If your hand is made at 7.5 degrees, and you fly it with a handle made at that angle then you are flying with a UNBIASED handle. If on the other hand (PUN!) you FORCE the handle to be vertical then you are flying a BIASED handle. SO to tie a bow on it, I would NOT install my bellcrank with a 7.5 degree bias, for the same reason I would NOT bias my handle to an unnatural vertical position that was 7.5 degrees away from natural.
(re-read that 3 times fast!)
Handle wars - I love it! Haven't had this discussion in....30 years????? (not any closer to "settling" anything either) I think we all need another round. 010!
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My first Vector did not turn the same both directions when I fdirst flew it. I had a Bill Byles adjuster in the pushrod and I added a little more down in the elevators and it then turned the same both directions and this could actually be a trim problem. Seein you havn't flown for a while this could also be a bias problem but I would say that proper trim could be the culpret. HB~> HB~>
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I held my arm straight out like I was flying level laps, with a dowel in it had my wife measure the angle of the dowel, and that is the the bias I put in to the handles I make for myself. Works for me. n~
Phil
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I think there are two problems here:
1. Only Han can tell whether he should be using a bias handle, depending on how he flies. And only he can tell if the handle was adjusted correctly.
Edit: After re-reading Randy's response, I believe I got caught up in the bias from verticle (hand tilt) while Randy was talking distance from center (fulcrum), Sorry.
2. Being anxious to get back into stunt, Han also ignored the "sluggish" outside loops, which perhaps should have been corrected before going further. He didn't mention if someone was observing his flights, looking for trim problems on the first eight flights.
We all...well, most of us, make mistakes. Han, sorry for the loss of your plane. Hope your Vector can be repaired.
George
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""OK now I'm really going to sling it: If your hand is made at 7.5 degrees, and you fly it with a handle made at that angle then you are flying with a UNBIASED handle. If on the other hand (PUN!) you FORCE the handle to be vertical then you are flying a BIASED handle. SO to tie a bow on it, I would NOT install my bellcrank with a 7.5 degree bias, for the same reason I would NOT bias my handle to an unnatural vertical position that was 7.5 degrees away from natural.""
But Denny
It is a fact...that if you have "any" handle that is biased in overhang, please note "overhang", because that is what I talked to Han about, It WILL make the plane harder to turn in the direction of the greater overhang..... I am not talking about handle tilt. which I don't like, but many use.
Again I am talking about "overhang bias" NOT "tilted handle bias" many seem to get this confused
When you have as much as 1 inch overhang difference that I see in some handles it will greatly affect the turn of the ship and will be in some cases almost IMPOSSIBLE to turn the ship in one direction in the high winds.
I can tell a large difference in as much as 1/8 of an inch in biased overhang. and in winds the turn rate changes as the stick pressure of whatever side you have hung out go way up.
I have seen, personally, more planes pile in, in HIGH WINDS from too much overhang, Matter of fact I would say that flying TOO nose heavy and TOO much overhang accounts for more flying into the ground in HIGH WIND crashes than any other part of the equation
I have seen people try to compensate for this by pushing the side (normally down) with more overhang out further to speed up the turn rate. This is the wrong thing to do as it is not a fix but a bandaid on that problem, Some people have used handles like this for so long they do not even realize that they have to use a much greater force to turn the ship in one direction as opposed to the other, BUt ,As Larry stated the body gets use to it
Regards
Randy
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Actually the target angle is 7.5 degrees - like the natural angle in your hand.
OK now I'm really going to sling it: If your hand is made at 7.5 degrees, and you fly it with a handle made at that angle then you are flying with a UNBIASED handle. If on the other hand (PUN!) you FORCE the handle to be vertical then you are flying a BIASED handle. SO to tie a bow on it, I would NOT install my bellcrank with a 7.5 degree bias, for the same reason I would NOT bias my handle to an unnatural vertical position that was 7.5 degrees away from natural.
(re-read that 3 times fast!)
Handle wars - I love it! Haven't had this discussion in....30 years????? (not any closer to "settling" anything either) I think we all need another round. 010!
O.K. Denny. Put up your dukes! mw~ mw~ mw~
I noticed you cleverly avoided my second question. So let me put it another way and see how you respond.
"Biasing" a handle is achieved by lengthening one line relative to the other. Biasing a handle so as to allow neutral to be achieved at the "natural" position of the hand relative to the forearm requires that the down line be lengthened appropriately. You say doing so is appropriate because you'd rather bias the system than your body. I say biasing the system compromises that system in a manner that can't be undone by simply forcing your body and mind to believe it's better.
I like to illustrate such stuff for myself by taking the premise to an extreme where the result is obvious and undeniable.
Let's take the biasing to an extreme and see what happens.
Say you've got a handle with four inch spacing attached to a four inch bellcrank. Now, either adjust the cable in your handle so that the down line is four inches longer than the up line or simply attach a set of lines where the down line is four inches longer than your up line. This will bias your handle so that neutral will be achieved with the handle rotated down 90 degrees from vertical (as suggested in the second question in my original post). (Big Iron, this is the type of biasing I'm discussing, not a "T" shaped handle you mentioned which is an entirely different deal ... I'll discuss that in a separate post when I get a chance).
The result of this four inch down bias on the "four inch" airborne system will be that any further rotation of the handle will produce up control no matter which way you rotate it ... "up" or "down" will result in up elevator. This will happen because the "down" end of the handle will rotate "toward" the airplane and the "up" end will rotate "away" from the airplane. Any "down" input at all is impossible.
An ancillary effect of bias that becomes worse as more bias is introduced is that the rate of response for a given degree of handle rotation will be different. Up inputs will be more responsive than down inputs and the difference will be increased as the bias is increased. You can demonstrate this effect with the airborne system by assembling a test system and biasing the angle of the bellcrank at neutral elevator. If neutral is achieved at 45 degrees of "down" bellcrank rotation elevator response will be very rapid in the up direction and very slow in the down direction. This same effect occurs with handle bias.
As I noted this example is an extreme which demonstrates the end result of any intermediate changes toward that extreme. I like to use the water and poison analogy. Pure water is a healthy, nutritious necessity; poison will kill you. Anyone interested in drinking a mixture of 90% water and 10% poison? I didn't think so.
Biasing of the handle (or any other fixed part of the control system) is like adding poison to water. It changes the character of the resulting product in a less than beneficial way and we shouldn't do it. Any such bias will result in more rapid response in up inputs and reduced rate of response in down inputs. That's not good.
To make this point even more dramatically. Say that your modern aft CG, large control system airplane requires the use of narrowed line spacing at the handle for comfortable response rates (my Trivial Pursuits, for instance, use right around 3 1/4" spacing at the handle couple to a four inch b/c). It is entirely possible with significant bias and a narrow handle spacing to set up your controls so that it is impossible to achieve all the down control with the handle that is available from the airborne system. This is not remotely hypothetical. I can recite two very real instances where I have flown such airplanes and nearly crashed them because the down response was so dead. These same airplanes with the bias removed turned outside just fine. One was Bill Fitzgerald's Banshee a long, long time ago and one belonged to a now top level Pacific Northwest flyer who shall remain nameless unless he chooses to get involved. Note, also, Brett Buck's metamorphosis to vertical in his earlier post.
A final note. Some have suggested that the above problems can be overcome by utilizing a longer arm on the down end of the handle so that the attach points of the lines are vertical. While doing so does eliminate the problems addressed above it also introduces another variable which ... while not as likely to end up with an airplane which is unable to turn outside ... will bias the effort necessary for maneuvers; requiring more effort to turn outsides than insides. This is because the overhang of the down side of the handle will be greater than the overhang on the up line.
As Randy has suggested above, increased overhang increases the amount of pilot effort required to achieve a desired amount of control deflection. Doing so on only one end of the handle means you only increase the load when turning one direction. Thus insides will feel "easier" to do than outsides. An imperfect solution in my opinion, but much preferable to simply biasing your Hot Rock which can very easily result in the sort of imperfect end to a flight as the end of the flight which started this thread ... lots'a little pieces!
Ted Fancher
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Interesting thought...
If I'm not mistaken, back in the 70's Bobby Hunt won the NATS and worlds with a Hunt Handle which is both biased, has what a 2 inch overhang and on top of that is a cable handle. What has changed, are the patterns that much better now with straight hard point handles? Would the pattern flown by Bobby at the 76 NATS get beat by Paul Walker with a straight handle. What kind of handle does the current NATS champ use?
I don't know the answers just thought it interesting to note that some pretty impressive patterns have been flown with all kinds of different handles.
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Ted:
Gosh you answered in COLOR Not sure I can top that! I did not intentionally mean to disregard any part of your orig post - sorry.
I remember way back when watching you fly - I always though your hand looked uncomfortable laying way back like that. As I recall you could not understand how I could use my angled grip handle - when ever I pick-up a Hot Rock style handle it feels like an impending crash! I do not recall we convinced each other of much back then. I will go out on the limb and say it does not look like either of us has changed our positions very much.
Randy: just saw your post. Perhaps a touch of "handle history" might be in order. Early on my Dad and brothers were heavily envolved in Rat Race - typically flying with Hot Rocks & such. These handles were NOT very friendly to hold down a hard pulling rat, and when 1000 lap races came into play - Dad decided to make his own handle. Finger grips were a natural and he noticed his grip was NOT vertical and made the handle accordingly to help accomdate a relaxed neutral position. Longish arms helped give solid feedback and again made it easier to help, uhhh, lead the rat along - only while gliding in for a landging you understand! The arms were made the same length top & bottom so at their extremes the were roughly 1/2" diffierent from each other relative to a vertical line. THe new handles greatly reduced pilot fatigue flying Rats, but they seemed to work just fine flying stunt too. Came to idea later that maye the arms SHOULD be the same length for stunt - so new handles were made and old ones modified.
That is LONG story to say that I suppose under conditions you could notice a 1/8" difference. I have flown with handles with as much as 1/2" offset in the arms without a problem. YES it felt different AT FIRST but was never unflyable. Within 3-4 flights I did not notice it at all anymore. Try restating what I said before: any offset from a comfortable neutral position is biased; if you FORCE your hand into a vertical position, then THAT is biased.
Howver, I am amazed at how much out bodies can consciously or unconsciously adjust for things like handle - yet ultimately we all find something comfortable that works for us. That is the key. I do not think there is any prohibitive "best" way to make a handle. However I think it was Alan Hahn's & I think Steve Moon's posts that said it best: handle "bias" did NOT cause this crash.
Its kind of like the old discussion about whether toilet paper should unroll off the top or the bottom (Ann sLanders said this was her MOST responded topic!)
I'm not above trying new things heck, one of these days I am going to get around to trying one of them high fallutin hardpoint handles just to see what the fuss is all about. Heck, I'll probably even cut the arms off one just to spite. I suspect it will feel very strange and uncomfortable.
...and my hardpoint handle prototype has a 7.5 degree angle built into it. na#
(I can almost see Ted & Randy going HB~> but you know I'm teasing you!) 010!
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>>"Biasing" a handle is achieved by lengthening one line relative to the other. <<
Well, maybe that's were the discussion should begin. When I talk about a "biased" handle, it's only the grip that is biased. The lines are the same length. The "bar" that the lines attach to is perpendicular to the lines. The handle (grip) attaches at an 8° or so forward angle to the bar. The connection to the plane is not biased.
It's been my experience that if you hold your hand directly in front of you with your elbow bent (as I've been learned to fly lately), then an upright grip is necessary. Rather than rocking your wrist directly forward and backward, you rotate your wrist around the pivot of the handle. If you hold your arm more straight out with little bend in the elbow, then you sort of have to have a biased forward handle or you won't be able to give much "up" control without bending your elbow.
It's really a matter of stance and how you hold your arm when you're flying that dictates which handle is going to be more comfortable. I've found recently that if I move my hand in and use the vertical grip that I move my arm less while flying, keeping my hand movement more or less in a restricted space. This has allowed, I think, somewhat more precise control. But it's really a matter of taste.
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Ted, as usual, you pontificated sufficiently to completely lose me in your "explanation" of where I was wrong. Well, I am not so wrong. As to not answering your second portion of your question, that is where I got the "T". Again---simply put---' leave the belcrank NEUTRAL, lines the same length, handle arms or line attachment points either verticle or parallel to the belcrank arms (the way you seem to think they should be) and now rotate ONLY the grip portion of the handle (the part that goes in your hand). IF you rotate that part ONLY, you effectively have a "T". Now tilt that stem of the T either up or down and you will get corresponding angle changes of equivilant degrees on the line attach part of the handle.
Since we are "supposing", Suppose one's hand will not tilt upward past a point where if he was holding a stick, it would not go past the verticle. HOW is he supposed to give "UP" ???? But he has LOTS of down now. Bias the grip portion in relation to the verticle bar such that he has equal number of degrees both up and down from neutral.
I stand firm in my assesment.
Bigiron
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Apparently, we will all find the sweet spot that we best feel servess our needs. Comment has been made that the human body can adapt to huge differences, and I b elieve that's a fact.
So biased or not go for it. As for me, I'll use what works for me. (I'm not telling)
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Baloney. The Morris handle is biased in the grip, not in the overhang.
Make a fist with your hand right now. You'll notice that your knuckles
are not straight up and down. I have flown many a plane at many a
contest with a bias grip handle, and I have also flown many without.
In this case it is very doubtful the handle would cause a crash.
Later, Steve
Hi Steve
and NO it is not baloney, ANY handle you fly with that has a lot of "overhang bias" can and will put you into the ground in high winds, and there is most times ZERO that you can do to stop it. Except for trimming the setup so that you can overcome the bias in winds.
Not saying it happens every time, but it does happen...then it's too late. It is obvious that many people fly with all types of handles. If your handle fits you and cannot be improved, by all means use whatever you like.
It slows one control in all conditions but in high wind it is MUCH MUCH worse, to the point in some I have test flown ,that you cannot fly a consistant pattern because of how much the force changes with wind speed, or kiting windup or motor windup.
Randy
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Apparently, we will all find the sweet spot that we best feel servess our needs. Comment has been made that the human body can adapt to huge differences, and I b elieve that's a fact.
So biased or not go for it. As for me, I'll use what works for me. (I'm not telling)
Well, NOW he's not telling. But last March? #^ Steve
(http://stunthanger.com/smf/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=11814.0;attach=38851;image)
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And if you adjust those arms out or in much, you create bias.
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And if you adjust those arms out or in much, you create bias.
LOL he already did LL~
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Flew my entire career with an 8 deg handle and never noticed any bias. Maybe because I grew up with it. Also. my handle had equal length posts with the grip tilted 8 deg. If the posts are different lengths maybe that causes the bia feel. ??
After reading the discussion and re-considering. I have a non biased tilted grip handle. It fits my hand and I have NEVER crashed a plane on an outside pullout. And I have lots of trophies too... H^^
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It is a fact...that if you have "any" handle that is biased in overhang, please note "overhang", because that is what I talked to Han about, It WILL make the plane harder to turn in the direction of the greater overhang..... I am not talking about handle tilt. which I don't like, but many use.
Again I am talking about "overhang bias" NOT "tilted handle bias" many seem to get this confused
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Well, NOW he's not telling. But last March? #^ Steve
(http://stunthanger.com/smf/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=11814.0;attach=38851;image)
Darn Steve, you outed me.
I make a huge effort to have the ends of my lines come out as equal as possible, so there is no excess overhang dialed in when the handle is adjusted. I understand and agree with Randy and his statement about biasing with overhang.
It is a fact that using any adjustable fixed or hard point handle, a small amount of overhang bias can be induced. In mine, where the handle ends of the lines line up almost perfectly, any overhang bias is so miniscule as to be a non entity.
Still, my opinion is to use what works for you, and I'll continue to use what works for me. H^^
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It is a fact...that if you have "any" handle that is biased in overhang, please note "overhang", because that is what I talked to Han about, It WILL make the plane harder to turn in the direction of the greater overhang..... I am not talking about handle tilt. which I don't like, but many use.
Again I am talking about "overhang bias" NOT "tilted handle bias" many seem to get this confused
I agree completely. Your older post is what prompted my clarification. I have always used equal post handles for stunt. When we made our first handles they were not equal. I complained to my dad that it was hard to do outsides so he made me one with equal posts that were long enough to be shortened to fit my needs. Same handle angle - equal posts. Eliminated the issue completely. Unfortunatly for me I took a couple years off and Big gave my handle to George A. ~^ I'm now using Dennis's Walker Cup handle which is almost the same as the one that got away. Lucky me...... #^
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Interesting thought...
If I'm not mistaken, back in the 70's Bobby Hunt won the NATS and worlds with a Hunt Handle which is both biased, has what a 2 inch overhang and on top of that is a cable handle. What has changed, are the patterns that much better now with straight hard point handles? Would the pattern flown by Bobby at the 76 NATS get beat by Paul Walker with a straight handle. What kind of handle does the current NATS champ use?
I don't know the answers just thought it interesting to note that some pretty impressive patterns have been flown with all kinds of different handles.
Here's a better question, Bob. What kind of handle does Bob use now? I don't know the answer for sure but I'd be interested to hear. I'm betting it isn't the same type.
I'm well acquainted with Bob's handle with which he won the World Championships. It was exactly as you described with some notable bias, a wide spacing, a very long overhang and a cable in it. It was beautifully made (as is anything Bob and his late, great father put together) and he had some for sale at the Nats I believe a year or so before he won that WC. Gary McClellan and I both bought one of these in flight adjustable beauties and went out to test fly with them promptly upon arriving home from the nats.
Both Gary and I had qualified for the finals that year so we sort of knew what we were doing already. We both used Hot Rock handles on our ships but couldn't wait to see how much better we'd fly with Bobby's beauty.
Long story short, even though the handle spacing was wider than our Hot Rocks (I'll have to go measure to be sure) "BOTH" Gary and I planted our stunters (Gary's a Nobler and mine the Nobler based original Moby Dick) on the first inverted pull out of the very first wingover. On grass, fortunately, and in both cases it was a pancake wipeout that did nothing more disastrous than breaking the props and getting grass stains on the top of the airplanes. This paragraph probably sounds pretty familiar to Han, I'll bet.
The difference in control forces involved was huge and the response rate per unit of force applied was dramatically reduced. Since both airplanes were still flyable we were able to make (more conservative) subsequent flights and found the difference from what we were used to unacceptable.
I did modify mine by cutting off the overhangs to more or less match the overhang of the Hot Rock and it was better but still not as consistent as the Hot Rock (for a variety of reasons including, of course, the fact that I had by that stage of my life thousands of flights on Hot Rock handles). After one additional flying session the handle was put on the shelf and still exists somewhere in the bowels of my "stuff". I later came to believe the reason I continued to find the handle inferior (from my perspective) was the turn bias that came from the handle bias. Outsides just always took more effort.
I retell this story to emphasize that the effects we're talking about are very real. You can argue whether they are good, bad or not worth thinking about because you can adapt to anything (I don't believe that last one) but anybody that flies back to back flights with handles so different will never be able to honestly say it doesn't have the effects I've chronicled. At least that's my opinion.
Finally, and most importantly, Bobby could beat 99% of the stunt fliers in the world flying with one line held in each hand. He is among the very best (if not the best) natural flier I know of and I know most of the best ones stateside. That he won with equipment that wasn't, perhaps, as good as it could be is no surprise. Both because of his great skill and because other equipment hadn't been refined to the degree it has today. You can only beat what's at the field on the day of the contest.
I've beaten Bobby a handful of times over the years and I don't think I would have done so if I hadn't refined my equipment to the greatest degree of which I was capable at the time. This for no other reason than, although I'm pretty good, I'm not in the class of a Bobby or a Bart when it comes to flying naturally. What success I've had over the years has occurred when my pretty well tuned equipment was mated with near perfect engine runs (something that had always been more or less a crap shoot for me until the piped set-ups came along).
Like the tuned pipe, once I flew the first time on a Hot Rock based adjustable handle with minimum overhang and no bias, I never went back.
Which may or may not mean a darn thing.
Ted
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Ted, as usual, you pontificated sufficiently to completely lose me in your "explanation" of where I was wrong. Well, I am not so wrong. As to not answering your second portion of your question, that is where I got the "T". Again---simply put---' leave the belcrank NEUTRAL, lines the same length, handle arms or line attachment points either verticle or parallel to the belcrank arms (the way you seem to think they should be) and now rotate ONLY the grip portion of the handle (the part that goes in your hand). IF you rotate that part ONLY, you effectively have a "T". Now tilt that stem of the T either up or down and you will get corresponding angle changes of equivilant degrees on the line attach part of the handle.
Since we are "supposing", Suppose one's hand will not tilt upward past a point where if he was holding a stick, it would not go past the verticle. HOW is he supposed to give "UP" ???? But he has LOTS of down now. Bias the grip portion in relation to the verticle bar such that he has equal number of degrees both up and down from neutral.
I stand firm in my assesment.
Bigiron
Big Iron, I'm sure you do! I never thought I had much chance of changing either "Dennys" minds. ;D ;D ;D
However, pretty much none of the message was directed at your T handle concept. I put that comment in green to emphasize the fact that I was talking about a particular type of bias. The last couple of paragraphs where I talk about the difference in overhang which accompanies the sort of "adaptation" of grip bias to a vertical line attachment point is the only part of the pontification which could be applied to your "T" handle concept ... and I stand firm in my assessment of the negative aspects of differential overhang.
TEd
p.s. Marvin,
I'm sorry you think I'm pontificating on this stuff. It really isn't my intention to sound like some sort of huffy college perfesser! I'm only trying to state my case as clearly as I can because I don't really know how to go about making and posting the pictures that are worth a thousand words apiece to make it clear.
Here's hopefully a clearer way to test my suggestion. Measure the distance between the up and down lines on your AAE handle and then cut a piece of string or wire and tie it off to match that distance ... i.e. if the handle spacing is 3.5 inches make the string 3.5 inches. Now add that string to your down line. The result should be a 90 degree biased handle at elevator neutral; i.e. the attach point of the up and down lines should be equal distance from the ground. Now rotate the handle and try to get some down elevator.
Tell us how it works.
Ted
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Less talk - more pictures, please!
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Less talk - more pictures, please!
Had to laugh, Frank, because I saw your post two seconds after adding the PS to my response to Big Iron. I simply don't have the computer skill to make and post pictures. Ergo ... as you so accurately suggest ... way too many words to try to get the point across.
Sorry,
Ted
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I thought it might be of value to relate the story of Bill Fitzgerald's Banshee that I alluded to in an earlier post. Bill is the late father of current World Champion David Fitz and was an excellent stunt pilot in his own right. In the early to mid '70s he was a very competitive expert flier in Northern California WAM contests ... and probably my very best friend from then until his untimely death a couple years ago. Bill was an airline captain, an award winning aviation safety expert and an accomplished accident investigator who worked on a number of very exhaustive accidents including the disasterous crashes of B737s in Colorado Springs and Washington National (now Reagan). He was nobodies dummy and a meticulous builder ... and a great coach who was the primary coach for three eventual national champion stunt fliers. Notwithstanding these hard earned "props", Bill suffered dramatically from exactly the problem under discussion in this thread.
In the '70s WAM contests had three classes of stunt: 1/2A, A and BC. As I've mentioned a number of times we routinely used Sig Banshees with Veco .19s spinning low pitch props at high revs for Class A events.
Bill had thoughtfully developed a control system geometry that alllowed him to use large handle inputs that resulted in very modest flap and elevator deflections, believing this would provide a large degree of "slop" in the system allowing errors in input not to result in big errors at the airplane. Not totally without merit, IMHO, but taken too far.
Bill modified his Hot Rock handles by installing an aluminum frame with multiple holes in it that extended forward allowing him to vary the line spacing in roughly 1/4" increments. It also moved the point at which the lines exited the handle forward at least an inch ... maybe a bit more. IOW, the frame both narrowed spacing and increased the overhang. Bill's handle spacing was a very narrow 2.5 or so inches, combined with the aforementioned additional overhang.
Finally, Bill also flew with a relaxed grip position and, thus, the handle was biased "down" with flaps/elevators at neutral. In other words, Bill's system was the "Perfect Storm" of the situation we're talking about.
Well, Bill flew it "fairly well" but constantly complained that it was very slow in outside maneuvers and required pretty much all the deflection he was able to input ... sort of a panic response in every outside corner. He didn't like it and wasn't competitive with it.
In frustration, one day he asked me to fly it. I did so and discovered his description was entirely accurate. It barely was capable of decent outside loops and outside corners were pretty much a hit it and pray situation.
My first thought (remember, this was more than thirty years ago and was the beginning ... not the culmination ... of my experience and conviction about handle geometry) was that the problem was the very slow control system. I asked to fly another flight with my own handle ... a hot rock ... and Bill said sure.
To make a long story short, the problem disappeared. The airplane turned outsides just fine and although a little quick on the controls (my Hot Rock was a full four inch stock spacing).
To finish the story, we put Bill's handle back on and investigated the response of the flaps/elevators to handle rotation. Because of the narrow spacing and because he threw away part of the potential down input by biasing the neutral, the handle was only able to drive the flaps/elevators to a fraction of the throw of which the on board system was capable. IOW, no matter how hard he yanked on the down line he was only going to get a fraction of the deflection he built into the airplane.
That was wrong!
Ted
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John Miller's handle, and mine (below) are "Ted Handles". They are kitted by Carl Shoup in Colorado, as shown in the first few pictures. Ted Fancher designed them, and made the first few, then kitted them for a short time. When he bowed out, Carl took up the project, THANKFULLY!
I took these pictures! And I designed and made the jig shown, using a scrap piece of pine and three nails. I drilled the holes with a drillpress, to make the holes square to the surface, and so the nails are a push fit by hand. It's not fancy, but it works perfectly. I assembled the two handles with thick CA, carved and sanded them into a shape that fit my hand, gave them two coats of epoxy finishing resin, and applied the handle wraps. The wrapping is fishing rod handle wrap, but tennis racket wrap, golf club wrap, etc., all work. I like them very much, and thank Ted and Carl for sharing. The contact information for Carl, in picture #1 is good. The kits come in two sizes...Hot Rock and EZ Just, essentially. They're very comfortable and light. Mine weigh right at 2 oz each.
Most of us set the arms as close in as possible (minimum overhang), with the limit being what will fit over our fingers. From there, we use line clips of various lengths to adjust neutral. A set of the standard "paperclip" style clips is included. Jim Lee (see vendor's forum below) makes a clip bender that was designed by Derek Moran. There are alternate methods of making these clips, of course. Tho simple, these work VERY nicely, and are highly recommended. I have been wondering who designed these clips! H^^ Steve
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[quote author=Ted Fancher
However, pretty much none of the message was directed at your T handle concept. TEd
< Ted it wasn't my "T" concept--- it was your description of positioning the portion of the handle that was held in the hand "90 Degrees" that effectively made the handle a "T" shape. I only used ti described as a "T" to clarify the portion being held.>
p.s. Marvin,
I'm sorry you think I'm pontificating on this stuff. It really isn't my intention to sound like some sort of huffy college perfesser! Tell us how it works.
Ted
[/quote]
< Sorry Ted-- I probably used the wrong word pontificating. I didn't mean it as it now sounds. I have a simple mind that only engineers can develop. And you are certainly NOT sounding like a"huffy Perfesser"
I really think we may be very close to being on the same track anyway, just talking about two different types of bias. I'm going to take a close look at some recent video of you top guys flying and a really close look at the handle positions during level and inverted flight.
No offence on this end and I hope not on your end.
Marvin AKA Bigiron Denny
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Picture diesect this one please Id parts for clarification of terms.
Chuck
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OK I'll start it. The eye bolts are used by me to set the elevator at dead level with the aluminum bar set to 90 degrees to the lines. That would not be a bias adjustment. From dead center on the aluminium bar I put the eyebolts equal distance from the center. That is not bias that is sensitivity.Then I fly the model. If to sensitive then I move the eyebolts closer to the center. That still is not bias. Notice the angle of the handle, that matches the motion of my right wrist and the angle is set to be on the center of my wrists motion. Notice that one end of the handle has a longer arm that the other. That has to be because the angle to get the mid position of my wrist motion requires it. This unequal length has no effect on the control movement and is not bias. The handle is really the aluminum bar. The wooden grip is just attached to it. The model flying could dictate futher adjustments with the eyebolt spacing and or length. Example would be to move one eyebolt closer or further from the center and not move the other eyebolt at all. That is a bias adjustment.
Changing the length of a single eyebolt? No! Once I set that I do not go back to it. That makes the position of the elevator higher or lower. The eyebolt length function is to make small adjustments to compensate for differences in the line length.
Chuck
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Perhaps the easy solution is to switch to the monoline control system. 8)
L.
"Why is the alphabet in that order? Is it because of that song?" -Steven Wright
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[quote author=Ted Fancher
However, pretty much none of the message was directed at your T handle concept. TEd
< Ted it wasn't my "T" concept--- it was your description of positioning the portion of the handle that was held in the hand "90 Degrees" that effectively made the handle a "T" shape. I only used ti described as a "T" to clarify the portion being held.>
p.s. Marvin,
I'm sorry you think I'm pontificating on this stuff. It really isn't my intention to sound like some sort of huffy college perfesser! Tell us how it works.
Ted
p.s. back in the days I was doing the column I did two consecutive articles on handles and "exactly" the subject matter we're discussing here. That did include some drawings. Because I'm math challenged I don't try to give any fancy equations or anything, just approached the concepts with illustrations which clearly showed what I was trying to get across. If someone has access to any of those old columns and could scan and post them it might clear up some of what I'm trying to say. They were published back in the mid '80s just before I stopped writing the column when I was elected President of PAMPA.
< Sorry Ted-- I probably used the wrong word pontificating. I didn't mean it as it now sounds. I have a simple mind that only engineers can develop. And you are certainly NOT sounding like a"huffy Perfesser"
I really think we may be very close to being on the same track anyway, just talking about two different types of bias. I'm going to take a close look at some recent video of you top guys flying and a really close look at the handle positions during level and inverted flight.
No offence on this end and I hope not on your end.
Marvin AKA Bigiron Denny
Hi Marvin,
NO worries. It looks like we took turns misunderstanding each other. Besides, I'm well aware of my reputation for long windedness but really don't know how to make sometimes complicated concepts clear without using a lot of words. Again, I need some sort of simple drawing program to allow me to sketch out some of these things and then post them. Our misconnect on the handle concept is the perfect example!
In the olden days when I did the column in Model Aviation I had a drafting table set up full time and it was easy to whip out some simple stuff and mail it off to the magazine with the hard copy of the text. Let them massage it to fit the magazine page!
No, the description of 90 degree bias I was trying to make was what would happen if you took your basic symmetrical style Hot Rock handle and lengthened the down line enough that at neutral the grip was parallel to the ground. All the discussion that followed was based on that premise: i.e. the inability to get any down control at all from that position; and the fact that any bias of that sort would make "up" control faster and "down" control slower as the bias was increased; that, with narrow enough spacing and enough bias you can get a control system hooked up so that it is impossible to get all of the down control built into the airplane's on board system, etc.
Ted
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Picture diesect this one please Id parts for clarification of terms.
Chuck
Hey, Chuck. Thanks a million for such a great picture. It allow me to illustrate some of the stuff I've obviously failed to get across with my posts.
As far a definition of terms, I'll give it a shot from my perspective.
First, the "grip" is obvious. It's where you hold onto the handle whatever shape it is.
Second, "bias". We differ just a bit here although I agree completely with your use of the word when you talk about different line attach points for the up and down lines. Bias means a divergence from symmetry. In the case of your handle I would state that there is a bias between the grip and the plane at which the control lines attach to the line attachment bar. IOW, they are not parallel to one another. It is important to note that the form of bias in your handle is not the "super bad" bias I address when I speak of adjusting a symmetrical, Hot Rock style, handle so that at neutral elevator the handle is not perpendicular to the ground.
Your handle is what I would grudgingly refer to as an "OK" handle in that it satisfies the need to have the driving mechanism (the line attachment bar) at the proper angle (90 degrees) relative to the control lines (i.e. "square to the on board system).
My only serious disagreement with the ultimate value of such a handle is related to the last definition of the parts and that is the "overhang". Overhang is the "arm" or distance from the grip (technically, the hinge point of the wrist) to the to the line attachment point (the bar on your handle). In your case the down line overhang is roughly twice as long as the up line overhang.
This is exactly what Randy Smith has been addressing in his posts. It is true that the greater the overhang the more force will be required to deflect the controls against the airloads on the flaps/elevators. This is why you'll find "most" of the fliers (including me) that win the big ones fly with minimal overhang so as to allow finer input refinements with modest effort.
Now, let me make it clear that a modest amount of any of these factors can be overcome by a good flier with a well trimmed, properly powered stunt ship. As Bob Reeves has pointed out, there have been a lot of "Big Ones" won by fliers using handles that are non-symmetrical in many facets. I think, however, if an historical count could somehow be taken you'd find that the symmetrical type handles have pretty much kicked butt ... on balance ... throughout stunt history.
Now, I haven't looked closely at Orestes' handle but I have spent a lot of time caddying for guys like Paul Walker, David Fitzgerald, Brett Buck and many others who are threats to win big contests. Every one of those guys uses a handle that looks so much like a Hot Rock they could be clones (in fact, many made from the Ted kits are exactly that ... clones of a Hot Rock with hard point attachments and modest amounts of adjustability built in). Of course, Paul does fly with some bias in his neutral. Too bad. I think he could be a pretty good pilot if he'd just go vertical H^^ H^^ H^^
By the way, if you like your handle feel free to tell me thanks but no thanks. That's the bottom line on all of this tech talk.
Ted
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Since Larry C. brought up Monoline...here's my old monoline handle. The handle itself has no 'bias' (or effect!), but where the knob is placed before takeoff limits the amount of up or down, so that is "bias". Much the same as the "bias" in a 2-line handle for stunt...it gives you more of one at the expense of the other.
Pulling the red knob toward the handle gave 'up" elevator. At neutral, I usually had the knob a little toward the far end, where the line connected. Usually ended up with the knob pushed 'down' (farther toward the model) to lock it into a fast, low "groove". Going like he!! was fun, but couldn't get enough ST parts to fly except at contests and one Spring shakedown session. Free flight and Stunt was more like 'sport' flying...anytime the mood struck. Speed still beckons, however... n~ Steve
PS: I'm wondering why the safety thong is so darned long!
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Hello Ted,
Thank you for responding to me and this post. I have no problem with anything you said. Yes I do like my handle it does for me what I designed it too do.
It allows me to have equal (throw) up and down with my wrist. The overhang you speak of is not a problem in fact it is the answer to get equal throw up & down for me. I hope this discussion continues.
Chuck
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Since Larry C. brought up Monoline...here's my old monoline handle. The handle itself has no 'bias' (or effect!), but where the knob is placed before takeoff limits the amount of up or down, so that is "bias". Much the same as the "bias" in a 2-line handle for stunt...it gives you more of one at the expense of the other.
Pulling the red knob toward the handle gave 'up" elevator. At neutral, I usually had the knob a little toward the far end, where the line connected. Usually ended up with the knob pushed 'down' (farther toward the model) to lock it into a fast, low "groove". Going like he!! was fun, but couldn't get enough ST parts to fly except at contests and one Spring shakedown session. Free flight and Stunt was more like 'sport' flying...anytime the mood struck. Speed still beckons, however... n~ Steve
I remember seeing (on a tape) Dale Kirn's son demo-ing a stunt flight using monoline. One of the things he mentioned was that the lines would twist enough that he needed to re-establish neutral several times by spinning the red knob during level flight. He was used to adjusting it so he just did it in a matter-of-fact way.
George
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Don't know what happended on my first attempt at this reply, so I am trying again.
I made some diagrams of handle goemetries to try and understand all that is being said. I have the following observations that I take from these diagrams:
1: almost all geometries exibit larger line movement on the active side (the side we are applying the up or down control), for a given handle deflection. This is due to the fact that the actual pivot point is not in the handle but at the point where the hand joins the wrist. Watch you hand movement closely and you will see what I mean. This means that at the passive side of the handle the line goes slack !. This suggests that the plane will try to yaw around the active leadout until the line tension in the passive line is restored. (Could this be right ??)
2: the handle with equal overhang, but held at a relaxed (biased) position does give less response on down than it does on up !!
3: the handle with built in bias and unequal overhang (line attachement points are vertical) behaves the same for up and down movements; I cannot find from these diagrams confirmation about the the statements made by Randy and Ted about these handles. Incidentally; this is the type of handle I was using when I crashed.
Some of the things I am saying are counter-intuitive, certainly to me, so lets hear your comments.
Han Slaats
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Hello Hans!
While I have no doubt you had a bias handle in your hand at the time of the crash, quite often symmetrical alignment of the control system in conjunction with a nose heavy airplane......and a bias handle could be more of the culprit...one accentuating the other so to speak. Then again, its summer, depending on the wind or lack of it, this also could have helped you into Terra fir ma..... or not.
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You are over complicating things with various pivots points.
Nobody flys with their shoulder and elbow locked, pivoting only at the wrist.
Handle rotation is generated by a combination of all three.
The input to the planes control system is the total relative movement of the up & down lines to each other. Your pictures 6 and 7 show that for a given rotation of the handle, the relative movement is the same; 1.6 + .5 for up and .5 + 1.6 for down; 2.1 in both cases. This will be true so long as the lines attachment points are vertical in the neutral position. That handle configuration will give equal amounts of up & down control for equal degrees of up & down handle rotation. Question is can you physically input equal amounts of handle rotation from what is your personal comfortable neutral position, with equal precision and repeatability. Thats why its different for everybody. Your incident indicates that you are lacking with the down rotation of handle. You can gain additional down input by raising the handle higher in your neutral flying position. Raising the handle higher also gets rid of most if not all of the grip bias.
Try a handle with no grip bias, it helped me. Will take some adjustment to get comfortable with new handle position, proceed with caution.
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It also showed that the overhang setting on the handle will varies from one person to another with different wrist to grip length to get the same feel.
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It is often easy to tell if a stunt flier flies with a lot of down bias in his handle. Most likely in outside corners you'll see his flying arm and hand down below his/her beltline in order to get enough down versus up line displacement to deflect the controls sufficiently to perform the corner.
This is not only an ineffective way to fly a precise, controlled corner (way too much physical activity and movement of the handle required just to apply the necessary control input) but doing so also drags the airplane sideways towards the pilot which adds drag, slows the airplane and "requires" that the arm and handle move back toward the airplane thus reducing line tension and once again forcing the airplane to now fly away from the pilot to regain it path around the circle. I can't think of many things a pilot can force him or herself to do that is more detrimental to the desired flight path of the airplane.
Inward and outward movement of the handle (toward and away from the airplane) should be minimized to the greatest degree possible (with only a handful of exceptions when the pilot might want to add or subtract energy to the airplane through positive or negative "whipping") so the ship can cleanly follow the desired pitch tracks as it circulates otherwise unaffected about the surface of our flight sphere.
There is a certain amount of latitude in this area for inside maneuvers because the inputs available from the wrist, hand and fingers can be supplemented by elbow and shoulder inputs. These are largely done in the same vertical plane as the hand/finger/wrist inputs so lateral movement of the airplane itself is modest or nonexistent.
This really isn’t an option in outside maneuvers because the elbow only bends one way.
This argues strongly for not throwing away part of the available down control by biasing the handle down at neutral.
Ted
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Don't know what happended on my first attempt at this reply, so I am trying again.
I made some diagrams of handle goemetries to try and understand all that is being said. I have the following observations that I take from these diagrams:
1: almost all geometries exibit larger line movement on the active side (the side we are applying the up or down control), for a given handle deflection. This is due to the fact that the actual pivot point is not in the handle but at the point where the hand joins the wrist. Watch you hand movement closely and you will see what I mean. This means that at the passive side of the handle the line goes slack !. This suggests that the plane will try to yaw around the active leadout until the line tension in the passive line is restored. (Could this be right ??)
2: the handle with equal overhang, but held at a relaxed (biased) position does give less response on down than it does on up !!
3: the handle with built in bias and unequal overhang (line attachement points are vertical) behaves the same for up and down movements; I cannot find from these diagrams confirmation about the the statements made by Randy and Ted about these handles. Incidentally; this is the type of handle I was using when I crashed.
Han, No, you won't find the overhang issue based on the "deflection" geometry. The issue with overhang is increased loading to deflect the controls as the overhang gets larger. Whatever the force required to deflect the control surfaces against the airloads it will be multiplied by the length of the overhang. Again, let's use an extreme to illustrate the concept while recognizing that "modest" amounts of overhang are perfectly acceptable ... to a point.
Consider 30 foot overhangs on the up and down lines. The first thing logic will tell you is that you aren't strong enough to deflect the controls of an airplane pulling, say 10 or 15 pounds when the arm you are using is that long. To deflect the handle 45 degrees for a square corner will require pulling the entire airplane toward you a goodly amount inasmuch as the handle arms will be rotated up and in a number of feet. The strength required to do that is well beyond anything us normal guys could provide. (I'll let some of the math wizards figure out exactly what the load would be and how far "toward" the pilot the airplane would have to move at 45 degrees of handle rotation. All I know is it'll be a lot foot/pound of torque [increasing as the angle increases] and the airplane will be pulled in a "lot" of feet!
Again, think of the water and poison example from the earlier post. Sure, thirty feet of overhang is clearly off the charts. The question is (are): 1.how much poison can you stand in your water and still fly as well (overhang in general will force the pilot to use more muscle to fly a given radius), and; 2. do you really want to load the controls more in down maneuvers than you do in up maneuvers if your goal is to make inside and outside loops and corners of identical radii (longer arms on one end of the handle will bias the load required for a given turn rate making identical inside and outside radii more difficult)?
A quick disclaimer. In modest amounts none of the "bad" things I've discussed are deal breakers for 90% of the people who simply want to fly stunt planes and have fun while doing so. The other 10% who really want to kick everyone else's butts need only to decide if they want to compromise the consistency of response by accepting certain amounts of these variables built into the only interface they have between themselves and the critter the judges are watching and scoring. The widespread acceptance of "Modern" Hot Rock styled handles by those pilots tells a large part of the story.
Great discussion.
Ted
Some of the things I am saying are counter-intuitive, certainly to me, so lets hear your comments.
Han Slaats
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>>The other 10% who really want to kick everyone else's butts need only to decide if they want to compromise the consistency of response by accepting certain amounts of these variables built into the only interface they have between themselves and the critter the judges are watching and scoring.<<
And then there's Paul Walker. Ever look at his handle?
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>>almost all geometries exibit larger line movement on the active side (the side we are applying the up or down control), for a given handle deflection. This is due to the fact that the actual pivot point is not in the handle but at the point where the hand joins the wrist. Watch you hand movement closely and you will see what I mean. This means that at the passive side of the handle the line goes slack !. This suggests that the plane will try to yaw around the active leadout until the line tension in the passive line is restored. (Could this be right ??)<<
Ted,
thanks for your enlightened views and explanations "ad absurdum". We do seem to be getting to some valuable conclusions as to what to do and what to avoid.
Could you also give your thought about what happens when line displacement is not equal on the Up and Down line, which happens with all configurations of handles with overhang.
Related to this question is the issue about moving your arm up and down as you fly. On an Up command, the Up line will move further backward than the Down line moves forward if you only hinge your wrist.
If you now move your hand downwards, so that the arms are at an angle to the lines, this will lengthen the down line relative to the up line and may well be a strategy to maintain equal line tension.
Han
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And then there's Paul Walker. Ever look at his handle?
Never seen it, what type is it ?
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Never seen it, what type is it ?
In this video clip.. it sure looks like an EZ-just handle.
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OK...All info given has been good. I fly with a Bias handle However, I bend my elbow and pull my handle into my body. This relives the bias and gives me control that is for me. AS you see in the video Paul bends his elbow and has bias. ALSO Paul can fly with my handle. Ted, Brett....I think there is a feel to what is comfortable. When I shake hands with someone MY hand is comfortable at a few degrees down, I then have equal movement up and down. NO strain in my arm or wrist.
I think a handle WILL improve your CONTEST flying. As a sport flyer...air is good .....ground is bad. GET handle time...be comfortable....relax
OH TED...I know this subject is one of your lets say...*&^%)#@. S?P I have had a lession from you on your technique and I just can't change..my bad.
:-[
GREAT POST BY ALLLLLL H^^
Scott no more trophies Riese
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>>almost all geometries exibit larger line movement on the active side (the side we are applying the up or down control), for a given handle deflection. This is due to the fact that the actual pivot point is not in the handle but at the point where the hand joins the wrist. Watch you hand movement closely and you will see what I mean. This means that at the passive side of the handle the line goes slack !. This suggests that the plane will try to yaw around the active leadout until the line tension in the passive line is restored. (Could this be right ??)<<
Ted,
thanks for your enlightened views and explanations "ad absurdum". We do seem to be getting to some valuable conclusions as to what to do and what to avoid.
Could you also give your thought about what happens when line displacement is not equal on the Up and Down line, which happens with all configurations of handles with overhang.
Sure, Han. Be glad to.
First of all, if your handle needs to be "biased" in this manner there is something else wrong that should be corrected. The classic reason for having the lines attached at different distances (from the "center" of the handle vertically) is to achieve equal inside and outside turns. The theory being (correctly, as far as it goes) that increasing the "arm" of the handle in the direction of the poorer turn will increase the amount of control deflection resulting from a given handle input.
Guys, if the airplane isn't turning equally inside and outside (and the handle is vertical at neutral flap/elevator, sorry 'bout that but it is a fact that tilting the handle at neutral will change the response rate) there is an aerodynamic reason why. The correct fix is to determine what is causing the unequal turn and correct it. Generally speaking on an otherwise straight airplane the flap/elevator neutral will need to be adjusted. Biasing the up and down lines at the handle simply masks the problem and doesn't correct it. Plus, it adds a few other tiny kinks that you can well do without.
Such as: large amounts of bias in this regard changes the feel of the airplane when the controls are in neutral because -- although both lines are carrying an equal share of the load (line tension) -- if one line is attached further away from the center of the grip that line will be pulling harder "about" (i.e. around) the handle's axis of rotation. Ergo, if the up line is attached a half inch further from the handle center the torque about the center will be an additional 1/2" X the load on each line. If each line is carrying 10# of pull and the down line is at 1.5 inches, the torque applied is 15# in that direction. If the up line is at two inches the torque applied will be 20#. The differential in torque will be five pounds trying to rotate the handle in the down direction.
The bottom line is that biasing the up and down arm lengths will accomplish what you want to accomplish. The problem is it doesn't correct the underlying problem and, because it is --once again -- a bandaid it brings with it just another tiny bit of baggage a top flier can do without. I've said it a bazillion times. Winning big in stunt is primarily the result of taking "details" seriously. Every little "compromise" when added together can make the difference between the big trophy and polite applause for coming in sixth.
Related to this question is the issue about moving your arm up and down as you fly. On an Up command, the Up line will move further backward than the Down line moves forward if you only hinge your wrist.
If you now move your hand downwards, so that the arms are at an angle to the lines, this will lengthen the down line relative to the up line and may well be a strategy to maintain equal line tension.
Han, I think I'll address this comment with a statement rather than an answer. All of the above comments should be irrelevant. The vast majority of upper echelon fliers limit the amount of arm and hand movement to the greatest degree possible, primarily using small wrist and finger movements to fly the complete pattern. Again, there are exceptions but they are few and far between.
The last thing a pilot should be doing is anything that makes a stunt ship do anything other than pitch up and down at the appropriate moments. All of the control in other than the pitch axis is (should be) supplied by the control lines tethering it to the hemisphere in which it must fly. IN other words, mother nature makes it fly at the ends of the lines and the pilot's only job is to direct it to the correct locations on the hemisphere.
Any time the arm moves especially at the shoulder the airplane, by virtue of the tehter, must come with it. Every sideways movement that results absorbs the energy you've spent so much time tuning into your powertrain. No, not a lot but more than you can afford to lose if, like me, you need all the advantages you can get to beat more talented natural fliers. In addition, those sideways movements go both ways, adding tension as you put control into the ship and giving up tension when you return to neutral. And, finally, sideways movement will cause yawing which is among the more detrimental things you can do to your pattern.
I will make some exception for using the elbow in inside maneuvers. Try it and you'll note that you can pretty much go to 45 degrees of elbow movement with very modest motion toward the pilot. This, by the way, is a large part of the issue that those who complain about unequal up and down wrist movements when arguing for a down bias in their handles don't consider. The elbow is a perfectly effective multiplier of "up" wrist inputs while there is no equivalent available for down inputs.
Finally, one last attempt to convince people that the vertical handle set-up is not only desirable but demonstrably superior. The reality is that the handle is an integral part of the mechanical system by which we fly our tricks. The handle angularity is every bit as pertinent and important as is that of the bellcrank and control horns that we all spend a lot of time and effort (and sometimes some pretty big bucks) to get set up as accurately as we can measure. To put that effort into the airborne system and then attach a handle that is eight to 15 degrees cattywampus make zero logical sense.
The reason I didn't address your question about moving the arm and so forth is that the only thing that is variable in our control system is the human element. There are just to many variation of human physiology to try to address the differences and try to make a case for everybody using a custom made mechanical system that will somehow overcome any problems. The proper approach is to make the mechanical system as close to perfect and symmetrical in response as we can and then allow the human adaptability to adjust to what is right.
No, as many have suggested, you don't have to do that to win if you're really, really good or if the competition is modest. If you're not a great pilot and the competition is really really good it really behooves you not to compromise your equipment but, rather, to optimize your use of the fight"stuff".
Again, just my opinion, but I do sort of feel strongly that there is some truth there.
Ted
Han
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From my previous post:
No, as many have suggested, you don't have to do that to win if you're really, really good or if the competition is modest. If you're not a great pilot and the competition is really really good it really behooves you not to compromise your equipment but, rather, to optimize your use of the fight"stuff".
Actually, I meant to say the "right" stuff but it came out too good to change.
Ted
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OK...All info given has been good. I fly with a Bias handle However, I bend my elbow and pull my handle into my body. This relives the bias and gives me control that is for me. AS you see in the video Paul bends his elbow and has bias. ALSO Paul can fly with my handle. Ted, Brett....I think there is a feel to what is comfortable. When I shake hands with someone MY hand is comfortable at a few degrees down, I then have equal movement up and down. NO strain in my arm or wrist.
I think a handle WILL improve your CONTEST flying. As a sport flyer...air is good .....ground is bad. GET handle time...be comfortable....relax
OH TED...I know this subject is one of your lets say...*&^%)#@. S?P I have had a lession from you on your technique and I just can't change..my bad.
:-[
GREAT POST BY ALLLLLL H^^
Shoot, Scott!
I'll just have to work on you again. Maybe hypnosis ...
Ted
Scott no more trophies Riese
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O.K. Dennis. One last chance. S?P S?P S?P
I would still like to hear your rebuttal about the affects of a (tilted handle at neutral) bias on the control handle with respect to the extreme example I suggested ... i.e. tilted so that neutral flap/elevator is achieved with the handle tilted 90 degrees down. Then work backwards to explain why a little bias is better than adapting the human element to overcome the bias thus built into the system. :-\ :-\ :-\
Have a great holiday and hi to the family!
Ted
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TED and Others.
I've been thinking about this subject for a few days and I've come up with something that maybe relevant. I see the logic in all that have posted. However, I'm just talking about holding the handle at what I call ZERO/Neutral. My Bell crank is at zero, with the flaps and elevator, my lines are equal, I have the same input up and down, I'm comfortable. NOW my HAND has about 8 degrees down feel. What I'm saying is MY hand. If I put my wrist at zero I have less control (input) up then I do down (over controlled). I hope you can get the just of what I'm saying. I still feel there has to be a comfort level to each flier. What works for Sam may not work for Steve.
OH.....I need to start trying the hard point handle. I still use cable. b1
Thank you for your time. H^^
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I don't know about others, but I find i do not just use just my wrist to make control input.
When giving up, I use my elbow, and fine tune with my wrist.
When giving down, I use my wrist first, and add some elbow action.
The relaxed grip is totally a non function for me.
I suppose that learning on an Easy Just is part of the reason I feel most comfortable with an upright handle.
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>>The other 10% who really want to kick everyone else's butts need only to decide if they want to compromise the consistency of response by accepting certain amounts of these variables built into the only interface they have between themselves and the critter the judges are watching and scoring.<<
And then there's Paul Walker. Ever look at his handle?
Actually, I have and I have flown his airplane. His tilt is only slightly off of mine.
Brett
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>> Actually, I have and I have flown his airplane. His tilt is only slightly off of mine. <<
About 5 Degrees? ;D
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I am just used to using handles similar to the Hot Rock. Would someone please explain what "overhang" is? I am planning on buying some new handles and am enjoying this discussion by the "masters". I just want to make sure I understand it correctly. Thanks.
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I crashed my Vector due to a change of mind , or a Brain Fart. >:( >:( HB~>
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I am just used to using handles similar to the Hot Rock. Would someone please explain what "overhang" is? I am planning on buying some new handles and am enjoying this discussion by the "masters". I just want to make sure I understand it correctly. Thanks.
Guy,
Go about 1/3 of the way to the top of this thread and check out the picture of Chuck Feldman's handle and some subsequent responses to his post. "Overhang" is the length of the "arms" that extend from the "grip" of the handle to where the lines are attached (or, in Chuck's case) where the bar to which the lines are attached. In Chuck's case the overhang on the "down" line arm is about twice as long as the overhang of the "up" line's arm.
The result of increased overhang is an increase in force required to make a given control input.
Ted Fancher
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I'm probably going to regret posting this and it should probably be the start of a separate thread--but, here goes.
All the talk about the individual "Human" differences making a biased handle more appropriate for some fliers doesn't ring entirely true to me. I don't dispute there are individual differences in bone structure, etc. (although I question how much different we are) but I don't believe that is the primary thing that makes some think a biased handle is better "for them".
I encourage each of you to go to Will Hubin's great series of in flight pictures from the team trials thread. These are pictures of some of the very best fliers in the country if not the world. If you look past the airplane in each and everyone of those shots you'll note that the flier's hand is located somewhere between the flier's upper belly and and his chin (note that the guy who won the whole magilla is the guy whose hand is near his chin in level flight--just about five feet above the ground! This is especially notable in the pix of airplanes in upright flight (even a lot of really, really good guys distort their posture when inverted--most likely because we all learn to fly upright first and learning to fly inverted was a challenge we met in a variety of ways not all of which are pretty to watch!)
Note also that essentially all of them (save Sparky) also have their elbow bent so their hand is closer than an arm's length from their body. Hmmmmm, does that turn on that little light bulb over your head?
No matter how you currently hold your hand, just stand up now, place your hand level with your chest with your elbow slightly bent. Close your fist around a broom handle or long dowel and hold it so it is vertical. Now flex only your wrist so that the stick is tilted "down" seven to 10 degrees. Think of this "relaxed" position as "neutral" elevator. Now, leaving your arm in the same position, give your handle another 25 or 30 degrees of "down" elevator. My bet is you can't do it.
In order to have any wrist generated "down" control from a relaxed neutral wrist position the handle must be held lower relative to the fliers body (and to the five foot level flight elevation). EAch of the fliers I've discussed in this and other threads who had dramatic problems with outside maneuvers with airplanes perfectly capable of good outsides when flown by yours truly flew with their handle held at stomach level or below and flew with the "relaxed/tilted/biased" handle setting. Each of them could be seen attempting to fly outside corners by dramatically lowering the arm, hand and handle well below their waist in an attempt to get the darn critter to turn outside.
None of those flier's pictures are in the Team Trials thread.
No, it's not impossible to fly well with a relaxed grip and a lowered handle position in level flight. However, I think you'll look long and hard at pictures such as Will's before you'll find many examples of such postures with follow up pictures holding the big trophies.
Pretty much all of the really good fliers don't do anything to make their job harder. Pretty much all of them fly with their handles held in front of the upper torsos and have the handle pretty darn close to vertical. That's got to say something about the subject.
All right, I'm hiding in the bunker. Fire away. ~^ ~^ ~^ ~^ ~^ ~^ ~^ ~^ ~^ ~^
Ted
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Ted,
Your absolutely right (now admit it, that was a shock). ;D
If you hold your hand directly in front of you and chest high (more or less) and hold you hand so that fictive broom handle is vertical, then you can get pretty much equal up and down control by rotating your wrist. Since your wrist is also bent, like your elbow, it allows you a better range of motion. This is basic human kinesiology. You position muscles and joints to obtain the maximum easy movement. I completely agree that this is the best way, mechanically, to go.
If, however, you hold your arm more or less straight out in front of you, particularly if your body is rotated slightly away from directly facing the plane (as you see often at contests), then you simply can't get a full range of motion for "up" control if you use a handle with a vertical grip. It's just the way the wrist is constructed. The position requires that your wrist is in line with your arm and more or less locked so that you can't really get the rotational motion you can get with your elbow and wrist bent. I think this is the source of a lot of comment about the need to have a slightly canted forward handle. It had more to do with body position than with preference. I absolutely agree that the first description is the best. It just provides more precise control because the motion of rotating your wrist is so much easier. That's why, after years of having you talk about this, I built a vertical handle and changed how I flew. I pulled my hand in to 12-18" from my chest (for me to have my hand at about 5' off the ground, my hand is just in front of my sternum). With my hand directly in front of me and insuring that I am squarely facing the plane in maneuvers, it got a lot easier to fly precisely.
But for those still holding their arm more or less straight out with no real elbow or wrist bend, a canted handle is just about required. And I think that it makes things much more difficult overall.
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""The result of increased overhang is an increase in force required to make a given control input.
Ted Fancher ""
Absolutely correct! which is what I told the person who started this thread, and about a 100 others
Now the BIG problem...when the wind blows...the pressure increases dramatically on the leg that has the greater overhang much more than it does on the shorter arm. And if the winds get high enough, you will not be able to turn the plane. I am positive this is exactly what happened to Sparky in the TTs when the wind came up. Sparky was flying very very well and had nice flat 5 ft bottoms, when the higher winds started to blow his ship got lower on the outside pullouts. It didn't seem to me to be any pilot error of Sparky's, just the greatly added pressure that happened when the winds came up and saw a nice overhang bias!!
To compound this problem add the tilted handle effect and you have a recipe for a potential crash that is out of your control....Yea I know it doesn't happen all the time, but I have seen it over and over and over for dozens of years.
You can do yourself a favor and at least spend some time trying the square handle setup out (equal overhang and square to the plane)
Randy
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I love Hans' illustrations, now if we can just assign some variables to them we can formulate some equations. . This is very good! I'm surprised it hasn't been published before.
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OK....
I was convinced I was going to stay out of this but there seems to be one very important factor that I haven't seen mentioned...unless I just missed it. This is after all one of the most "Wordy" threads I've seen yet ( No I'm not picking on you Ted...well maybe I am.) so it's possible someone else mentiond this and I missed it but here goes anyway.
I noticed in the little video of Paul Walker that like me (hey I actually do something like Paul) He does not grip the handle like a tennis racket, but basically holds it in the forward part of his hand...actually more fingers than palm grip.
I had decided a long time ago that this gave me the most freedom of movement and the least bias between up and down motions. Also with the slightly more relaxed grip fine motor control functions (in your hand not the airplane) are faster and more precise.
Holding the handle like this makes a straight up and down position with no handle bias the most natural position.
Those people who fly with the "tennis racket" style grip with the hand tighter around the handle will probably find the biased grip more comfortagble. This is a guess of course because I've tried to fly like this and cannot! Too much muscle memory I suppose, but I've seen some folks like Lou Wolgast that seem to adapt to just about anything.
This of course does not consider the overhang bias which in my opinion can be used as a trimming tool for airplanes that are more sensitive in one direction of turn than the other (and do not have an adjustable elevator) as well as bias to the center of the grip. This is of course irrespective of neutral position of the handle which will certainly be affected by changing the overhang of one end of the handle.
I typically fly with fairly slow controls and do not really notice any difference in small increments of overhang adjustment.
I see different folks flying with what I consider really wierd handle setups that seem to work for them so...more power ....
Randy Cuberly
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I love this thread! #^ #^ #^ #^ #^ #^
Ted
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OK....
I was convinced I was going to stay out of this but there seems to be one very important factor that I haven't seen mentioned...unless I just missed it. This is after all one of the most "Wordy" threads I've seen yet ( No I'm not picking on you Ted...well maybe I am.) so it's possible someone else mentiond this and I missed it but here goes anyway.
I noticed in the little video of Paul Walker that like me (hey I actually do something like Paul) He does not grip the handle like a tennis racket, but basically holds it in the forward part of his hand...actually more fingers than palm grip.
I had decided a long time ago that this gave me the most freedom of movement and the least bias between up and down motions. Also with the slightly more relaxed grip fine motor control functions (in your hand not the airplane) are faster and more precise.
Holding the handle like this makes a straight up and down position with no handle bias the most natural position.
Those people who fly with the "tennis racket" style grip with the hand tighter around the handle will probably find the biased grip more comfortagble. This is a guess of course because I've tried to fly like this and cannot! Too much muscle memory I suppose, but I've seen some folks like Lou Wolgast that seem to adapt to just about anything.
This of course does not consider the overhang bias which in my opinion can be used as a trimming tool for airplanes that are more sensitive in one direction of turn than the other (and do not have an adjustable elevator) as well as bias to the center of the grip. This is of course irrespective of neutral position of the handle which will certainly be affected by changing the overhang of one end of the handle.
I typically fly with fairly slow controls and do not really notice any difference in small increments of overhang adjustment.
I see different folks flying with what I consider really wierd handle setups that seem to work for them so...more power ....
Randy Cuberly
Hi Randy,
I'll go quite a ways further and state that any flier who grips the handle in the palm of his hand (the tennis grip) is giving away the most valuable source of maneuver refinement at his/her disposal--the fingers. Once again, I don't believe you'll find many top level pilots who grip their handle in the palm. It's more like a good golf grip. No firmer than necessary and in the fingers.
Another story ... sorry.
Another great stunt innovation was the result of the very clever mind of Bob Baron. He, I believe, was the primary developer of the adjustable control that is the heart of pretty much every serious stunt handle since; the ubiquitous bar with sliding adjustable up and down line attachment points and even a certain amount of in-flight neutral adjustment. It was brilliant!
And, like Bobby Hunt's handle I "had" to have one. When Gene Martine made his versions available I got one immediately.
The handle was very much like a hot rock in terms of grip size and naturally "square" (designed to be used with a vertical handle at neutral). What was very different from the Hot Rock was that the "arms"--the ends of the "U" to which the line attach bar were attached were missing. Instead, there were just two bolts that went through the grip and to which the attach bar was affixed.
Well, I flew a bunch of flights with this great new handle and was seriously disappointed. The same plane I'd been flying very well seemed to have a mind of its own when it came to pull outs: high/low/perfect; perfect/low/high totally random and the angles at which it exited corners were all different as well.
After several flying session filled with frustration I finally decided to give it up and go back to my old Hot Rock. Ta da! everything was instant back to normal. There was, however, something that immediately jumped out at me from the very first flight back on the Hot Rock. All of a sudden I felt things I had never noticed before. Where my index and pinky fingers touched the arms of the Hot Rock I was suddenly aware of the pressures I applied with those fingers to the arms to "refine" corner sizes and pullout angles. The Baron handle didn't have a surface against which the top and bottom of those fingers could do the work they'd done for so many years and the airplane, as a result, wasn't getting the refined inputs it was used to getting. The patterns fell apart.
Long story short; I went home that very day; got out the Baron Handle and disassembled it. I then added "arms" to cover the bolts just about as long as the arms on the Hot Rock and spaced "identically" to the Hot rock so that they touched the index and pinky fingers exactly the same as the Hot Rock. The result was a "nearly" perfect Bob Baron adjustable Hot Rock. I used that for many years including a couple of Walker Cup wins and two team trials and WCs.
At that last WC in Shanghai I caddied a lot for Mr. PW. That's when I noticed his hard point--essentially Hot Rock shaped--handle. I knew that more so than anyone save perhaps Bob Baron, Paul never did anything without a good reason. Not being as smart as Paul but having no shame whatsoever, I immediately pictured a marriage of the Baron adjustabililty and the Walker hard point. Thus was born the "Ted" handle which is a total rip-off of the bright ideas of two of stunt's greatest minds.
I guarantee it's worth the twenty or thirty bucks it costs for any stunt flier who wants to be the best he can be to try one out. Unless he/she thinks they know more about this stuff than Bob and Paul. I sure didn't but I haven't used anything but a Ted handle since the wedding.
Ted
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Hmmmmm,
Well I also have used nothing but the "TED" Handle since I saw you flying with it many years ago. I have about a dozen of the ones made by Carl Shoup.
I have a couple of the "Big Ones" however that I can't seem to use.
May be exactly what you described in your post. No finger contact with the ends.
Randy Cuberly
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Hmmmmm,
Well I also have used nothing but the "TED" Handle since I saw you flying with it many years ago. I have about a dozen of the ones made by Carl Shoup.
I have a couple of the "Big Ones" however that I can't seem to use.
May be exactly what you described in your post. No finger contact with the ends.
Randy Cuberly
Hi Randy, I'll bet you're exactly right!
Ted
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I had a low pull out at the team trials. Scrapped the rudder and broke a prop. Randy Smith said it was because my handle was bias. I said no way was my handle bias. Well while talking on the phone I went to the car and got the handle out and looked at it and sure enough. The handle I had become accustom to using had a 1/4 inch bias on the down side.
It was explained to me as the wind picks up more stick pressure was applied to the down side. Meaning I had to put more input to the handle to get it to turn the same. :! The bulb came on. I wont be using my old handle any longer.
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I been watching this thread for some time now and trying to think of something to say without sounding like the jerk that I am. It is not the handle that causes crashes. Yes I changed handles at Tulsa last year and lost an airplane. It was not the handles fault. It was my fault as I had not used that handle in a while. I fly most of the time by sight and not by feel of the airplane. I have used the hard point handle, but, keep going back to the regular handles with all kinds of adjustments that confuse me at times. When I get a set up that works I try to keep it that way. Myself, I am to blame for my crashes and not the handle.
I hear of getting the timing down and engine runs as well as other stuff. I guess what I am saying is get used to the equipment in all kinds of conditions. Having fun, DOC Holliday
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Hi Doc
Of course you are correct, a handle cannot fly an airplane, so it cannot cause the crash, however here is the problem with your statement, It is a fact that in certain condition if you are using a handle with overhang so extreme,(over 1\4 inch) it will be impossible to turn the ship if winds are high enough. In some circumstances you cannot put enough muscle into the handle to turn the plane in time! You can't just "get use" to that in all conditions
So it maybe best to say this,it is the "Choice" of handles (pilots choice) that can and do, cause crashes, and it is about impossible to "get use" to a handle with a large amount of overhang bias when the winds are changing quickly and blowing hard. The amount of force you have to put into the side with much more overhang is just too variable to fly an accurate pattern.
So bottom line is it all comes down to pilot error, some times we don't know, what we don't know.
Regards
Randy
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Too much CG forward, and misalligned controls can be part of the problem. For example, a stock Nobler with a 9 1/2oz engine in the nose turns quite willingly and quickly outside but requires significantly more handle input sooner to execute an inside turn of the same radius and height. In this instance flap size blanketing the effects of the elevator in combination with nose heavy and misalligned controls is the problem. It would be exacerbated using a handle with built in cant forward and to much overhang. I have flown lots of my friends planes and found that many are to much positively stable and depending on surface size and placement relative to each other in combination with missalligned flaphorn to elevator horn and often set without the bellcrank in the neutral position. You get a plane that turns willingly one direction, but not the other, often requiring input well ahead of the intended change of direction.
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I have thought about this thread for days. I have concluded that there are two basic types of handles for us to choose from.
They are OPEN. aka teds,hotrock, ezjust, hunts, kaz and many others.
Closed type, Aka Morris, brodak, feldman and others.
Here is my point; overhang can exist on the open type handle, AK Hunt has a longer bottom arm.
On the closed type handles there is no overhang because the lines are connected to the bar. The handle that is behind the bar cannot be called overhang and only influence's the hand position.
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I have thought about this thread for days. I have concluded that there are two basic types of handles for us to choose from.
They are OPEN. aka teds,hotrock, ezjust, hunts, kaz and many others.
Closed type, Aka Morris, brodak, feldman and others.
Here is my point; overhang can exist on the open type handle, AK Hunt has a longer bottom arm.
On the closed type handles there is no overhang because the lines are connected to the bar. The handle that is behind the bar cannot be called overhang and only influence's the hand position.
Sorry, Chuck. Have to disagree.
The overhang is the distance from the point of rotation (really the wrist for most folks) and where the control lines attach to the handle. Makes no difference if the attachment point is at the end of a simple arm (like a hot rock) or on a bar attached to that arm.
Again, think in extremes and the problem becomes immediately clear. Think of a "closed type handle" that has the attachment bar positioned five feet from the grip. Every time you give control input you're going to rotate that bar toward you and as you do so you'll be pulling that airplane toward you. 45 degrees of up control will require pulling the airplane toward you a couple of feet.
Now, remember that that airplane is pulling some 20 or so pounds due to centrifugal force. As you rotate the five foot long handle to 45 degrees every degree is going to increase the "arm" against which that force is fighting your control input. I'll leave it to our math wizards to tell you how much torque you'll have to apply to get that 45 degrees of deflection but my bet is most of us aren't strong enough to do so. In addition, to make a square corner in a half second or so your going to have to pull that ship toward you--all 75 or so pounds of it-- and then return the handle to neutral. A square eight will be sort of like 18 75# wrist curls in about 15 or so seconds. Maybe Governor Ahnold could do that. I sure couldn't.
Overhang is a very real factor of handle design. Randy's comments are on the money although I'm not sure how much overhang and how much wind would result in a fatal outcome for any individual's pride and joy.
Ted
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"Overhang is a very real factor of handle design. Randy's comments are on the money although I'm not sure how much overhang and how much wind would result in a fatal outcome for any individual's pride and joy.
Ted"
Hi Ted
I am sure this will vary from plane to plane, much of it depending on weight, But I can offer this, at Muncie a few years back and at a few of the Florida contest, the winds we flew in were 12 MPH to 22 MPH, I had my MNT handle set up with about 3/16 more overhang than I normally fly with (close to a Hot Rock position), It took all I could give to make the pullouts, even then many were at the 2 foot level, and had near crashes, The line tenion was very very high as the wind kited and whipped the airplane on the outer corners of the square eight. I pulled the adjustment back 3\16 inch and it was a much much easier plane to fly in high winds, The corners were much easier to turn, and the overall handle "stick pressure" went down dramatically, it was more like flying in 5 MPH winds. I have done this dozens of times over the years with mine,and several other people's setups.
Without the overhang adjustments it would indeed be almost impossible to fly in some of the high wind conditions we face. Not to mention how much easier it is to "tune" the handle to help you increase the performance level of flying your stuntship.
There is just no comparision on how much easier it is to fly in all conditions with a proper setup handle, and an airplane that is not nose heavy.
Regards
Randy
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"Without the overhang adjustments it would indeed be almost impossible to fly in some of the high wind conditions we face. Not to mention how much easier it is to "tune" the handle to help you increase the performance level of flying your stuntship.
There is just no comparision on how much easier it is to fly in all conditions with a proper setup handle, and an airplane that is not nose heavy.
Regards
Randy"
Hi Randy,
Sounds like you and I have to start the "church of the redeemer handle". Yup, there is absolutely no question that handle design has as many physical "principles" as does the aerodynamics by which the airplanes fly. Ideally the handle will be right with respect to those principles and any "adjustment" that have to be made will be by the human attached to it. Ted
Randy, an edited p.s. Bless you for the comment about "nose heavy airplanes in the wind". I actually missed it the first few times I read your post. Yeah, handle overhang makes things tough but nose heavy airplanes are almost a total deal breaker in really high winds if (more likely when) they wind up. The faster they go the more the nose wants to swing away from the radius of turn, the more control it takes to make them stay at the desired radius, which increases G loads and the tendency for the nose to swing away again as a result starts the whole "dog chasing it's tail" scenario to start all over again.
None of this stuff is "Black Magic" and all of it is very real.
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Ted,
Well, looks like I'm a convert to the church of the redeemer handle. Having read so many posts by yourself and others advocating uprightness in how we handle planes (sorry, that was bad--the Devil made me do it VD~), I decided to try abandoning my downcast ways (eegad), and give verticality a shot last weekend. I was expecting discomfort and a lengthy acclimatization process, but was pleasantly surprised to find that it took less than one flight to start getting the hang of it, with noticeable improvement wherever Down control or just holding level inverted were involved. I'm guessing that upcoming trips to the field will be especially productive, and I'm looking forward to practicing my new religion.
BTW, thanks for your email reply to my engine question.
Kim Mortimore
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Ditto KIM, In the near future I am going to construct a new (for me) handle that will incorporate all things that have been posted here as the correct and best way. That means it will be vertical and have minimum overhang on both ends. I am also considering no longer using the tennis racket grip and going to a golf grip. Once I have done the design and construction I'll make a photo and post it. I will also post the results of flight tests. In testing the number of flights it takes to reach a conclusion.
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Chuck,
Sounds interesting. I would like to see the results of your new handle project.
I'm curious if anyone has tried making a handle that is just a bar with the lines attached to the front, right above and below the fingers (or even to the top of the bar) for even less overhang. It would require a plane with controls set up for very wide line spacing.
Kim Mortimore
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Kim,
Bless you for your testimony! ::) ::) ::) ::)
I do hope you find the transition continues to be painless. There is no doubt it will feel different but I think the rewards will prove valuable in the long run.
Ted
p.s. You're more than welcome, by the way.
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Chuck,
Sounds interesting. I would like to see the results of your new handle project.
I'm curious if anyone has tried making a handle that is just a bar with the lines attached to the front, right above and below the fingers (or even to the top of the bar) for even less overhang. It would require a plane with controls set up for very wide line spacing.
Kim Mortimore
Kim,
That's a really good question and one that I attempted to answer in my two articles on handles back when I was doing the Stunt column in Model Aviation. I'll try to paraphrase my discussion in less than a bazillion words.
The bottom line is that the more the line attachment point moves toward the wrist the lower will be control forces required for a given airplane response. It is the reverse of the five foot overhang I discussed in my last lengthy post.
The virtue of some overhang is that it is more or less like castering of wheels. Wheels "caster" so that they will want to continue in the same path when rolled. A handle with overhang wants to return to "neutral" because as you rotate (up control for instance) the up arm swings above the point of rotation (the wrist) and the load is multiplied by the "arm" that results. Simultaneously, the down arm moves up closer to the pivot (wrist) and the force on the down arm lowers as a result. The net result is the handle wants to return to neutral. It is "stabilizing" in that it "wants" to return the controls to neutral.
My article took the concept a step further than you suggest by moving the line attach points "behind" the wrist so that when "up" control is given the "up" arm gets closer to the pivot (wrist) and the down arm gets further away. This results in a load on the handle that is "de-stabilizing". IOW, the load on the lines wants to increase the input because the down line is pulling harder "around" the pivot than is the up line. A handle in this configuration would be very difficult to fly a pattern with because "inputs" to the controls would try to increase the handle angle and a return to neutral would require the "muscle" we ordinarily employ to displace the control surfaces in the first place.
Your concept is somewhere short of having the attach point directly over the wrist. As a result there will still be some change in the up and down arms as input is applied--but less than the same handle with arms. As a result the loads for inputs will be somewhat less but there will still be some tendency to return to neutral (stabilizing).
If you made a handle where the line attachment point is directly over the pivot (wrist) there would be no "arm" induced leverage to increase or decrease inputs. The net result would be a handle with no "feel" to inputs (IMPORTANT NOTE: THIS IS TECHNICALLY NOT QUITE RIGHT BECAUSE THE AIRLOADS ON THE FLAPS AND ELEVATORS WILL BIAS THE PULL ON THE TWO LINES AND WILL ALWAYS PROVIDE SOME "STABILIZING" RETURN TO NEUTRAL FORCES. IOW, THE TOTAL TENSION ON THE TWO LINES WILL NOT CHANGE; WHAT WILL CHANGE WILL BE THAT THE SHARE OF THAT TOTAL TENSION WILL INCREASE ON THE LINE PULLED TOWARD THE FLYER AND DECREASE ON THE LINE MOVING FORWARD. THE DIFFERENCE IN TENSION WILL BE EQUAL TO THE AIRLOADS ON THE DEFLECTED FLAPS AND ELEVATORS). It is, however, still entirely possible to move the line attach point far enough behind the pivot (wrist) to achieve the situation where control deflection will, in and of itself, try to drive the handle to greater deflection rather than return to neutral.
Does any of this make any sense??????
Ted
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Ted,
I am very encouraged by the feel of the vertical neutral handle. I think I had previously mixed together two separate handle issues in my thinking and treated them the same: "vertical neutral" (VN) which we have been discussing, and "upright handle" (UH) where the handle is not tilted left or right during inverted and outsides. Brett said that he had been flying Expert for several years before he became really comfortable with UH (if my memory is working), and I thought "Yikes and eegad! No way am I going to go thru that kind of relearning curve. I'll croak before I'm done with it." I think I had "tarred" both UH and VN with the same brush. So I'm glad the whim to try VN came along.
Yes, your overhang discussion does make sense and is very helpful. Since the effects of zero or "negative" overhang appear to be neutral or disadvantageous, if I read you correctly, the interest in them is theoretical--it helps to grok the fizziks involved. However, positive overhang shorter than we typically use seems like it might be an interesting practical possibility, both reducing the amount of control force required and (maybe) affecting favorably that nebulous thing called "feel".
Speaking of feel, I posted a diatribe a while back claiming that narrow line spacing is overrated, based primarily on the the spongy, rubber band-like sensation that I have experienced when using narrow spacing, as you may recall, since you participated in that discussion. I'm thinking it might be interesting to try an experiment using a handle with low to very low overhang and the wide line spacing that would require. Maybe I can put together a simple quick-build plane with external, adjustable, removeable controls, starting with, say, a 5" bellcrank to accommodate the wide spacing, and see what happens.
Hope to see you at Meet 'n Meat.
Kim
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Kim,
FWIW, I do believe that setting up the airborne geometry to allow wider spacing would be another "detail" improvement. A lot of what we do is the result of refined inputs that are based on feel. As the airborne systems get more and more mechanical advantage (longer horns, smaller deflections, etc.) some of that feel is lost. The smaller the handle spacing the more you lose that feel as well. I think wider line spacing would result in greater feedback of these reduced control loads and possibly make maneuvers a tiny bit more precise. Again, not a quantum leap sort of thing but likely another detail that would allow more consistency.
I emphasize again the airborne system would need to be configured so that roughly the same amount of handle deflection is required for the "same" corner.
Glad you're enjoying your experiment. Unsure about the Meat and Meet. I've got a concert the same day that I'll have to bail on to get there on Sunday (my son's surprise 40th birthday is Saturday so that's out of the question). If the "maestro" has plenty of singers for the concert I'll take the month off from that and go visit my other friends (maybe even see if I can still do a pattern myself!).
Ted
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As we all know, trimming thr handle is just as important as any other trimming on your plane and I think the more experienced you are at flying stunt the more you will realise this. I thrim my handle to get the turning radias as close to the same both directions. Also the trim should be for level flight in both directions. This will make flying your level laps a lot eisier. Find someone that has good experence in trimming your handle to help you and i am sure you will fly much better. H^^ H^^ H^^
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"FWIW, I do believe that setting up the airborne geometry to allow wider spacing would be another "detail" improvement. A lot of what we do is the result of refined inputs that are based on feel. As the airborne systems get more and more mechanical advantage (longer horns, smaller deflections, etc.) some of that feel is lost. The smaller the handle spacing the more you lose that feel as well. I think wider line spacing would result in greater feedback of these reduced control loads and possibly make maneuvers a tiny bit more precise. Again, not a quantum leap sort of thing but likely another detail that would allow more consistency."
Hi Ted
I have been chasing this for about 25 years, and have came to the conclusion that a 1 to 1 ratio is as good as it gets for me. I have flown\built stunt ships with 3 , 3.5, 4 and 4.5 bellcranks.
My ships I use now have the best "feel" at the handle of "stick pressure" and ease of turn in all conditions at a 4 inch spread of the lines.
I am using currently, a 4 inch bellcrank
I have flown mine and many other ships at 4.5 and up to 5 inch handle spread, and down to 3 inch handle spread.
I don't like either when it gets much off from the bellcrank spread, I especially do not like the 3 inch handle spread, as the feel tends to go away , I would describe it as a numb handle.
The 5 inch spread affects the stick pressure and makes it change too much as winds changes.
So I setup my ships as close to the 4 inch span and then adjust the overhang, and a very slight CG adjustment till it feels dead on.
The handle will sometimes wind up at 3 7\8 or 4 1\8 from making the very fine adjustment, But this is in the range.
I use a 3\4 inch output arm off of a 4 inch bellcrank for 1.25 inch flaphorn connection, and a 7\8 inch Bellcrank output for 1.5 inch flap connections, on the elevator, this setup seems to always wind up at almost 1 to 1, or just a slight bit faster on the elevator IE: 1 inch to 1 inch or 1 inch to 15\16th
I have also retrimmed both the ship and handle of a couple of "other peoples stuntships" that had the planes setup with a very wide, or very small spacing, the planes felt better and they flew them better after
I have seen some 7 and 8 inch handle spacings and wonder how in the world you could ever fly with them??? My control setups must be way off from what they are using
Regards
Randy
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"...I especially do not like the 3 inch handle spread, as the feel tends to go away , I would describe it as a numb handle."
Hi Randy,
Thanks for that, which is the point I was trying to make in my "Is Narrow Handle Spacing a Free Lunch?" topic a while back. Some people are big advocates of narrow handle spacing.
"...The 5 inch spread affects the stick pressure and makes it change too much as winds changes."
Could I ask you to say a bit more about this--how the stick pressure changes? Do you think this effect might be due in part to the fact that a 5" handle spread is greater than your bellcrank spread? You mentioned that you like to keep the two spreads close to each other.
In your 25 years of experimenting with handles, have you ever tried an armless handle with the lines attached to the front or top of the vertical bar, substantially reducing overhang? This is the thought behind the 5" bellcrank that I mentioned--the idea being to see what would happen with less overhang than conventional handles, using a handle spread wide enough so the line connectors don't touch your fingers, and at the same time keeping handle and bellcrank spreads close. Any thoughts about what affect the lessened overhang might have?
I'm asking a lot questions here but don't want to impose. Any part of this you want to respond to would be much appreciated.
Thanks,
Kim Mortimore
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"...I especially do not like the 3 inch handle spread, as the feel tends to go away , I would describe it as a numb handle."
Hi Randy,
Thanks for that, which is the point I was trying to make in my "Is Narrow Handle Spacing a Free Lunch?" topic a while back. Some people are big advocates of narrow handle spacing.
"...The 5 inch spread affects the stick pressure and makes it change too much as winds changes."
Could I ask you to say a bit more about this--how the stick pressure changes? Do you think this effect might be due in part to the fact that a 5" handle spread is greater than your bellcrank spread? You mentioned that you like to keep the two spreads close to each other.
In your 25 years of experimenting with handles, have you ever tried an armless handle with the lines attached to the front or top of the vertical bar, substantially reducing overhang? This is the thought behind the 5" bellcrank that I mentioned--the idea being to see what would happen with less overhang than conventional handles, using a handle spread wide enough so the line connectors don't touch your fingers, and at the same time keeping handle and bellcrank spreads close. Any thoughts about what affect the lessened overhang might have?
I'm asking a lot questions here but don't want to impose. Any part of this you want to respond to would be much appreciated.
Thanks,
Kim Mortimore
Kim
I have maybe 50 or more handles I have used, I even have had many people make me their killer handle and have bought most everything out there.
I have ones so simple they were made from 5 gallon pail holders, to very nice works of art like the ones Paul Pomposo made for me.
I have made and used hard point handles for about 30 years now, the first ones were the yellow Tatone handles. Scott Bair used these almost exclusily back in the 70s and 80s on his StuntFire designs because he could get a larger spacing, He also used much wider bellcranks then.
I have used a handle similar to what you described but that type is near impossible to keep the airplane tracking thru manouvers as it has hardly any feel, or feedback (stick pressure).
Having too little stick pressure is almost as bad as having too much, You need a certain amount to help the plane go back to neutral, and also to give you feedback pressure in the rounds, loops will just not stay on track with no handle pressure.
I have 2 round handles, these I wanted to use with a certain round bellcrank I got many years ago, The theory behind the round bellcrank is good, but it takes a round handle to complete it. I was going to give Ted feedback on that setup but I never got both of them in one airplane.
I did use the round handle several times on 3 airplanes, It didn't seem to make a lot of differance, if anything the controls felt just a tiny bit faster, and the stick pressure went down, One of the things I didn't like in the round handle was the inability to make the range of adjustments.
I think one day soon I may design another one with more adjustable features in it.
Regards
Randy
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Thanks Ted and Randy. Very informative and useful information. H^^
Kim Mortimore
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Hot Rock! Yayyy! static discharge and all, my big skinny hand still loves 'em. They just feel right. Think I'll cobble up a wooden one or two...
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STATIC DISCHARGE!
Keeps the battery charged, with out that I can't keep on going and going.
Richard, you would really like this one!
All metal in flight adjustable with thumb wheel.
These features allow more metal contact for better current flow LL~
The thumb wheel gives more to do while flying as you can never decide if adjustment is perfect. #^
Added surprise if left laying in hot sun very long. ???
This handle was in some of my dads old stuff, no one remembers it or knows where it came from.
The name cast into it is "Italian" made in Japan
Exact size of Hot rock/Ez-Just small , no plastic to deteriorate!
David
51336
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Probably cost a fortune to reproduce and I like it. DOC Holliday
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My testing of various handle configurations has stopped for the time being. This because the model I am using was giving me lots of odd manifestations. I E one flight would require down pressure for level flight. Next flight would require up pressure for level flight. I never found it comfortable enough to do anything but simple maneuver's. So as I used straight handles and bias handles I became more confused. Could these handles cause such drastic changes? So I gave up and put the model on the work bench. At first just putting strong up and Down inputs everything seemed OK. However when small inputs revealed that there is resistance in the controls around neutral. The model is profile so it was easy to disconnect the elevator. Once I did this the control system became silky smooth. Hmmmm? The elevator movement was found to have friction. So I lubricated the hinges etc. It did no good. The elevator has a 1/8" cross over bar as the elevator's are separate. This turned out to be the source of the friction.
When I get this corrected I will resume my experiment with Biased and Straight handles. By the way this friction could very easily cause a crash.
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My testing of various handle configurations has stopped for the time being. This because the model I am using was giving me lots of odd manifestations. I E one flight would require down pressure for level flight. Next flight would require up pressure for level flight. I never found it comfortable enough to do anything but simple maneuver's. So as I used straight handles and bias handles I became more confused. Could these handles cause such drastic changes? So I gave up and put the model on the work bench. At first just putting strong up and Down inputs everything seemed OK. However when small inputs revealed that there is resistance in the controls around neutral. The model is profile so it was easy to disconnect the elevator. Once I did this the control system became silky smooth. Hmmmm? The elevator movement was found to have friction. So I lubricated the hinges etc. It did no good. The elevator has a 1/8" cross over bar as the elevator's are separate. This turned out to be the source of the friction.
When I get this corrected I will resume my experiment with Biased and Straight handles. By the way this friction could very easily cause a crash.
Looking forward to your getting it back in the air. It'll be fascinating to see how you react to the differences.
Ted
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Chuck, was the plane flying okay before you started expeirmenting? I had one one lyear that just could not trim out. Three flights in a row without changing anything. Each flight was different. Then we started trying more nose weight and then less. Tried leadout movements/locations and tip weights. I then found a sucker that liked the design and bought/talked me out of it. He finally gave up after about thirty flights on the plane. Sometimes it would do a real good pattern and then next flight not stay on the end of the lines even tho it had good tension. At the time I was using the Bigiron version of the E-Z Just 4 inch handle. Have fun, DOC Holliday
PS:I think the plane wound up in the trash bin. jeh
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Doc,
The plane had not been flown for three years. Three months ago I gave away all my flying models because I needed room for the models under construction in my shop. So I had lots of room but nothing to fly. So I borrowed this model and tried it out. It is repaired now and the controls are smooth as can be. It will be OK now. Chuck
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Two flights have been completed. The controls on the plane are no perfect and it flies nicely. First flight was with a straight (Kaz) handle. It was set with the closest line spacing I could get. I had no problem flying the pattern except the sensitivity was to high. Can't close the handle so I switch to one of my biased handles for flight two. This flight was not good because the handle settings are off the insides are good but the outsides are dangerous. Could not fly the pattern with this handle and settings. Next flight will be with this handle with the outside or down line biased to be more sensitive.
Once I have my biased handle trimmed to the plane I will report the results here. As for the Kaz handle. I suppose I could add nose weight to decrease the sensitivity but that is not something I want to do. Any suggestions on this will be welcome.
Chuck
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Two flights have been completed. The controls on the plane are no perfect and it flies nicely. First flight was with a straight (Kaz) handle. It was set with the closest line spacing I could get. I had no problem flying the pattern except the sensitivity was to high. Can't close the handle so I switch (ed) to one of my biased handles for flight two. This flight was not good because the handle settings are off; the insides are good but the outsides are dangerous. Could not fly the pattern with this handle and settings. Next flight will be with this handle with the outside or down line biased to be more sensitive.
Once I have my biased handle trimmed to the plane I will report the results here. As for the Kaz handle. I suppose I could add nose weight to decrease the sensitivity but that is not something I want to do. Any suggestions on this will be welcome.
That red sentences above sounds suspiciously like where this thread began. That's my suggestion! ~^ ~^ ~^
Ted
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Two flights have been completed. The controls on the plane are no perfect and it flies nicely. First flight was with a straight (Kaz) handle. It was set with the closest line spacing I could get. I had no problem flying the pattern except the sensitivity was to high. Can't close the handle so I switch to one of my biased handles for flight two. This flight was not good because the handle settings are off the insides are good but the outsides are dangerous. Could not fly the pattern with this handle and settings. Next flight will be with this handle with the outside or down line biased to be more sensitive.
Once I have my biased handle trimmed to the plane I will report the results here. As for the Kaz handle. I suppose I could add nose weight to decrease the sensitivity but that is not something I want to do. Any suggestions on this will be welcome.
Chuck
Hi Chuck
I would suggest that you go back to the MNT handle, if the overhang adjustment is all the way back..(this is the way many come).. you can set it out away from your hand 1 or 2 holes . That will add some stick pressure and will help you to take away some of the quickness you feel, only move it away from your hand by one or 2 holes if it is back at the first position
Second if your CG is back a bit, add a small amount of nose weight. If your plane is that quick with the MNT handle set as close as it can be you either have controls much too fast, or tail heavy condition, Can you change the controls easy? have you checked the CG location?
Regards
Randy
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Randy.
Thank you for your reply. I have Adjusted the KMT handle as you suggested. The spacing between the lines is now at 3 1/4 " I have moved the overhang forward by one hole top and bottom. I have to say that these small adjustments would seem to be unnoticeable in flight. Perhaps I am in for a surprise. Many of the things I have learned since returning to flying in 2003 have been surprising. I can recall saying that small thinks (differences) can make a big difference. Soon as I fly again I will report the results here.
Chuck
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Hi Chuck
You said you moved the spacing in to 3 1/4, what was it before?
I would suggest making only 1/8 inch movements, that would be 1/4 inch total and that is huge in adjustments.
Please let us know how it goes
Randy
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Randy,
It was 1/8 per side that I closed. So yes 1/4". You feel this is a huge move. I hope your right because that would mean the sensitivity would be to slow and I will need to open it up.
I wonder how we flew in the old days with 3" bellcranks and those big ez-just handles. We also set up the controls per the plans to get 45 degree deflection. Yet I do not remember that we have sensitive airplanes? Did we fly with nose heavy models? Of course back then I and those I flew with where not really good flyers even though we could fly the pattern? Next report will not be for a few days.
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Randy,
It was 1/8 per side that I closed. So yes 1/4". You feel this is a huge move. I hope your right because that would mean the sensitivity would be to slow and I will need to open it up.
I wonder how we flew in the old days with 3" bellcranks and those big ez-just handles. We also set up the controls per the plans to get 45 degree deflection. Yet I do not remember that we have sensitive airplanes? Did we fly with nose heavy models? Of course back then I and those I flew with where not really good flyers even though we could fly the pattern? Next report will not be for a few days.
Chuck
Chuck,
Gotta remember that highly competitive stunt fliers tend to use what might appear to be “hyperbole” when we discuss the effects of changes to the aerodynamics of our airplanes and/or the control systems that manage them. What we consider to be “huge” differences might to the casual flier seem no more than a nuisance. (My good buddy Brett Buck is probably the poster boy for such hyperbole—but for the highly critical and ambitious competitor his descriptions are almost always on they money)
With respect, I’m not sure where you are on that fun/precision spectrum.
Any competitor worth his/her salt refines their equipment to the nth degree. The reason for doing so is that, by doing so, the airplane is adapted to the needs of the pilot rather than the pilot having to adapt to the airplane’s idiosyncrasies. Competition fliers will make what appear to be immeasurable changes to their equipment (especially things like handle neutral, line spacing, flap/elevator ratios and other things that control the manner and rate at which the airplane responds to pilot input) so that the pilot can use what his body tells him/her is the “correct” amount of input and it then translates into the desired response by the airplane.
This is the biggest difference between pilots who find success at the bottom of drums of fuel versus those who find a few tune-up flights prior to a big meet to be a great plenty to get the tricks down pat. If you know what the shapes look like and your natural inputs to produce the appropriate tracks actually do result in the desired flight tracks, flying becomes pretty darn simple. Flying gets a lot tougher if you’ve got to use an unnatural amount of input (either too little or too much or too different) to get the desired response. The only way to get yourself competitive is to re-program your neural-muscular memory banks to those idiosyncrasies. That requires readapting the body every time you fly a different airplane or lay off flying just one such airplane for any length of time.
That latter approach is a recipe for frustration.
All of this is preamble to stating that what Randy refers to as a “huge” difference from ¼” total change might seem silly to you if your flying goals are to have a good time and not to try to win the Walker Cup. One goal I isn’t inherently better than the other, but the demands of doing one versus the other are distinctly different.
Let us know what you think of the changes and how you would describe them from your perspective.
Good stuff in this thread.
Ted Fancher
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Ted,
There is nothing in this thread that I regard as silly. OK that said, To get information like this is very worthwhile to me. As to my flying skills. They are actually quite good. However you cannot judge this yourself until you fly an experts airplane. I have not had the chance to fly yours or Randy's or Brett's etc so it is not easy for me to judge how well I can fly. I do know this. There are models that are very easy to fly because they behave and I can place them in the proper spots. There are other models that I have flown that are so sensitive I wonder how anyone can fly them with precision. What is your experience in this. Can you fly Brett's models well. Is is more or less very much like yours? How many models that belong to others have you flown and where you able to do good with them?
Chuck
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Interest pages n' pages about handles that cause crashes n' rashes...
bottom line (maybe?)
"Whut eva floats yer boat or what handles handle your Ukie-dookie'...one truly is only as good as their last gig or flight?
So with that...here is a shot of Pete Peterson's new control handle concept up for what GRABS YA? LL~
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Ted,
There is nothing in this thread that I regard as silly. OK that said, To get information like this is very worthwhile to me. As to my flying skills. They are actually quite good. However you cannot judge this yourself until you fly an experts airplane. I have not had the chance to fly yours or Randy's or Brett's etc so it is not easy for me to judge how well I can fly. I do know this. There are models that are very easy to fly because they behave and I can place them in the proper spots. There are other models that I have flown that are so sensitive I wonder how anyone can fly them with precision. What is your experience in this. Can you fly Brett's models well. Is is more or less very much like yours? How many models that belong to others have you flown and where you able to do good with them?
Chuck
Great question, Chuck. Your comment about airplanes that are so sensitive you wonder how anyone could fly them really, really makes the point I’m talking about. Give yourself enough concentrated stick time and you could probably teach yourself to fly them reasonably well. Leave it for a couple of months and/or go back to an airplane well suited to you and then return and you’ll have to start burning fuel all over again. It is, quite literally, self defeating.
I’ve been privileged to fly the airplanes of a number of former and current national and world champions. Locally, I believe you could take the airplanes (as flown—handle to tail wheel) of Brett Buck, David Fitzgerald, Bob Hunt, Brian Eather and Ted Fancher and assign them at random to each other and after two or three flights all four of us would be flying them at close to the best we ever could no matter how many gallons of fuel we burned. The predictability and rate of response for a given control input is nearly identical.
I’ve also flown Paul Walker’s airplanes several times over the years and--with the Impacts and its derivatives--I’d have to make very small corrections to the neutral setting and the sensitivity of response to obtain that same level of comfort. They are flyable for me but to make them into the repeatable type of “pick up and fly” after a long layoff deal I’d have to make those (small) changes. Paul, by the way, is one of the few truly special guys who combines absolutely demanding perfection of the systems with an inspirational level of commitment to practice. He’s flown more flights in the last week than I have in the past year. As a result, he’ll beat me almost every time but I’ll never be far behind.
The B-17 had little of that problem. It would have taken a bit more stick time to get used to the mass involved but the linearity of response inside and outside was very comfortable from the get-go. “That” airplane (both of them, although I only flew the first) was a monumental achievement.
Unlike Bobby Hunt and Bart Klapinski and, I’m sure others, I’m not a great natural pilot who can adapt to big response differences or neutral settings in a few laps. I have as many times as not with other people’s airplanes simply stopped flying maneuvers because I was uncomfortable tempting fate with somebody else’s airplane. This is true even with airplanes I’ve judged doing pretty reasonable patterns earlier the same day. In each case it is my belief that what success the pilot had came as a result of adjusting his body to meet the needs of the airplane—a mistake, in my opinion, that I addressed in the earlier post.
Ted
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Wow Ted....
I don't mean to be mean spirited and truly take these pages and pages of posts about "tis' handle OR dat' verses that HANDLE..etc etc...LIGHTLY!!
HOWEVER I DISCOUNT ANY HANDLE WITH A HUGE DOSE AND A BILLONGRAINS OF SALT!!!
YEARS AGO...(humm? My how time flies)......
In those days...I had virtually made it a PRETTY HIGH RISK HABIT after the competition flying was over to RESPECTFULLY REQUEST A FREEBEE' TEST FLIGHT OFF MY PEEEEEEER'S N' FELLOW COMPETITIORS STUNTERS, ESPECIALLY THE MODELS THAT TOOK THE HARDWARE AWAY FROM ME.
Also that came with some equally poor choices in returning that same favor to those who were either foolishly brazenly bold enough to ask me for a FREE BEE FLIGHT on my models in return.
In the process....guess I was extremely lucky to come away with my models mostly intact or no damage at all and one item so over-looked in those tests was the CONTROL HANDLES..
Thinkin back...
FACT!!!MOST of those beautiful models, no matter how beautifully their builder-owners flew them, I think I can say...VIRTUALLY ALL OF THOSE HANDLES...were not adjusted to my own "LAME BRAIN TO MY OWN LEARNED MUSCLE MEMORY THANG'-THING~????
Even the slightest out of adjustment...starting at handle, or the matched (or miss matche) line lengths, weight of those lines..the dia. etc..leadout sweep, outboard weight, CG locations...etc etc etc...Make such a huge "IMPACT" in how we perceive how much we like or dislike how the stunt model out there on the end of the line flies?
Bottom line again: Does it all make sense that it ALL START WITH THAT ONE ALL IMPORTANT THING!
THAT OL' HUMAN EYE-TO-BRAIN-TO MUSCLE MEMORY'S DIFFICULT JOB...SIMPLY TO TEACH AND PROGRAM OUR BODIES HOW TO HANDLE THAT DIGGITY DARN HANDLE FROM HEAVEN OR THE PITS OF HELL IN A HANDBASKET![/!!b]
End of rant...and main lesson learned:
If you see old Shultzie approaching your purty brand new model for a test ride...AND JUST SAY! NO! VD~ VD~ VD~HELL NO!!!
"HEY TED! HOW BOUT A TEST RIDE ON THAT NEW STUNT MACHINE OF YERS?" %^
This post will self destruct in 10 minutes...(much longer than my last fatal flight...that's for certain. LL~ LL~
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Thanks Schultzie. My son and I fly identical handles, but, have different settings. I am re-learning with the grand kids that their nuetral is different than mine and each of them is different than the other. DOC Holliday
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Thanks Schultzie. My son and I fly identical handles, but, have different settings. I am re-learning with the grand kids that their nuetral is different than mine and each of them is different than the other. DOC Holliday
Hi Doc,
It would never occur to me to suggest that anybody has to do the things I suggest are valuable. This is a hobby--one that I've enjoyed for a lifetime--but a hobby nonetheless. I've been fortunate to have achieved some success (competitively, which isn't everybody's thing) and enjoy sharing what I think I've learned over the years. I personally believe that there is value in what I suggest is important but don't think for a minute I'm going to change the minds of people that have found opposing routes to enjoying the hobby.
I think that's the beauty of the forums (for which I thank guys like Sparky and Len); that guys can easily share their points of view with literally hundreds of others around the world from the comfort of their desk at home. Readers are perfectly free to pick and choose those points of view they believe have value. I am naturally predisposed to trying to prove (in an amicable fashion) the value of my point of view. Again, each reader can make up his or her own mind whether those thoughts have any value at all.
I believe in what I suggest and make every reasonable effort to try to convince people to try what I think might be helpful. For instance, I don't think it's a coincidence that I could pick up the airplanes of guys like David, Brett, Bob Hunt, Brian Eather and (almost) Paul Walker and fly them at very high levels of performance without having to adapt to the way they are set up. I simply think that it is pertinent to consider the similarities of demonstrably successful equipment (and their adjustment).
I'm glad that your grandkids and you are having a great time and learning about what works for each of you. If they stick with the event and are someday demonstrably expert in their efforts I will happily read with great interest what it is they believe made their approach successful. It isn't a zero sum game. We can all almost certainly learn from each other.
Ted
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Randy,
It was 1/8 per side that I closed. So yes 1/4". You feel this is a huge move. I hope your right because that would mean the sensitivity would be to slow and I will need to open it up.
I wonder how we flew in the old days with 3" bellcranks and those big ez-just handles. We also set up the controls per the plans to get 45 degree deflection. Yet I do not remember that we have sensitive airplanes? Did we fly with nose heavy models? Of course back then I and those I flew with where not really good flyers even though we could fly the pattern? Next report will not be for a few days.
Hi Chuck
I think you will find the 1/4 inch spacing movement a big help in going the direction you want to go it, The mere fact that you can fine tune the handle after that is going to be a tremendous help to you in trimming.
About the large Hot Rock, I had them but I could never get use to them or use them at all, The small one was Ok, but the large one made my ships so fast they were impossible for me to fly .
You will find after these handle exercises, that being able to trim the handle is nearly as important as trimming the airplane, and an adjustable handle will effectively be the control system trim in your planes... This is critical if you want to get the most out of your flying and your stuntships, Plus it make flying your planes so much more enjoyable
Regards
Randy
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Hi Randy :)
I am on a short schedule but I did fly this morning. I will not be able to fly again until Oct 7th because we are going on a trip to PA. OK I only had time for one flight and I used the Straight (kaz) handle adjusted with more overhang and minimum line spacing. All this to reduce the sensitivity. It worked! While still a touch sensitive I flew the complete pattern. The model tracked very easily and the corners where very good. I flew high for safety of course. I know that after three more flights I will feel very comfortable with this handle. I did notice some wobble in the top of the hour glass so I did another one. It is doing something up there that isn't right? (more on this later) I also set the neutral on the handle mechanically. Handle 90 degrees with the controls level. This proved to be uncomfortable for me. So I shortened the up line for the next flight to make it feel more natural to me. When I got home I hung the model by the lead outs to see if the nose pointed downward. I did not. It appeared to be straight ahead. (leadouts are all the way forward) So I moved the leadouts back and now the nose hangs slightly down. So next time out I will be testing two changes. Handle neutral and leadouts moved back. I am getting lots of help with this and I do appreciate it.
Chuck
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Having returned from a short vacation trip I went out to fly today. It is still very hot down here in Florida so I did not fly a lot but here are the results. Previous adjustments where. Moved neutral on the handle and moved the wing tip lead outs back.
1st handle. It works fine but if you vertical guys used it it would be in the up position and you would have to apply down to fly it. BUT IT WORKS PERFECT FOR ME.
2ND leadout move, line tension went up wallowing around in the hour glass went away. But now the wing flops about (hinges) also I can see both wheels (all of the inside one and about 20% of the outside one) I don't like that. I removed some wingtip weight (has three large bricks in there took one out) This seems to have fixed the hinging. Actually I think it just improved it, it still flops around some. Line tension remained good. I flew two patterns and on the second flight brought the bottoms down near proper altitude. The model is still sensitive and there is no longer anyway to bring the lines closer together on this handle. I am going to add a little nose weight to calm it down. The grass we fly from is being kept higher so I will add bigger wheels to get some weight on the nose and make the ground handling better.
The tip weights, I will remove them and weight them and replace them with smaller size leads to get a finer trim. I could increase the overhang on the handle by one more hole. Will that make the sensitivity less? THANKS GUYS CHUCK
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Having returned from a short vacation trip I went out to fly today. It is still very hot down here in Florida so I did not fly a lot but here are the results. Previous adjustments where. Moved neutral on the handle and moved the wing tip lead outs back.
1st handle. It works fine but if you vertical guys used it it would be in the up position and you would have to apply down to fly it. BUT IT WORKS PERFECT FOR ME.
2ND leadout move, line tension went up wallowing around in the hour glass went away. But now the wing flops about (hinges) also I can see both wheels (all of the inside one and about 20% of the outside one) I don't like that. I removed some wingtip weight (has three large bricks in there took one out) This seems to have fixed the hinging. Actually I think it just improved it, it still flops around some. Line tension remained good. I flew two patterns and on the second flight brought the bottoms down near proper altitude. The model is still sensitive and there is no longer anyway to bring the lines closer together on this handle. I am going to add a little nose weight to calm it down. The grass we fly from is being kept higher so I will add bigger wheels to get some weight on the nose and make the ground handling better.
The tip weights, I will remove them and weight them and replace them with smaller size leads to get a finer trim. I could increase the overhang on the handle by one more hole. Will that make the sensitivity less? THANKS GUYS CHUCK
Hi Chuck
Depending on where the CG is, I would try adding a little nose weight..before you add anymore to the overhang, try the nose weight first, I think you are pretty close now, I would also try removing a small amount of the tip weight still in there and fly it again
Try 1 thing at a time, then fly a time or 2 before you make another adjustment
Try also to look at the wing when in square corners see if the outboard tip is being pushed up or down
Randy
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Latest flights,
Today after changing the wheels to heavier and larger size the plane now flies great. Corners are still sharp and the sensitivity is in my range. There may be nothing further to do?
OK now that I can fly with a straight type handle I am going to try to duplicate these settings in my Biased handle. My Kaz handle that I am currently using is not 90 degrees for neutral. But it is very comfortable this way for me. I believe the handle is probably very close to the Bob Hunt model of years past. Of course the line spacing is much less on the Kaz handle.
So then after all this what is the point of it? I am not sure? In order to feel comfortable I still had to change the handle from being 90 degrees for neutral. I suppose in the old days I adjusted the EZ-Just to do the same thing. Didn't we all set it to what was comfortable for each of us?
Causing the plane to crash. If the handle was set to a place where it was comfortable to fly level than I would say the the Bias did not cause the crash. Funny now I went through this period with a new model and handle that I had a dangerous situation that could well of caused a crash. But it was not the handle. It was the sticking controls on the elevator that brought out the danger. Today that same plane with the sticking removed is a pussy cat. Very easy to fly.
Chuck
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"So then after all this what is the point of it? I am not sure? In order to feel comfortable I still had to change the handle from being 90 degrees for neutral. I suppose in the old days I adjusted the EZ-Just to do the same thing. Didn't we all set it to what was comfortable for each of us? "
Hi Chuck
The point for many people is..You now have a setup that does NOT have overhang bias, and you have NOW a completely adjustable handle, in terms of independent up\down overhang bias, or just overhang, up\down adjustments, independent on each leg of the up or down. Now I would try to start getting the handle closer to the 90 degree setting. You can get used to it and it will make you able to fly better.
With a handle that has one leg longer than the other and is NOT adjustable you will NEVER have consistany in the winds. I cannot stress enough how important it is to have a setup that turns close to the same when the stuntship gets loaded up by high winds, You can never have that with a much longer leg (up or down) on the handle.
Overhang bias, with a longer leg on either can, will, and does cause crashed airplanes, I have seen this many times, It also cause flyers to bail out of patterns and not fly because of the inconsistent and un-equal turns
Regards
Randy
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Hi Randy,
Thank you for pointing this out to me. Based on what you have said I am not going to attempt to get the same result from my overhang handle. I will start adjusting to 90 degrees as you said.
Down here in Florida on most every morning we are flying in dead calm air. It is dangerous and we do learn to walk backwards because of it.
Contests are another story. There is always wind, good and bad at contests.
This thread has proved to be a very good experience for me and I have learned from it.
Thank you for your Patience with me.
Chuck
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Bump for Michael
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Dont know so much about the handle's, but both of the inverted crashes I seen this year the pilot ran out of down because they lifted there arm up when they got close to the ground. Some of us were talking about this, it work good when upright. Is it just something most of us can't do inverted is push the arm down at the ground?
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On handle adjustments....... a couple years ago, I was having a bit of a problem with the outsides turning quicker than the insides. It was at a contest and Randy was helping me out so he can back it up. I have been flying a long time with my elbow relaxed which automatically creates a vertical hand at neutral (like I said in another post, try it, you will see that there is no forward tilt of the hand if the arm is bent). I was actually tilting my hand "BACK" at neutral ad didn't realize it. Randy told my son to go do something to my handle which I not told about. Next time I flew the model, the outsides and insides were almost exactly the same, a great improvement. Aaron had adjusted the handle neutral slightly by shortening the up line so that I had to move my hand back to a pure vertical position.
Again, the way you hold your arm will be a major factor in handle tilt. If you fly with a very straight arm, the more forward tilt your hand has. The more you relax your elbow, the closer the hand comes to the body and subsequently the more vertical the hand's axis becomes (that's a given for everyone who doesn't have a physical deformity of huge proportions) . In this position ( a bent elbow and a forward tilted handle), "down control" movement becomes extremely difficult if the handle is tilted forward. Try it (but not hooked up to a flying model! LOL!!)
Big Bear
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Thanks for the bump Randy.
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It could also be the line spacing was set too narrow on the biased handle.. D>K
This is the one I was looking before I posted it. I had crashed just recently with a bias handle it just seemed the plane was not reacting. ??? So after a fix the next flight I moved the spacing apart and all was well. y1 H^^
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Han, as Randy pointed out, the handle could very well be the source of sluggishness on outside turns. It can easily be enough to cause the crash you had, particularly since you had limited flying on a new plane and didn't have a good feel for it.
The main reason I like having the axis of the hand grip perpendicular to the lines is that it makes it very easy to see that everything is hooked up properly from one flight to the next. No wiggling the handle and asking someone if the controls are in neutral. Put a mark on the plane, after it is all trimmed out, to show the elevator neutral when the handgrip is vertical. You can see it instantly. A strategically placed trim line in the paint work does a good job.
Nobody flies with their hand perfectly centered on their chest. Everybody does a fair amount of arm waving during a pattern. That itself changes the angles between the lines and planes an adds control input. So the arguments for putting some angle between the hand grip and the line attach points doesn't hold much water. Maybe for ratracers or if a person has a real physical problem with wrist movement, but aotherwise, once you learn the feel of how the plane flies with a nice, squared up control system with no built in biases things will get much easier.
The rest of the control system has to be set up to make all the angles between the various pushrods as close to 90 deg. as possible. This minimizes the non-linearity of the controls. As Larry Renger and a couple others have shown, it is pretty much impossible to make the controls perfectly linear, but getting all the angles close to 90 deg. works pretty well. Make sure there is a way to adjust the amount the flaps move relative to the elevator.
Make the lines as absolutely close to the same length as you can. I do this by making up one end of each line and staking them to the ground. Grab both lines and tug hard on them and wrap them around a small screw driver to set where the second loop will be and go to town with your favorite terminations. Both lines need to be under similar tension when you do this to keep them close.
Set the internal controls so the bell crank is parallel to the axis of the line attachments at the handle. On many planes the BC is set forward of where the leadouts exit the wing tip so it may have to be angled a bit. Mounting the bellcrank further back makes it easier to get everything square. Otherwise you may have to reposition the pushrod hole in the bellcrank.
After all that, you can get into fine tuning the handle as part of the trimming process. Randy is right. As little as 1/8 in in line spacing or the overhang to the line attach point can make a noticeable difference. I recently spent some time with an old plane. Narrowing the line spacing 1/4 in. and moving the down line attach point out 1/4 in. changed it from a jumpy plane that took total concentration to fly smooth to one that still turned on dime but exactly the same in both directions and eliminated all the jumpiness in corners.
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FYI; I now use a straight handle. One day I found myself nearly crashing with the biased handle. (outside loop)
Chuck Feldman
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Having just lost my Vector in a similar situation as noted in the first post and almost losing a Primary Force in the exact situation I found the elevator control horns loose. The Vector's broke out of the plywood end mounts and the Force due to the balsa weakening.
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Having just lost my Vector in a similar situation as noted in the first post and almost losing a Primary Force in the exact situation I found the elevator control horns loose. The Vector's broke out of the plywood end mounts and the Force due to the balsa weakening.
Not trying to be nasty Perry, but broken controls have a bias all their own- usually straight down!
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another crash just happened because of handle overhang bias, so I bumped the thread for reading by an interested party
Randy
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Interesting thought...
If I'm not mistaken, back in the 70's Bobby Hunt won the NATS and worlds with a Hunt Handle which is both biased, has what a 2 inch overhang and on top of that is a cable handle. What has changed, are the patterns that much better now with straight hard point handles? Would the pattern flown by Bobby at the 76 NATS get beat by Paul Walker with a straight handle. What kind of handle does the current NATS champ use?
I don't know the answers just thought it interesting to note that some pretty impressive patterns have been flown with all kinds of different handles.
Based on what I've read I doubt that Hunt does anything like he did in the 70's. No wife, no kids, and very nose heavy ships.
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I belive Bob Hunt is using the straight MNT handles he bought from me, they are excellent
Randy
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I got a new hard point handle no bias. Pancaked two more plane, I thing the ground is higher here in Michigan.
Steve
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It's not the handle, it's the pilot not getting the lines in neutral position. I have not had a problem with my hard point handles, other than the better feel/control of the planes. H^^
Could have been the planes fault also by being out of allignment.jeh
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Based on what I've read I doubt that Hunt does anything like he did in the 70's. No wife, no kids, and very nose heavy ships.
Still makes me wonder how the pattern flown by Bobby at the 76 NATS using a handle with everything wrong by today's thinking would stack up against patterns flown today. Something we will never be able to determin but interesting to think about. I do remember when watching Bobby fly back then I was awe struck by his bottoms and intersections. Still have the handle I bought from him at the 76 NATS and use it from time to time, it's fine on an airplane with fast controls.
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I got a new hard point handle no bias. Pancaked two more plane, I thing the ground is higher here in Michigan.
Steve
What line spacing did you have the handle set at? and how much overhang.
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Still makes me wonder how the pattern flown by Bobby at the 76 NATS using a handle with everything wrong by today's thinking would stack up against patterns flown today. Something we will never be able to determin but interesting to think about. I do remember when watching Bobby fly back then I was awe struck by his bottoms and intersections. Still have the handle I bought from him at the 76 NATS and use it from time to time, it's fine on an airplane with fast controls.
Bob
In the Saturn construction article Hunt stated that Bill Werwage couldn't even get one of Bobs airplanes off of the ground because it was so nose heavy. If you look at Gene Schaeffers Stunt Machine plans the CG is at the leading edge of the root chord. A real common practice for trimming back then seemed to be brass crankcase covers and flywheels.
I'm sure that was a great pattern you saw in 1976. Bub Hunt put a lot of effert and practice into it.
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The line spacing was just over 3.75 and the over hang is about 1/2". I think I raise my arm up when I get close to the ground just like I do when it is right side up, and this it what my problem is. I do like the new brodak handle.
Steve
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Bob
In the Saturn construction article Hunt stated that Bill Werwage couldn't even get one of Bobs airplanes off of the ground because it was so nose heavy. If you look at Gene Schaeffers Stunt Machine plans the CG is at the leading edge of the root chord. A real common practice for trimming back then seemed to be brass crankcase covers and flywheels.
I'm sure that was a great pattern you saw in 1976. Bub Hunt put a lot of effert and practice into it.
Hi Joseph,
I have talked to Bob about that story. Billy thought something was wrong with the plane and had Bob come out and get the plane. Bob then went into a program to balance his models more like Billy did (which Bob felt was VERY tail heavy at the time). As was mentioned, Bob at that time was balancing his models very nose heavy and yanking them around the corners.
That was very typical at the time in the NE. Bob says his conversion was the best thing that happened to his flying.
BIG Bear
RNMM/AMM
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Still makes me wonder how the pattern flown by Bobby at the 76 NATS using a handle with everything wrong by today's thinking would stack up against patterns flown today.
Most of the improvements haven't necessarily changed the ultimate performance, but they almost all make it easier. You can ask Bubba himself and he sure doesn't use the same handle, or do much else like he did in 76.
That having been said, it's pretty clear that the best performances have gotten a lot better if you go back far enough. A stock Nobler or any close derivative is utterly incapable of flying like, say, Paul Walker flew the Impact in the early 90s. Its just impossible to make the corners look like that (i.e. correct) with a Nobler.
I am far less convinced that we have made a lot/any improvement since the late 80's/Early 90s in terms of ultimate performance.
Brett
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A stock Nobler or any close derivative is utterly incapable of flying like, say, Paul Walker flew the Impact in the early 90s. Its just impossible to make the corners look like that (i.e. correct) with a Nobler.
I cannot disagree with the above statement in any way.
During Open Top 20 last year I asked Paul to critque a practice session with my .61 Gieseke Nobler in an attempt to extract the most performance I could. The consenus was there wasnt much more I could do. I think Paul said words to the effect of ( Your getting as much out of it as possible ) I doubt anyone has flown a Nobler with an equivilant power to weight ratio so we can expect performance to be good compared to today.
The issue is the performance envelope has increased so far that the older designs just do not go where the modern ships go - I knew where I wanted to put it, but the limitations of the design were such that it just wouldnt track along the lines it needed to go.
Think of it like a F1 car vs a high performance sports car ; no matter how hard you try one cannot go that deep into a corner to match its performance.
This was a similar issue , could not go as deep as I needed to - the stopping force was in design. Tracking rounds were closer... but the pattern is much more than simple rounds or tracking.
I am far less convinced that we have made a lot/any improvement since the late 80's/Early 90s in terms of ultimate performance.
Hard to disagree with that either...