Posts by John Hargreaves

    That thing looks like a piece of exercise equipment!

    Helicopter sim equipment is such a tiny subgroup of an already niche minority within a very specialist community. There are few sources of helicopter specific gaming/sim hardware in the whole world, but what is out there tends to be good quality, however it tends to be expensive because they make such a small number of units.

    I've tried making some of my own items, but to be honest, unless you have access to some pretty good workshop facilities, it actually works out cheaper to bite the bullet and buy your choice from the pros.

    That Puma rig is expensive, but costs less than three hours of real helicopter lessons, so you just have to make a choice and stick with it.

    Let's see John

    Initially the helicopter is on the ground, it is supposed to idle. Next we have to accelerate (increase the r.p.m. = Throttle); once the rpm is increased, we gently activate the collective, and consequently ascend. Once we reach the desired altitude (with rpm at approximately 75% of its power (or any other), we would continue to move horizontally.When we want to descend, we must necessarily decrease the angle of attack of the blade, consequently, it will increase its rpm (consequence of the decrease in lift), and here again, we have to decrease the throttle, otherwise, the blades would increase in excess their rpm

    If my reasoning is wrong, I beg you to explain it to me, but I have a hard time believing, that it is not necessary to act on the power applied to the helicopter engine and that we solve everything with the collective, once certain rpm of the blades has been reached.

    Regards: Delfin

    It's a bit odd at first I agree. On the ground, at idle, the engine is just ticking over and the throttle would be twisted towards you, it's like a motorcycle throttle that goes the other way. Once the engine is warm you would twist the throttle away from you, the rpm rises and you will see the engine rpm needle rise too on the instrument panel. You twist the throttle to about 75% and then the engine revs run away from you for a second and then settle again as the governor takes over, but you don't need to touch the throttle any more, the power comes automatically now when you need it.

    So the collective pitch lever is down, engaging the clutch involves belts tightening behind your head, and the thing makes a few weird noises and vibrates a bit, as the rotor starts to come up to speed. At this point the other needle on the rpm gauge rises and they match each other in position, that's when you have a happy helicopter.

    Then, as you raise the collective it increases the pitch of all the rotor blades, which needs more power to maintain engine rpm, supplied via the governor as it senses the engine rpm dropping.

    Edit: sorry delphin, I was writing this post at the same time you were writing the one above, but also, yes, the rotor rpm always stays the same during flight, it's the pitch of the blades that moves it in any direction. Collective moves all the blades of the main rotor at once to go up and down, cyclic moves them differently to each other, making you go sideways and forwards/backwards etc. The tail rotor changes its own collective pitch via the pedals to give lift but at right angles to the rotor disc.

    The main rotor rpm remains constant in a helicopter, so it's a bit counter intuitive at first when you are used to more power/faster prop/aeroplane goes up in air.

    The clutch comes in for when the engine stops while you are still up in the air, it allows the rotor to keep spinning and give you some control even though you may have no engine power. That allows the helicopter to sort of act like a big parachute and get you down safely, it's called an auto rotation.

    There are lots of good tutorials on youtube, but Nick Murray has an excellent channel of helicopter reviews, Smarter Every Day did some good stuff, and there's one called 'helicopter lessons in ten minutes or less', that's really good. I'll post some links when I have a bit of time.

    I've just lost 40min of my life flying around Manhattan. Absolutely wonderful. You can land on any surface big enough to take the aircraft, so I've been hopping from roof to roof for ages, settling and enjoying the view. A slow take-off and slipping over the side of a skyscraper in VR is a truly wonderful thing.

    +1 for the yaw string too, it's a great detail.

    For the tail rotor I am using a thumbwheel axis on my x52 throttle. Counterclockwise for left and clockwise for right. I have combat rudder pedals but they are evidently not centered for zero input. As soon at I start the R-22 it is almost spinning in a right hand circle and it take a lot of opposite rudder to stop the rotation but, then it is almost impossible to fly with it like that.

    This is the dial where you thumb naturally falls when you grip the throttle so it works just fine for a work around.

    Regards.

    Ray

    That's pretty much what it's supposed to do, so as the main rotor spins, it creates opposite torque that wants to drill you into the ground, you need the left pedal to balance that, but once you get moving, the weather vane effect means that you no longer really need the rudder (anti torque pedal). I'd suggest persevering with your pedals, it's more realistic for starters and I think you would soon get the hang of it.

    Jan,

    Can you post some typical CONTROLS settings for the R-22. I have the Saitek x52 Pro and I have the throttle set backward for the collective but I can't seem to get the joy stick set correctly.

    Regards,

    Ray

    It's worth having the sensitivity quite low to begin with for helicopters. The real cyclic is usually a very long instrument, so a small movement is a really small movement in a real helicopter. Our 6" long toy joysticks overcontrol the helicopter until you get used to it. It's absolutely micro movements that will enable you to fly, plus there is a bit of a delay between an input and a movement of the aircraft as you have a big gyroscope spinning above your head.

    You have the right idea using the throttle pulling back to simulate the collective pitch increasing. What are you using for rudder (tail rotor)?

    I think one of the problems is that rudder pedals just have one axis that each pedal gives you +/-, whereas good driving pedals have three. I tried once to set up my G29 pedals to do this but it never really worked. Also, you would miss the toe brakes. I ended up getting some TFRP ones, which were great for fixed wing, but not quite sensitive enough for helicopters.

    The VKB ones are more expensive and lack a toebrake (although you can do a software workaround) but are fantastic for helicopter flight.

    Oh boy, just got in from work to find the R22 downloaded on Steam, took her out for a maiden flight around Monterey. Really, really good aircraft. 90fps in VR, smooth as you like, it handles beautifully straight out of the box with the pro flight model. Excellent work guys, well worth the wait. On first impressions it feels right up there with the best of the X-Plane helicopters.

    If I had to pick a slight downside it would be the sound for me, it felt a little muted, but other than that it's a wonderful piece of work. I can feel another helicopter wishlist thread coming, I think my last one got deleted :thumbup:

    Hi chaps

    I seem to have an odd situation here, in 2D all my controllers are working ok, but when I switch to VR, none of the input devices appear to be recognised. Here is the control options page in 2D and in VR. Everything works as expected in 2D, and the last time I flew in VR, everything was fine, but I've just loaded a flight in VR and I can't control the plane. No input registers in the game and all the controllers are undetected when in VR. Any ideas anyone?