Gerhardt:
Set the record straight and tell us the way it should be...because more people are learning from you than you realize.
Inthetin:
Doesn't matter what the subject is, PPF's replies are still the best.
Thank you guys, but dang! I had to cancel a flight just now. Got into the ship and found my head banging simutaneously on the rotorbrake handle and right hand upper door post. Just wouldn't fit into the greenhouse. And I think someone left my headset out in the rain, because it must've shrunk, because I coudn't even get it over my already-sumptuous noggin. I don't think that I can take it, for it took so long to make it...ahh, there I go lapsing into Richard Harris verse again...Sorry.
Look, seriously, I have had the incredible good fortune of being able to learn from a variety of very talented people as I was coming up. I believe that to be a true student of aviation one must accept knowledge from wherever it springs forth. And never stop! Even at this advanced age (50+ now), I'm still fascinated by flying. I still love watching helicopters fly, and watching the differing techniques of those mortals at the controls. It's pathetic/funny, really. As I hear a helicopter rev up for liftoff, I *must* stop and watch.
Will he get the yaw figured out beforehand so the ship doesn't slew sideways? Will he get the cyclic positioned *just right* so the ship eases gracefully into flight? Will he stabilize at a hover long enough to check things out, or will he just begin moving right away? Will he takeoff into the wind? Will he handle the ETL burble/balloon smoothly? I'm obsessive about that stuff, because when it's done right, it's pure poetry.
There is no single person who has all the answers, and for certain I do not claim or pretend to be him. AND! And I've found myself being wrong about stuff, even recently. Which is upsetting, because nobody enjoys being wrong in front of others. Yet we must continually allow for the possibility of being wrong, which is easy to say but very tough to do.
I hate hearing about helicopter crashes, especially those in which the first indications tend to point back toward the pilot (such as the most recent H-300 wirestrike accident in California). I hate it. There is just never any reason to crash a perfectly good helicopter. Yet people do, with monotonous regularity. Yes, even us so-called "experienced" guys. I just wish people would learn to use their noodle and use some common sense. Learn as much as you can from as many different sources as you can, folks. Meld it all together into a flying philosophy that works for you. Get and be good, and more importantly, strive to be even better every day, every takeoff. But don't ever think that you're so good that the basic "rules" that we learn when we're young don't apply to you now because you're older.
And don't ever let me catch you making banked hover turns.