Searching 'manual stick handling' literature

[Apollo30]

Hi!

I'm searching for literature about how pilots handle their control stick / column (how do they grab the stick, which inputs are done) and how to analyze these inputs.

One major contribution to this field of research was done be Ebbatson (https://dspace.lib.cranfield.ac.uk/bitstream/1826/3484/1/Ebbatson_Thesis_2009.pdf).

I have not found any literature how to grab these input devices. And many Airbus pilots told me, they had never been told how to handle and grab the stick.

So if you know something, tell me please ....

[gatbusdriver]

There is clearly some joke in there somewhere.

Although not in literature, i was always told to handle the side stick like it was a woman's breast. To this day I am none the wiser! On the Boeing now, apparently a mans aeroplane, again none the wiser.......

[sevenstrokeroll]

no literature

however

just like holding snare drum sticks, holding the yoke or stick requires the lightest of touches in order to fully appreciate the feedback

if you hold anything TOO tightly, your hands lose their ''touch'' and you lose a valuble input.

[hvogt]

As the two posters before, I have never come across anything on how to touch or grab a control stick or yoke, not in scientific literature nor in pilot training literature. In flight training it all comes down to telling the students not to hold the stick or yoke too firmly. Various references to female body parts have a familiar ring to it. I wonder what references are used when they teach the lady pilots how to hold a control stick.

What I can remember is an article about the Bombardier Challenger 605 in Flight International in 2007 or 2008. The author had flown the aircraft and reported the approximate ratio of aileron, elevator and rudder control forces was something like 2/3/5 (don't quote me on the numbers), a value which had proven fine in aircraft design. Perhaps this and the provisions on control forces in the certification standards might help your search.

If you do a Google Books search for "'ram horn' yoke" you'll find an article (http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=I5GzYqRjVAoC&pg=PA40&dq=%22ram+horn%22+yoke&hl=en&sa=X&ei=3XsBUOqNH5CxhAfX7pj3Bw&ved=0CEAQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=%22ram%20horn%22%20yoke&f=false) in Flying magazine from May 1985. On page 40 it says:The most obviously unusual feature is the ram's horn yoke, which is a trademark of British airplanes. The theory behind the shape is that your hand rests more comfortably palm-down on the ram's horn than it does grasping the vertical handle of a conventional control wheel. I'm afraid this might not be good enough for your purpose, but it shows searching for specific unusual designs could bring you forward. Maybe a further search for articles on the Spitfire's iconic control stick or the side sticks in a Cirrus SR22 will help you.