One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

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OneHungLow
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One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#1 Post by OneHungLow » Fri May 26, 2023 12:26 pm

I am undertaking a cross country VFR navex training flight to Shoreham in the next fortnight, and have been advised by my instructor who will accompany me as an observer, that I will be responsible for all of the flight planning including the use of the CRP-1 flight computer in preparing the PLOG and chart track marking, flying, navigation and radio work en route. Although I will have a GPS in the aircraft this will be switched off so I will revert to the1:500:000 chart with chinagraph pencil marked track and error fans. No Skydemon or other electronic aids allowed.

Big deal I hear you say, it is a simple flight (which it is) but the thought of faffing around with a chart while trying to safely fly the R44 has finally made me realise the added work load that a helicopter pilot has in comparison to a fixed wing one when flying, not least because one has to be totally hands on, eyes out in the helicopter while flying VFR whereas a well trimmed fixed wing aircraft, will fly straight and level giving some small breathing space for chart work. An R44 is no place to be fumbling around with a badly folded chart or being a total cack handed klutz!

Add darkness, and inadvertent flight into IMC to the equation above, and I begin to realise how even very experienced pilots have come unstuck, as was the sad case in the Mathew Harding accident which I was reading about today.

https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/17938
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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#2 Post by Fox3WheresMyBanana » Fri May 26, 2023 1:16 pm

Sounds to me like the pilot drew one line on his maps and did naff all else flight planning, and couldn't use the GPS.
As soon as he was off route, he was stuffed.
Failing to correct for drift once he'd turned for Birmingham is a very basic error, especially given he was reminded of exactly that by ATC. Must have been a long time since he'd done any real navigation.
At the lower altitude, he probably had a clue about the horizon location from the surrounding towns, plus (IIRC) the motorways are generally well lit in Lancashire. Once he got close to Crewe, the lights get a lot more sparse, and he would have lost the horizon impression on lifting the nose to climb.

Advice for yourself:
Map folding is an art, and needs practice. We used the call the failure to do so and subsequent attempt to refold in flight as 'wallpapering the cockpit', because you will have literally become a one-armed paper hanger ;)))
Calculate your checkpoint timings carefully, use a prominent clock/timepiece, then you can spend all the time between checkpoints times flying the aircraft.
Do consider alternative routes, especially those which may be imposed by weather or ATC.
If these routes are not simple, then mark your map with prominent visual points you can see for miles and navigate off (TV masts and lit motorways are great), coupled with limit lines (which may be beacon radials) so you don't 'bong' any controlled airspace or hit high ground.
It may pay to learn the shapes of significant towns from their lighting (night) or road/rail lines (day), I always did.
Practice the mental corrections for timing errors.

Whilst you are looking out the window, you should mentally always be aware of:
The time for your next action (e.g. turning point or drift check)
What you expect to do at that action time.
What are the significant hazards on this leg and how will you know you are avoiding or approaching them.

That's in addition to all the usual, safety altitude, fuel state, nearest diversion airfield, etc.

Then enjoy the view till the clock hits that time.

There can be a tendency to plan too many checks, but this can make you so busy you fly inaccurately, so need more checks.

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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#3 Post by OneHungLow » Fri May 26, 2023 3:02 pm

Fox3WheresMyBanana wrote:
Fri May 26, 2023 1:16 pm
Sounds to me like the pilot drew one line on his maps and did naff all else flight planning, and couldn't use the GPS.
As soon as he was off route, he was stuffed.
Failing to correct for drift once he'd turned for Birmingham is a very basic error, especially given he was reminded of exactly that by ATC. Must have been a long time since he'd done any real navigation.
At the lower altitude, he probably had a clue about the horizon location from the surrounding towns, plus (IIRC) the motorways are generally well lit in Lancashire. Once he got close to Crewe, the lights get a lot more sparse, and he would have lost the horizon impression on lifting the nose to climb.

Advice for yourself:
Map folding is an art, and needs practice. We used the call the failure to do so and subsequent attempt to refold in flight as 'wallpapering the cockpit', because you will have literally become a one-armed paper hanger ;)))
Calculate your checkpoint timings carefully, use a prominent clock/timepiece, then you can spend all the time between checkpoints times flying the aircraft.
Do consider alternative routes, especially those which may be imposed by weather or ATC.
If these routes are not simple, then mark your map with prominent visual points you can see for miles and navigate off (TV masts and lit motorways are great), coupled with limit lines (which may be beacon radials) so you don't 'bong' any controlled airspace or hit high ground.
It may pay to learn the shapes of significant towns from their lighting (night) or road/rail lines (day), I always did.
Practice the mental corrections for timing errors.

Whilst you are looking out the window, you should mentally always be aware of:
The time for your next action (e.g. turning point or drift check)
What you expect to do at that action time.
What are the significant hazards on this leg and how will you know you are avoiding or approaching them.

That's in addition to all the usual, safety altitude, fuel state, nearest diversion airfield, etc.

Then enjoy the view till the clock hits that time.

There can be a tendency to plan too many checks, but this can make you so busy you fly inaccurately, so need more checks.
Appreciate the good advice Fox3. :)
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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#4 Post by Fox3WheresMyBanana » Fri May 26, 2023 3:54 pm

Hope it didn't come across as preachy or patronising - I never intend that.
Just pick the bits you agree with and try them.

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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#5 Post by OneHungLow » Fri May 26, 2023 4:28 pm

Fox3WheresMyBanana wrote:
Fri May 26, 2023 3:54 pm
Hope it didn't come across as preachy or patronising - I never intend that.
Just pick the bits you agree with and try them.
No not at all Fox3, although I am a current fixed wing pilot, it is always good to have the basics expounded again, and if such advice was good enough for a man like you who poled around at Mach 1, then it should be good enough for me at 90 knots in the R44!

Your good advice is genuinely appreciated and it is good to have the basics reinforced again. The day that one stops learning or relearning in this business they call aviation, is the day that one hangs up one's flying hat or crosses the river Styx, preferably not as a result of not listening to another pilot's good advice. :-bd
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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#6 Post by Boac » Fri May 26, 2023 4:45 pm

Could one fly the R44 with your knees while you are papering the cockpit?

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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#7 Post by OneHungLow » Fri May 26, 2023 4:48 pm

On the subject of the Mathew Harding crash, it seems, as Fox3 has noted, that the pilot became "unsure of his current position" and I suspect, somewhat embarrassed by his predicament, not least because his clients were able to hear his exchanges with the controller and thus he didn't "fess up" and explicitly request some assistance in fixing his actual position. I also wonder if he was under some time pressure, imagined or otherwise, from his prestigious client?

That the pilot eventually became spatially disorientated seems fairly certain.
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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#8 Post by OneHungLow » Fri May 26, 2023 4:58 pm

Boac wrote:
Fri May 26, 2023 4:45 pm
Could one fly the R44 with your knees while you are papering the cockpit?
Some may say that it may look as if I am flying the R44 with my knees, but that is just a scurrilous rumour! ;)))

The R44 is an aircraft that requires one hand on both the cyclic and collective (preferably) at all times. I reckon that if one was to let go of the cyclic, the aircraft would be on its way to doing its best to kill you within +- 5 seconds. The R22 even less. See the comments ref. the R22 in the link below, ref. probable mast bumping within 2 rotor revolutions! :-s

https://www.morningtonsanfordaviation.c ... r-head.pdf
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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#9 Post by Boac » Fri May 26, 2023 5:04 pm

Is there no friction lock on the collective?

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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#10 Post by OneHungLow » Fri May 26, 2023 5:08 pm

Boac wrote:
Fri May 26, 2023 5:04 pm
Is there no friction lock on the collective?
There is, and thus one can free up the left hand with less risk. I am left handed so this is helpful. I see I wrote collective when I meant cyclic in the previous post. You can do the same on the cyclic, but it is not really advisable and can delay control recovery if things do go tits up.
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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#11 Post by Boac » Fri May 26, 2023 6:25 pm

:)) That's why your knees learn to fly!

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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#12 Post by OneHungLow » Fri May 26, 2023 6:37 pm

Boac wrote:
Fri May 26, 2023 6:25 pm
:)) That's why your knees learn to fly!
I know I knees something! =))
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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#13 Post by Boac » Fri May 26, 2023 6:45 pm

Just to avoid the obvious confusion - I do NOT expect/advocate/have never seen - a friction lock on a cyclic!

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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#14 Post by OneHungLow » Fri May 26, 2023 7:01 pm

Boac wrote:
Fri May 26, 2023 6:45 pm
Just to avoid the obvious confusion - I do NOT expect/advocate/have never seen - a friction lock on a cyclic!
;)))

Like all bad habits in life, just cos' you shouldn't do it, doesn't mean to say it isn't there... the cause of all my big failures in life! ;)))
The cyclic friction knob is located left of the cyclic center post. Turning the knob clockwise applies friction to both longitudinal and lateral ...
https://robinsonheli.com/wp-content/upl ... _poh_7.pdf
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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#15 Post by Boac » Fri May 26, 2023 8:16 pm

That is a friction control, not a lock? Wisely the POH advises against locking the cyclic in flight. =))
Without an A/P, I fear OHL is stuck with finding some way to control the attitude whilst frantically clawing down vast areas of cartography in order to see where he is lost ................

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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#16 Post by OneHungLow » Fri May 26, 2023 8:27 pm

Boac wrote:
Fri May 26, 2023 8:16 pm
That is a friction control, not a lock? Wisely the POH advises against locking the cyclic in flight. =))
Without an A/P, I fear OHL is stuck with finding some way to control the attitude whilst frantically clawing down vast areas of cartography in order to see where he is lost ................
As ever the case Boac, we are locked forever, in a semantic dispute, you and I. Long may it stay locked that way. ;)))

Once a cyclic friction control becomes too much to be overcome before a feeble (probably an English) pilot can overcome it) it becomes a lock. But, as you correctly say, the R44 has a collective lock! It is not to be overcome by even the force of a mighty South Africa's left arm and hand. =))
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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#17 Post by Boac » Fri May 26, 2023 8:31 pm

Since you tell us you will not be able to control the aircraft while holding a map, just work, semantically, on your knee technique... :))

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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#18 Post by OneHungLow » Fri May 26, 2023 8:35 pm

Boac wrote:
Fri May 26, 2023 8:31 pm
Since you tell us you will not be able to control the aircraft while holding a map, just work, semantically, on your knee technique... :))
I have made my way incontinently across continents like Africa with far less, believe me.

As for the rest you must believe what you will, or make, what you will about "what I told us"...

Shame that you make an honest opportunity to learn from something of interest to pilots, to show yourself up, not for the first time, to be an arrogant dick!
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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#19 Post by CharlieOneSix » Fri May 26, 2023 9:20 pm

I haven’t flown any of Frank’s machines but the JetRanger, Bell 47 and indeed the Whirlwind in which Boac had a few hours experience pre-Harrier, all had friction controls on the otherwise floppy cyclic and collective which with over enthusiastic friction tightening resulted in locked controls. The Bell 47 also had a very ineffective twist grip friction - that caught me out on one of the London CTR heliroutes when an itchy nose demanded a left hand scratch and the twist grip throttle snapped closed when for a second I left it to its own devices.

OHL - is it actually possible to use knees to control the R44 cyclic? Not being floor mounted I guess that’s difficult or maybe impossible?
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Re: One armed paper hanger-keeping it all together in a helicopter

#20 Post by OneHungLow » Fri May 26, 2023 9:26 pm

CharlieOneSix wrote:
Fri May 26, 2023 9:20 pm
I haven’t flown any of Frank’s machines but the JetRanger, Bell 47 and indeed the Whirlwind in which Boac had a few hours experience pre-Harrier, all had friction controls on the otherwise floppy cyclic and collective which with over enthusiastic friction tightening resulted in locked controls. The Bell 47 also had a very ineffective twist grip friction - that caught me out on one of the London CTR heliroutes when an itchy nose demanded a left hand scratch and the twist grip throttle snapped closed when for a second I left it to its own devices.

OHL - is it actually possible to use knees to control the R44 cyclic? Not being floor mounted I guess that’s difficult or maybe impossible?
Pretty much impossible Sir!
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