Airbus single stick control?

[admikar]

Airbus has tested new concept, in which single stick will sufice for conventional helicopter controls layout.
https://verticalmag.com/press-releases/airbus-helicopters-pioneers-user-friendly-ways-to-fly-evtols/

[albatross]

I remember when such a system was being tested at the National Research Council at Ottawa in the early 1980s.
It was being tested on a modified Bell 205.
I do vaguely recall that the tech was being developed in conjunction with Sikorsky. The rear cabin contained a huge computer.
The pilots liked it.
I know not what happened to the program.
The 205 was NRC’s flying test bed for a lot of projects and had no stab bar.
Great bunch of folks.

[casper64]

Airbus has tested new concept, in which single stick will sufice for conventional helicopter controls layout.
https://verticalmag.com/press-releases/airbus-helicopters-pioneers-user-friendly-ways-to-fly-evtols/

No, if you read it correctly it was testen in a helicopter, but intended for the simple eVTOL market which only goes up straight, flies forward, makes shallow turns and lands vertically again. Really straightforward “maneuvering”. More or less similar to performing a flight on a 4 axis AFCS bird with all upper modes on and only using beep trims. I cannot imagine flying, for example, a complex 180 degree quick stop manoever with such a control stick. (Or remember the 206 video putting Christmas trees in a lorry?)
https://youtu.be/08K_aEajzNA?si=9zibomSLJPV8222M

[Chauderon]

"...a project conducted in partnership with Airbus UpNext that will advance autonomy even further by managing navigation and simplifying mission preparation"

We'll see how successful Airbus's mission to phase out pilots goes over the coming years.

[admikar]

Then why test it in a helicopter? It would be cheaper and more logical to use a drone that flies the same as eVTOL.

[Mee3]

@admikar simply because helicopter is flight ready, city airbus is not.

@not every advancement in automation is about eliminating the pilot... Their newer twins all have single click stabilisation and auto take off. And pilots likes it.

[Lonewolf_50]

IIRC, Comanche dispensed with rudder pedals, and had all of the flight controls manipulated by the FBW "cyclic" (why can't I recall if that is what they called it...). Mr Dixson may be able to elaborate further.

[Ascend Charlie]

Wasn't there a problem in the early days with cross-controlling? As the driver slid the stick up to raise collective, the wrist twisted a bit and caused yaw.

A decent autopilot / stability system should fix it.

[IFMU]

Sikorsky had both 3 and 4 axis sidearm controllers in the simulation labs back in the day. I believe the 4 axis controller also flew on Shadow. The 4 axis controller was pretty unwieldy. The 3 axis controller was bad enough but there were a lot of advanced control laws on Comanche. We used an old Comanche sidearm controller on the X2 but used conventional rudder pedals. The twist for yaw feature was not used.

[WillyPete]

"...a project conducted in partnership with Airbus UpNext that will advance autonomy even further by managing navigation and simplifying mission preparation"

We'll see how successful Airbus's mission to phase out pilots goes over the coming years.

I think it's more likely an attempt at creating a control interface that is primarily fully auto with a human backup, to meet the expected rules that would apply to "sky taxis".
There's simply no way to disrupt the market with current commercial pilot licensing requirements.
This might be like passing your driver's in an automatic and being limited to those types of cars.

[JohnDixson]

LW and IFMU-your thinking brought back some history.

My first thoughts went back to the rear seat controls in the CH-54 where the cyclic controlled pitch/roll and yaw. But the results of that effort were certainly muddied by the fact that the inputs were fed into the AFCS and thus had +/- 10 percent authority limits and the back seat pilot had a cross pointer indicator telling him where he was with regard to limits ( and yes-I recall the B model had the further
RH-53D AFCS where the trim system extended those limits. The challenge was thaat when one had to use a good amount of that authority, associated with good angular displacement of the rear cyclic, it became hard not to unintentionally make a pitch or roll inadvertent input when over at some substantial twist angle of the cyclic due to a crosswind, ot any combinations of the same.
Some of us protested against doing that for the Comanche but I have to admit they minimized that sort of problem. ( Comanche did retain a separate collective control )
There was, at the time some efforts ( was it the Army NASA community? ) discussing the use of a single control inceptor, but in any case when it came to a decision, the FBW S-92 MHP Canadian ship came out with electric pedals and collective. Project pilot for that effort was Rus Stiles, who also had been the Comanche project pilot. He is a gifted aviator and I’d invite Rus to comment on the challenges of a single control. it would also aid this discussion if some of the commercial S-64 pilots who perform such miraculous work could add their experienced thoughts.
In my own thoughts on the subject, issues associated with max slope landings, auto landings, gunship helicopter operations, precision load placement operations, height-velocity/Cat A operations testing would seem to present challenges to precise flight performance due to inadvertent control inputs in one or more unintended axis.