Pickup to hoover seem impossible

[jfri]

I have never been able to lift up the huey to a hoover. I watch the tutorial videos and try to do the same thing in the training tutorial. To lift the Huey off the ground is no problem but to make it hoover never succeeds particularly avoiding it to move away is very difficult. Are you able to do this ? Also a detail in the tutorial video they raise the collective only about 10-20 % for the Huey to lift off the ground. I need it to be slightly above 50%. Is this normal ?

[razo+r]

The collective setting also depends on how heavy you are and how much power the engine can produce.

 

If you have enough practise, you should be able to hover, so just practise more...

[Ramsay]

To lift the Huey off the ground is no problem but to make it hoover never succeeds particularly avoiding it to move away is very difficult. Are you able to do this ?

It's relatively easy to learn to hold a hover for a short period of time. However it takes practice and good control to hold a hover for extended periods.

 

Start by moving from being light on the skids to a low hover like this

 

Initially focus on a close building. To hold a steady hover - use small, relaxed movements. You'll need to anticipate the helicopters movement and allow for lag/inertia. You should expect the helicopter to always move/sway a little (like a row boat rocking due to gentle waves), it'll need small adjustments but not so much as to over compensate or cause PIO's (pilot induced oscillations).

 

Once able to hold a short hover, practice hover taxis and stops around the airbase/taxiways. Try to use peripheral vision, the horizon and mid distance when holding a hover/making adjustments, as using close foreground references can make things difficult or induce PIO.

 

Also a detail in the tutorial video they raise the collective only about 10-20 % for the Huey to lift off the ground. I need it to be slightly above 50%. Is this normal ?

As said, the amount of power/collective required will depend on your weight/load. While near the ground, most of my attention is outside the cockpit.

[flyco]

Ensure you stay within ground effect. The fact that you are pulling a lot of collective suggests that you may be trying to hover too high. I had great trouble holding a constant spot, until I realised that if I stayed at around 3-6 ft agl (as shown on the Rad Alt). I could then forget about the collective - if the aircraft climbed a little the reduced ground efffect would bring it back down, and vice versa.

 

With the height pegged, you can concentrate on staying stationary. As recommended, spend half an hour hover-taxying around the airfield, landing at points as you go. I also used to positively think about what I was doing, for example:

I'm going forward, stick back a touch

Now I'm slowing down move it forward a touch

Coming to a halt, move it back a very very small amount

Etc etc

 

I actually talk to myself as I fly - my wife thought I was going senile (well I am going senile of course, but that's a different matter). I recall many years ago, when I was training at the RAF's CFS, I was always getting bollocked for 'chuntering' to myself all the while - the more difficult the task, the more I chuntered. Still do it - you should hear the things I call myself doing AAR.

[Cibit]

Check your torque gauge. For a huey with full fuel and 2x M60 doorgunners @20C your torque for a 5ft hover is about 32%

The torque gauge is just to the right of your Radar Altimeter

Once you get to the correct torque just leave the power setting and practice holding the chopper steady. The cyclic needs to be trimmed or held just back and slightly left for the correct attitude for hover. Don't be concerned about drifting you will learn to lessen that as you practice but if your cyclic is not at the correct position to start with it will be so much harder. Check Ramseys vid to see where his control indicator is positioned (Red Box top left)

Edited February 26, 2017 by Cibit

[jfri]

It's relatively easy to learn to hold a hover for a short period of time. However it takes practice and good control to hold a hover for extended periods.

 

Start by moving from being light on the skids to a low hover like this

 

Initially focus on a close building. To hold a steady hover - use small, relaxed movements. You'll need to anticipate the helicopters movement and allow for lag/inertia. You should expect the helicopter to always move/sway a little (like a row boat rocking due to gentle waves), it'll need small adjustments but not so much as to over compensate or cause PIO's (pilot induced oscillations).

 

Once able to hold a short hover, practice hover taxis and stops around the airbase/taxiways. Try to use peripheral vision, the horizon and mid distance when holding a hover/making adjustments, as using close foreground references can make things difficult or induce PIO.

 

 

As said, the amount of power/collective required will depend on your weight/load. While near the ground, most of my attention is outside the cockpit.

 

I'm using the ready tutorial practice mission and it's not before a hangar and I suppose I'm heavier loaded since I wont lift of from the ground with as little collective as in this video. How did you set up that flight ?

[jfri]

Ensure you stay within ground effect. The fact that you are pulling a lot of collective suggests that you may be trying to hover too high. I had great trouble holding a constant spot, until I realised that if I stayed at around 3-6 ft agl (as shown on the Rad Alt). I could then forget about the collective - if the aircraft climbed a little the reduced ground efffect would bring it back down, and vice versa.

 

With the height pegged, you can concentrate on staying stationary. As recommended, spend half an hour hover-taxying around the airfield, landing at points as you go. I also used to positively think about what I was doing, for example:

I'm going forward, stick back a touch

Now I'm slowing down move it forward a touch

Coming to a halt, move it back a very very small amount

Etc etc

 

I actually talk to myself as I fly - my wife thought I was going senile (well I am going senile of course, but that's a different matter). I recall many years ago, when I was training at the RAF's CFS, I was always getting bollocked for 'chuntering' to myself all the while - the more difficult the task, the more I chuntered. Still do it - you should hear the things I call myself doing AAR.

 

If I don't pull that much collective the helicopter will remain on the ground

[Robert31178]

There are other factors too, like weight and weather. If you loaded the Huey up with full fuel, rockets and mini's and crew served as mini's also then you have a totally different hovering experience than you do with just M-60's for your crew served and 50% fuel.

 

I have also noticed on Nevada that I need more power to hover on my unit's multiplayer map when we are running real weather. I know that in real life the huey had gobs of power stateside, but over in SE Asia humidity was such that it took every ounce of power for a fully loaded C model gunship to get a running take off started, and if you didn't hit ETL before the end of the runway you were going to crash.

 

To learn hovering start with a lightened bird, M-60's in the doors and 40% fuel. After that try the same fuel with mini's for your crew (that adds 300lbs). After that try the same crew guns with full fuel, and once you get that start adding the user controlled weapon systems. That's how I learned, that coupled with TONS of practice.

 

You'll get there eventually, we all do. One day your mind and hands will put it all together and you will all of a sudden just get it.

 

~S

[jfri]

Check your torque gauge. For a huey with full fuel and 2x M60 doorgunners @20C your torque for a 5ft hover is about 32%

The torque gauge is just to the right of your Radar Altimeter

Once you get to the correct torque just leave the power setting and practice holding the chopper steady. The cyclic needs to be trimmed or held just back and slightly left for the correct attitude for hover. Don't be concerned about drifting you will learn to lessen that as you practice but if your cyclic is not at the correct position to start with it will be so much harder. Check Ramseys vid to see where his control indicator is positioned (Red Box top left)

 

My torque gauge reads about 30 at pickup and then the collective is over 50%

[Bearfoot]

We've all been there! Hang in there!

 

One thing that helped me a lot is the realization that the progress with practice is not perceivable at first, i.e., it does not SEEM like you are improving ...

 

It seems like you practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, and not get ANYWHERE!

 

Then, one day, it just CLICKS!

 

I know how if feels to think that all the videos of folks pulling it off make it seem like just magic. But you will get it if you stick with it! Trust that your muscles and mind are working "behind the scenes" to get you there.

 

Now, for (mostly) practical advice:

 

(1) As others have noted, your torque is the key feedback.

(2) Lighten up that Huey as much as possible for practice: the more torque you need to pull to get her off the the ground, the more difficult she will be to control. Use 50% or even less fuel. In principle, once you get her 5 ft of the ground, you do not need to touch the collective [much] to keep her there [though you may find many micro-adjustments necessary to counteract other control movements], and, in principle, for a given weight + air temperature, you should be able to calculate exactly what that torque is. See Chuck's guide for detail.

(3) Really, really, really, small movements. Depending on your control hardware, this may be pretty darn difficult to do with precision. An extension helps .... A LOT. Others may disagree, but I think if you are using no extension, you should use a pretty good saturation and curve (e.g., 80% saturation and 20% curve). With a good extension (e.g., 20cm), this may not be necessary.

(4) Anticipate the lag. Don't hold a correction input until it "takes effect". Send a small correction input, and then return to center.

(5) Anticipate the required correct input: send that small, momentary, correction input just BEFORE it is needed so when it is needed the effect is already in place. In effect, I am saying you need to be able to predict the future! Crazy, but true! THIS is the trick to smooth hovering, and this is the part that is difficult to get until you develop that intuition that lets you "sense" the future. This is, I believe, the main activity that goes on "behind the scenes" in your mind+muscles+eyes with practice and that suddenly clicks into the place.

(6) The "Hover Practice" mission is an awesome, awesome, awesome, mission for this. Cannot tell you how many hours I spent on this.

(7) When I was first practicing, I also found it weirdly a lot more difficult to do an initial pick-up and hover than subsequently. That is, I would pick-up, careen all over the place, slip into translational flight, finally bring her back under the control, and then somehow, found it easier to control the stationary hover. Don't know why.

(8) Trim! I don't need it so much now, but still find it useful: a little aft and left trim were essential to help me keep/get the heli under the control when picking up.

(9) Related: it is much more difficult to bring her back under control due to PIO (pilot-induced oscillation, i.e., the deadly cycle of over-correcting one way than the other) than to keep her under control. So as much as possible, anticipate corrections on pick-up. In particular: in addition to the left + aft cyclic, make sure you have the correct anti-torque dialed in.

Edited February 27, 2017 by Bearfoot

[PurdueKev]

(3) Really, really, really, small movements. Depending on your control hardware, this may be pretty darn difficult to do with precision. An extension helps .... A LOT. Others may disagree, but I think if you are using no extension, you should use a pretty good saturation and curve (e.g., 80% saturation and 20% curve). With a good extension (e.g., 20cm), this may not be necessary.

(4) Anticipate the lag. Don't hold a correction input until it "takes effect". Send a small correction input, and then return to center.

(5) Anticipate the required correct input: send that small, momentary, correction input just BEFORE it is needed so when it is needed the effect is already in place. In effect, I am saying you need to be able to predict the future! Crazy, but true! THIS is the trick to smooth hovering, and this is the part that is difficult to get until you develop that intuition that lets you "sense" the future. This is, I believe, the main activity that goes on "behind the scenes" in your mind+muscles+eyes with practice and that suddenly clicks into the place.

 

Just want to add some extra emphasis to these three very excellent tips...

 

- Control setup is even more important for helicopters than for fixed wing. You really need to spend some time dialing in saturation and curve for cyclic, collective and rudder, unless you have a full-length stick extension for your cyclic.

- Precise control of collective is just as important as the precision in the cyclic for holding a hover. This can be really difficult if you are using a conventional throttle rather than a purpose-built collective. I was fairly decent at hovering, but it really clicked when I invested in a proper collective... though this is a really expensive option.

- Hovering is a lot like trying to balance at a stand-still with a bicycle; you must anticipate with very small but deliberate and precise movements and stay ahead of the machine. If you get behind, you are done. Your three controls should be constantly dancing with very small movements. It is like steering a taildragger aircraft with rudder pedals, only the "dance" includes two other control inputs too!

- If nothing else, make sure you have proper rudder pedals for anti-torque. You need to be constantly adjusting anti-torque to compensate for raising and lowering collective, and I don't know how one can do that really smoothly without decent pedals.

 

It is so key to remember that every input with one of your three controls will demand simultaneous compensating movements with the other two - it does take a lot of practice to internalize the responses demanded simultaneously from pedals, cyclic and collective without thinking about, but once you get it, it becomes intuitive (like riding a bike!).

 

And yes, stick with it! Hovering is a truly humbling experience when you are trying to learn it - but so rewarding when you get it!

Edited February 26, 2017 by PurdueKev

[Cibit]

My torque gauge reads about 30 at pickup and then the collective is over 50%

 

Forget about where the collective is mate, that's irrelevant. You can really only achieve about 45% torque anyway before your engine RPM degrades and your low revs warning come on. It is in fact a measurement of Pounds per square inch (PSI) of oil pressure

 

BTW jfri where are you based? If you want any help with the huey feel free to ask, we have a training slot every Thursday for an hour or two your welcome to come along see if we can help you improve :)

Edited February 27, 2017 by Cibit

[Ramsay]

I'm using the ready tutorial practice mission and it's not before a hangar and I suppose I'm heavier loaded since I wont lift of from the ground with as little collective as in this video. How did you set up that flight ?

 

I'm able to duplicate Furia40's mission at Senaki-Kolkhi, Ramp 19 using

• No Weapons or External Hardpoints
  
• 12,000 lb (87%) Fuel
  
• Default Weather (20°C, QNH 760 mmHg, No wind or cloud)
  

 

I've attached a recreation of the mission, in case you are unfamiliar with the mission editor. Place the file in "[uSERNAME]\Saved Games\DCS\Missions". It'll then appear under the Missions -> 'My Missions' tab in DCS World.

UH-1H Hover Test, Senaki-Kolkhi.miz

[Pocket Sized]

Forget about where the collective is mate, that's irrelevant. [...] It is in fact a measurement of Pounds per square inch (PSI) of oil pressure

 

Was gonna say this. Pull as much collective as you need to hover, you only need to worry about torque levels when you're climbing/cruising (assuming you're not overloaded). So, yeah, for now just forget about the engine, it's doing just fine ;)

[NeilWillis]

:music_whistling:

 

I do the hoovering here at home every Friday - it picks up most of the dust and dirt, but naturally, it is a Dyson, the DCS World of vacuum cleaners!

 

:music_whistling:

[Zimmerdylan]

:music_whistling:

 

I do the hoovering here at home every Friday - it picks up most of the dust and dirt, but naturally, it is a Dyson, the DCS World of vacuum cleaners!

 

:music_whistling:

 

I too was confused and intrigued by thread title lol.

 

Not to get off subject but You haven't vacuumed until you've done it with a Kirby! :yay:

[jfri]

Forget about where the collective is mate, that's irrelevant. You can really only achieve about 45% torque anyway before your engine RPM degrades and your low revs warning come on. It is in fact a measurement of Pounds per square inch (PSI) of oil pressure

 

BTW jfri where are you based? If you want any help with the huey feel free to ask, we have a training slot every Thursday for an hour or two your welcome to come along see if we can help you improve :)

 

Unless I miss something I control collective cycle and rudder and don't control torque directly.

Do you mean where I live with being based ? If so I live in Sweden.

[jfri]

I too was confused and intrigued by thread title lol.

 

Not to get off subject but You haven't vacuumed until you've done it with a Kirby! :yay:

 

Do you mean it should be 'hover' instead of hoover ?

[jfri]

Just want to add some extra emphasis to these three very excellent tips...

 

- Control setup is even more important for helicopters than for fixed wing. You really need to spend some time dialing in saturation and curve for cyclic, collective and rudder, unless you have a full-length stick extension for your cyclic.

- Precise control of collective is just as important as the precision in the cyclic for holding a hover. This can be really difficult if you are using a conventional throttle rather than a purpose-built collective. I was fairly decent at hovering, but it really clicked when I invested in a proper collective... though this is a really expensive option.

- Hovering is a lot like trying to balance at a stand-still with a bicycle; you must anticipate with very small but deliberate and precise movements and stay ahead of the machine. If you get behind, you are done. Your three controls should be constantly dancing with very small movements. It is like steering a taildragger aircraft with rudder pedals, only the "dance" includes two other control inputs too!

- If nothing else, make sure you have proper rudder pedals for anti-torque. You need to be constantly adjusting anti-torque to compensate for raising and lowering collective, and I don't know how one can do that really smoothly without decent pedals.

 

It is so key to remember that every input with one of your three controls will demand simultaneous compensating movements with the other two - it does take a lot of practice to internalize the responses demanded simultaneously from pedals, cyclic and collective without thinking about, but once you get it, it becomes intuitive (like riding a bike!).

 

And yes, stick with it! Hovering is a truly humbling experience when you are trying to learn it - but so rewarding when you get it!

 

I'm using TM Hotas Warthog with an extension to the joystick. The collective is assigned to the right throttle.

It was new to me that I simultaneously needs to make adjustment to all three controls. This sounds very difficult.

[Cibit]

Hi the amount of torque needed to acheive a 5 foot hover will change with added weight, temperature of outside air and humidity though this is not modelled in DCS. The thing I tried to get across but probably failed is once you have the power setting applied to give a 5 foot hover, irrespective of the torque gauge reading you can just keep your ball centred with rudder input and then concentrate on the cyclic to keep the chopper in place. Once the power is applied and the ball is centred you have no need to adjust pedal or collective, just keep the centre of gravity with your cyclic inputs.

RE your location the 229th have various Companies but B Co is the european one so would suit your timezone if you wanted any help online

[RyboPops]

Do you mean it should be 'hover' instead of hoover ?

 

Yes.

[PurdueKev]

I'm using TM Hotas Warthog with an extension to the joystick. The collective is assigned to the right throttle.

It was new to me that I simultaneously needs to make adjustment to all three controls. This sounds very difficult.

 

Well, it is only tricky when you are first learning you have to think about everything, just like riding a bike or skiing. :smilewink: Once you have earned how to ride a bike though, the muscle memory is established and it all becomes second nature - you don't have to think anymore.

 

What Cibit says below is true, you shouldn't necessarily need to adjust pedals and collective much once you have them set and dialed in for hover at a desired altitude, if you are in calm conditions. Most of your active adjustments will be with the cyclic. But in a real helicopter if there is wind you definitely would need to apply the anti-torque more actively to counteract variable impact of wind on yaw rate, rotor downdraft, etc. I am not sure how accurately the wind effects are modeled in DCS.

 

And of course, if you do raise or lower collective to change your height above the ground, you have to adjust anti-torque to compensate to stay pointed in the desired direction, or if you want to pivot in place while hovering.

 

But generally, I think one does want to practice how the three controls affect each other so you can anticipate what to do in a coordinated fashion. For example, my feet and hands are conditioned now that when I raise or lower the collective, I automatically adjust with my feet at the same time to change the anti-torque. (And if I switch from the Huey to the Gazelle, I get messed up trying to remember that the rotor is spinning the other direction and my responses have to be reversed!)

 

Hovering practice is actually a fun game unto itself! Just use the free flight scenario in DCS 2.0, for example, and air taxi to different points around the Nellis ramp and practice getting into, holding, and getting out of a stable hover.

[Razor18]

... once you have the power setting applied to give a 5 foot hover, irrespective of the torque gauge reading you can just keep your ball centred with rudder input and then concentrate on the cyclic to keep the chopper in place. Once the power is applied and the ball is centred you have no need to adjust pedal or collective, just keep the centre of gravity with your cyclic inputs.

 

Hi Cib!

 

Just a bit of nit picking: you meant turn indicator rather than ball (centered in hover), didn't you? Ball will always be centered in hover pretty much by itself, I guess :smartass: :) On the other hand I check by looking at the horizont rather than looking down at the turn indicator. Sorry if I misunderstood something tough...

 

Cheers: Blade

[Zimmerdylan]

Do you mean it should be 'hover' instead of hoover ?

 

LOL....Yes. Mr. Willis started it! But we're not picking on anyone, just adding a little good natured humor and ribbing to the thread. It was next to impossible not to give in to the temptation.

[Cibit]

Hi Cib!

 

Just a bit of nit picking: you meant turn indicator rather than ball (centered in hover), didn't you? Ball will always be centered in hover pretty much by itself, I guess :smartass: :) On the other hand I check by looking at the horizont rather than looking down at the turn indicator. Sorry if I misunderstood something tough...

 

Cheers: Blade

 

Hey mate,

it was more to emphasise the placement of pedals when lifting, the ball will move left or right until its balanced with the torque. Once ball is centred then that is another variable balanced. The turn indicator needle will still move in a hover but the movement is directly from cyclic inputs because the other factors are in balance. Hard to explain in writing, better to be sitting in the pit with someone one a server. Roll on multi crew:)