Flying a Helicopter

Flying a Helicopter

Having spent over 20 years as a commercial helicopter pilot the author has the following observations to make:

The first time I ever flew a helicopter I thought to God I was trying to stir a cake.

The second time I flew a helicopter I was convinced I was stirring a cake. The helicopter seemed to have a mind of its own because no matter what you did on the controls it took a helicopter about a second and a quarter to make up its mind that your command on the controls is what you really wanted. This is called a time the lag common to all helicopters. You don't know how long a second and quarter is until you've flown a helicopter.

We were at about 1000 feet and my instructor turned to me and said, "Here you take the controls I'm sick of flying." I quickly grabbed the controls as the nose of the helicopter was heading toward the ground, so I pulled back on the cyclic stick; nothing happened, so then I pulled even further back on the stick. All of a sudden the helicopter having a mind of its own decided I really wanted the nose to go up, so the nose went up until the helicopter was almost pointing straight up into the heavens. At this point I pushed forward on the cyclic stick. This is the stick used to steer a helicopter. The nose kept going up into the wild blue yonder, I panicked as the nose kept going up, and shoved the cyclic stick even further away from me to make the nose go down. All of a sudden down went the nose straight toward the ground, with that I pulled back on the stick. The nose kept going toward the ground. I pulled back on the stick, and the nose continued going toward the ground, so I pulled the stick even further. All of a sudden the nose started rising again toward the heavens.

Meanwhile my fellow passenger who was supposed to be my instructor was sitting over in his seat laughing his head off. He wouldn't tell me what was wrong all he did was to keep laughing, and laughing. His laughter made me mad, so I decided that I'd have to dope the thing out all by myself. The instructor was just sitting in his seat convulsed with laughter. For the next 60 miles by working with the rudder pedals I was able to keep the course of the helicopter reasonably straight, but I continued flying like a porpoise, up-and-down while reciting a whole litany of the traits both common to the helicopter and my instructor as well as some comments about their habits and ancestry. Meanwhile the instructor was sitting in his seat with howling laughter.

After flying all over the sky for about an hour I finally managed to get the helicopter to fly on the straight and level. I probably learned more about flying a helicopter in that one hour then I learned in all the rest of my training flights.

As we approached our destination the instructor took over the controls again and landed the helicopter. Then he finally told me why he would not take the controls back form me; because he wanted me to gain my own confidence of the helicopter. He felt that had he taken the controls back I would never fly a helicopter again. He was right!

Flying a helicopter is a much different proposition than flying an airplane. With an airplane you can set up the trim tabs and the airplane will pretty much fly itself. A helicopter on the other hand will fly the pilot. It is much more difficult to fly a helicopter than an airplane because it takes an entirely different set of skills. The only way you can learn these skills is by experience.

The helicopter has more controls than an airplane. The collective stick you hold in your left hand, and use it to make a helicopter to go up and down by pulling up or pushing down on the stick. This actually changes the pitch of the main rotor blades by changing the amount of bight they have on the air. The same stick also controls the throttle that is like a motorcycle throttle that you operate by twisting. The starter button is often on the very tip of the stick and engages the starter when you push it down. The cyclic stick controls the attitude of the helicopter; or more specifically the attitude of the main rotor. The final control that you use is the rudders. They control the direction in which the helicopter flies. These controls are on the floor towards the front of the cabin, and they are operated by your feet. They actually operate the pitch of the propeller that is at the rear of the helicopter; this is actually called the tail rotor.

Now we have explained what happened when I first started flying a helicopter, and the controls that you have to use to fly a one.

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