What an instructor!

[bugdevheli]

Who makes the better instructor? Do you go for the one that lets you get into trouble and only takes over when his own safety is jeopardised, or the one that is so careful you never knew you were heading for trouble.

[NickLappos]

We learn by doing, let him go as far as possible without creating true danger. Leave enough margin for your recovery to be a sure thing.

[Flingwing207]

There's always a balance in how far you let something go. While I am a relative newcomer to training helicopter pilots, I have 20 years training folks in performance-motor skills (which incorporate a fair amount of possible hazard).

If you let your students scare themselves (even if YOU knew it wasn't particularly dangerous), you inhibit their learning as well as reduce their motivation. The hover is a perfect example of this: a new pilot starts getting into PIO, long before it gets to the point where the CFI is concerned about stabilizing the helicopter, the student KNOWS they can no longer control it.

It's ironic this helicopter thing - the things which seem the most scary to a new student are usually the things which are actually the safest, and vice-versa.

Anyway, I don't let my students continue a failed experiment at any point - it's not about danger, it's about keeping the learning/experiential cycle focused on the desired outcome.

Using the hover again, you can let the student hold the helicopter within a 30' circle with big cyclic/collective movements, hoping that they will gradually use smaller and smaller movements (some do). Or you can focus on the subtle movements first, learning to hold a stable attitude without worrying about holding a specific position, knowing that when they master a light control touch, the position-keeping will be easy.

[Heli Sport]

Good question bugdevheli. And agree stronly with you NickLappos. When looking back on my training I had 2 very good instructors but one that was very experienced in alot of aspects of the helicopter industry and another with fewer hours but mainly all instructing (hour building) I found the more experienced instructor would always let you get yourself deeper into a situation before coming onto the controls if it was needed which I found to be alot more beneficial and motivating during my training. Or his inputs were very little that you would hardly notice the effect of his movements. Getting yourself out of a situation gives you a feeling of really learning to fly the machine.
Where as the other instructor was more of a nervous pilot in a way and would be felt on the controls more often which would sometimes get frustrating when you knew you could of resureccted the situation. Maybe just an experience thing.

But anyway that's my input. At the end of your training though it is really only a licence to learn there is so much out there we don't know. Just have to be willing to take on others opinions and experience.

Happy new year for all ahead.:ok:

[goaround7]

I had a great initial instructor with endless patience whose philosophy was close to Nick's. He would often say:

'You f@cked it up; you fix it !' and let me do so while keeping a safe margin for himself.

Also, later, when I was doing my instructor's rating, he was the only guy to put me in real life situations he'd experienced with students and practice recoveries. This included some pretty hairy and inexplicable control inputs but students do these things. I know I did a couple.

Where we differ now is that while he will ask the student how they feel about eg. their final approach to encourage them to realise they are going to overshoot and then let them if they don't correct, I prefer to make them get it right by telling them what to do if they don't do it themselves and encourage a go around if anything doesn't look or, sometimes more importantly, 'feel' right.

I do think that students should be scared a few times during training. This is not corporate team building stuff but a potentially dangerous method of transport. Helicopter pilots, especially private pilots, need to be 100% aware that if they lose the rotor rpm in a real autorotation they are going to die and possibly kill other people too. It's got to be fun too, but it's a very serious business when it comes to emergencies.

One other aspect I've noticed in the professional side of the business is a margin on margin factor: whereas military guys tend to be trained to the limit of the aircraft, civvies build in a little margin and then the instructors they train build in a little more and so on, until the envelope is very constricted. I'm not ex-military so I've no axe to grind here. I feel the same pressures as the next guy in commercial aviation not to break the aircraft or have your student go out and fly off the rotors or snap off the skids.

However, I usually seek out a military, law enforcement, or factory pilot for my own ratings so that they can show me where the limits are in case I ever need them in an emergency. If you know where they are you can go as close as the situation demands but a real emergency is not the time to find the limits by catastrophically exceeding them...

[the coyote]

Its a good way to judge an instructor's experience, by how much they are on the controls. More intervention = Less experience instructing.

[Vfrpilotpb]

Good afternoon from the Blue skies of Sunny Lancashire.

And a happy Christmas to one and all,

When my Lady insructor was taking me through every lesson in the book, she was thorough so much so, that I very quickly realised that any slip up or uncommanded move could spell disaster, I was fortunate to have a CFI such as her, for I do believe she built into my mindset many of the possible dangers that could happen, she was dogged in he persistance that I do everything right and if it was not to her liking she would force it again and again until I had it off to as fine an art as any student Pilot could do.

I think her criticality of teaching me has been a big, big lesson in my way of treating the act or skill of flying as safely as possible in any helicopter that I have been in since, looking back thru my learning hours, there was only two occasions when I asked her to take the controlls, and not once did she have to act out of self preservation because of any rogue inputs from me.

In all she was a great CFI and I salute her, and always remember her voice when starting any flight!


Peter R-B

Vfr