rec.autos.simulators

And I never use that damed word :)

Larry

:-)

Achim

...

Achim

Been a long time since I flew RC,  guess about 11 years now.

Don Burnette

I had the first Schoonard Xccel in San Diego.  Brought it over when I was on
Leave on the East Coast.  All we did was stare at it for weeks, and I was
afraid to fly it it was so pretty :)

And yes, I started with the Shuttle (well, 4 or 5 of them, actually :)) like
eveyone else did :)

Larry

I did that in San Diego.  Ran in the first ever ROAR 1/4 scale nationals and
if I remember right came out 3rd in the main feature.

It was a nice track.  It used to be an old midget track for kids.  Even had
nice banking!

The spectator crowds were so big that we were not allowed to race on
Saturday's because the track owner was afraid we would take ticket sales
away from the full-size short-track that also sat on the race grounds.  We
had to do all our races on Sundays.

These things were a blast.  32 pounds, a foot or so wide, about 3 feet long,
and I forget how many cc's of gut-wrenching WeedWhacker Motor power!

Larry

I started I think around 82 with a Schlueter, which was wrong for a beginner
as with every heavy touchdown you'd bend the metal chassis, leading to cogs
and everything else no longer running together well, and evrything getting
destroyed pretty quickly.

A year later when I'd ruined that first one beyond repair I switched to a
used Jet Ranger based on the Heim system which was indeed pretty advanced in
technology, and also looked like the real thing. Repairs to the main
mechanics were easier as all you'd normally ruin was the main rotor shaft (I
used to carry with me a few backup ones at all times). The body was wood and
glass fibre, so fixing it wasn't so expensive.

Once I'd learnt to fly well I bought two kevlar bodies of the Hughes 500 D
model. They were also designed to take the Heim system, and their kevlar
bodies were so robust that you could throw them down from 10 meters altitude
with the rotor running and all the happened was that the connection between
tail and main body broke. Very easy to fix. Well, of course the blades and
main rotor shaft were also splinters <g>

The greatest development was when gyros became avialable. I installed one
for the tail rotor and from then on it was like you were on auto-pilot and
the cost for repairs dropped dramatically :-)

I equipped those Hughes with 3-blade main rotors (5 blade would have been
even more expensive to repair after a crash <g>) and also a 3 blade tail
rotor, which really added control. Unfortunately I moved away from the site
where I used to fly, and couldn't find a decent spot where to fly from
nearby where I had moved to, so after a while I sold everything. But it had
been a great time :)

Achim

Geez, another hobby that I would have liked, but couldn't afford...  :-(

Eldred
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Never argue with an idiot.  He brings you down to his level, then beats you
with experience...
Remove SPAM-OFF to reply.

I built a Bell 222 with full retracts.  It took me over 2 years.  I never
flew it, and ended up selling it, un-flown and un-started just before
returning to the east coast for good in August of 1990.

I was afraid to fly it.  One problem I never really got over was loss of
orientation in the air.

I could nose-in hover and auto-rotate with the best of them, but for some
reason my eyes had issues with orientation if I inside-turns and the light
was a certain way.  I broke a lot of stuff over that :(  Of course I tried
the usual tricks like colored blades, landing gear, etc...  I suspect a
full-body would have helped but due to the massive hours involved in putting
one together I could never get myself  to go for it.

For those of you who have never done this before, Nose-In Hovering a Radio
Controlled Helicopter is probably the hardest manuever you can attempt to do
on any type of flying model.  It takes dozens and dozens of hours of
practice to do it poorly, and hundreds of hours to do it well.  And most
people eat a certain amount of rotor blades, tail blades and booms in the
process of learning it :)

Larry

A shame you never flew the Bell, it must be a breathtaking sight when it
takes off, transits into that typical forward/upward movement and
simulatenously starts retracting the gear. I'd always thought about building
one myself, but always shied away from it, for the same reasons why you
never flew yours I guess.

I tried the differently coloured landing gear struts as well, but the
problem was, when you were far enough away you could see the body fine but
not the struts <g> but you're right, a full body is in a completely
different ballpark in terms of visibility. I could have my Hughes soar high
and far like a fixed wing RC plane, it was really well visible.

I think I never really perfectioned the nose-in hovering. Probably partly
due to a shock I experienced during my first attempts, when the rear pushrod
for the cyclic came lose from the swashplate (correct term?) and my helo
started flying towards me, and towards me, and towards me... <g>

Achim

This guy could be nose-in hovering about 6 feet off the ground, and about 10
feet away, and he would actually flop his helo into an inverted nose-in
hover and I swear the thing never wavered more than 3 inches in any one
direction when he did it.

This guy was freakin' awesome.

The stupidist thing I ever saw in public?  At the Merced Fly-in one year
this guy (he was a factory owner/flyer as well for a famous model helicopter
company - I won't mention names here) was doing a nose-in hover and walked
up and kissed the nose of his Helicopter.

For those of you who don't understand how incredibly stupid and dangerous
this is, the typical .60 engine sized Helicopter has a rotor-span of like 60
inches.  The blades typicall run at 1800 RPM, and equates to a rotor-tip
speed of about 300 miles per hour.  These blades are NOT all balsa wood.
They tend to have hardwood leading edges, and most experienced pilots run
lead weights embedded at the tips for improved auto-rotation performance.
Some run blades that are FULLY fiberglassed instead of shrink-wrapped.

If you get hit in the head, you die.  Period.  I saw an out-of-control model
Helo completely destroy the fiberglass cap on the back of a pickup truck one
day.

Helicopters, full size or model, are basically Mechanical-***s that god
never intended to fly in the first place and I can think of MUCH better ways
to risk my life.

Larry