how is this for success?

[adam_jorgensen]

I have managed to hover the three dee helicopter in the FMS simulator for approximately 19 minutes without crashing it and managed to keep it within at least 3 feet of where my hovering point was in every direction. the most distance it would wonder is about a foot and a half. is this good so far? am I doing the right thing? how much more practice with hovering should I do? how long do you have to do it for to try it on a real heli? do you think im ready for a real heli?

when im good enough at hovering, what should i move on to next?

[johnhlong]

It will most likely be scary but you are about ready to try the real thing.

Take some time to do a lot of landings on the sim. Just lift her off, move her a bit and then land her. The more different landing aproaches you know on the sim the better.

Another thing... Rig up some kind of training landing gear on the real helicopter.

After that take a deap breath and try some SMALL SHORT hovers. At first just let her lift off and then land her again. Remember you migh be able to hover her but if she is out of trim you could have your hands full. Watch each lift off and after each one adjuct the mechinal / transmitter trim untill she lifts streight up on takeoff (at least for the first second or so.)

It is important to get the mecanical trim of the heli as close to ceneter without transmitter trim so she will fly easier. After you get her mechanically trimmed as close as posible, then do the fine trimming with the transmitter controls.

You will find it a LOT better to try to hover her if you are not fighting the trim problem.

You wil want to go through a gal. of fuel before you start into any thing besides hovering. You can latter on practice moving her from point to point around the course when you feel more sure of your self.

Fight the impulse to go out there and do some neet flying (unless you have extra money to spend). Although the expert heli flyers will know you are just learning to hover, your other friends will thing you an expert if you manage to not crash her into the building down the street. Even the wandering about as you hover will seem to them as if you are doing neat thing with your heli.


As a last thought. Take the trim adjustments on your transmitter and push them to the limits and then try to fly the heli on the sim. That will show you what you would be up against if the mechanical trim is out on your heli. Also try a quick, but gental take off with the trims mal-adjusted and then just put here back on the ground saftly. You will notice that even with the trims out of adjustment if you just do the up and down thing she won't get much out of control. If you then try to lift her off anf hover her, then is when things will get dicey.

Have fun

John

[adam_jorgensen]

how long does the average heli take to get its fule tank to be empty?

[kram66]

I get about 20-25 minutes hovering a Raptor 30...........this includes burning about 1/2 way into header tank.

[johnhlong]

I have a Ergo 30SS CCPM (Schweitzer) with training gear.

I've use 15% fuel with extra oil in it.

I get about 35 min on a tank (Header tank almost dry).
(10 oz main tank, 2 oz header tank).
That makes about 1/2 oz of fuel / min when hovering.
Or about 14.785 Ml of fuel / min when hovering.

John

[adam_jorgensen]

hope that the fms simulator will be a good sim and help me out allot. i keep hearing allot of peoples comments on how the controls are unrealistic and they find it not a good simulator. they say the real flight g2 is a way better sim. although it might be a better sim, its is also $300 more than FMS! i don't know why people would spend that much on a sim where you can get one that will teach you just as good for free. maybe people look at it because its free, its no good. you have to spend allot of money to get the best. this is not always the case however. some professionals i guess prefer the more highly sasfistiacted expensive simulators with all the bells and whistles where as a amateur like me, doesn't really care what simulator he uses as long as it teaches you the basics. i wouldn't know or care the difference between the simulators anyway the more expensive flight sims cant do much more than teach you the basics anyway. you don't learn 100% on a sim. you probably only learn like 30% on a sim