Hurricane tips

[Otto Rotation]

Any tips on starting to learn hurricanes? Inside, outside, nose or tail first?

I try them (nose first, skids in) in the sim but find I often bog out or get diagonal and slam into the ground...

[Russell Harding]

Can you do slow circuits? This is where you start.

Once you can groove in a circuit with a horizontal tail boom locked with the horizon, you are ready to increase the angle and speed to hurricane force!

For most flyers (skids in/inverted) CW nose first will be easiest because you are flying forward with L rudder.

[Otto Rotation]

Originally Posted by Code3Medic

Can you do slow circuits? This is where you start.

Once you can groove in a circuit with a horizontal tail boom locked with the horizon, you are ready to increase the angle and speed to hurricane force!

For most flyers (skids in/inverted) CW nose first will be easiest because you are flying forward with L rudder.

Slow circuits - yes upright or inverted. But sideways eludes me. I end up falling out of the sky.

[Russell Harding]

Funnels then?

[P@reez]

While doing slow circles, slowly rock your cyclic stick side to side (aileron). This will give you a feel of the corrections that you need to apply while flying the hurricane. You need to do this throughout the circle because the corrections you learn while flying away from you don't just translate over to the corrections needed while flying side in or towards you. Concentrate on maintaining the same altitude through the whole circle. Gradually start increasing the speed of your circle. You do that by leaning into the circle more.

If you are falling to the ground, then lean out of the circle a little and it should break your fall. (It will also make your circle bigger, so watch out for that if you are doing this in IRL. You may find yourself in a situation where that bigger circle now intersects with where you are standing). As you lean out you might gain altitude, so be prepared to reduce collective.

As you start flying the circles faster and faster they will start to look more like hurricanes. And you will have the muscle memory to do the micro adjustments of aileron to keep your heli from plowing into the ground.

[Otto Rotation]

Starting to get the feel for them in the sim. Long way to go before I'll try one for real.

[ame]http://youtu.be/lgSxY44JUy4[/ame]

[FailureToFly]

Try to do them small and slow. Slow will get you precision and small will get you working all controls simultaneously keeping the heli in the air through skill rather than momentum.

Keep the heli canted over 45 degrees and don't rely on just using aileron etc whilst keeping some controls static. You want to work all controls simultaneously and in sync.

You can then feel confident on your real heli that it's not suddenly going to plummet into the dirt at 100 km/h or at 5km/h (which is actually very cool - slow and tight hurricanes are not easy).

[Otto Rotation]

Slow/small ones I'm getting pretty consistent at.

[FailureToFly]

If you can do slow/small consistently at say 45-70 degrees over, fast are pretty easy.

Where fast gets tricky is max collective at basically full knife edge.

[Angelo A]

Originally Posted by Otto Rotation

Starting to get the feel for them in the sim. Long way to go before I'll try one for real.

http://youtu.be/lgSxY44JUy4

Otto,
I am far from an expert but here is what I am seeing watching your video. Your tail is slipping causing fluctuations in altitude, in other words, not in line with the flight path. Read Steve Graham's post about it here, he gives an awesome explanation on circuits, which applies here in your case:

https://www.helifreak.com/showthread.php?p=5394731

This is the section that talks about the tail being in line. When I read this, it made total sense and my circuits and hurricanes improved drastically following this advice:

"Slips and skids: The cyclic controls must be synchronized to the flight path and heading of the helicopter. If the tail is exactly in line and behind the flight path elevator back pressure will "pull" the heli through the turn while aileron sets and maintains bank angle. When the nose is no longer tracking exactly in line with the flight path the cyclic controls used for these two functions must also rotate around the gimbal the same number of degrees that the nose is offset. As an example lets say the heli is in a turn and the pilot fails to use enough rudder which is defined as a slip. The nose has now rotated to a position outside the circular flight path. If the cyclic controls are maintained as they were the back pressure maintained on the elevator now actually serves to increase the effective bank angle of the heli. This necessitates an increase in both effective back pressure and power to maintain airspeed and altitude. As altitude begins to decay the pilot increases back pressure but this further increases bank angle and now the confused pilot is watching the heli accelerating towards the ground. Using too much rudder or skidding has the opposite effects. Just remember that in order for pitch and bank to work in the traditional sense the heli's tail must be in line with the flight path."

Try to keep your heli 'in line' and I think you will be golden!

[ChapaWolf]

Rudder control is the key you must keep the aircraft as straight as possible. Also when headed in a direction you don't want to go use the rudder to go the other way. It took about a year for me to hurricane consistently so don't get discouraged. In fact hurricanes for me were the hardest thing to do.

[Otto Rotation]

Thanks. For some reason I'm having a hard time with both hurricanes and funnels. I thought piroflips were hard but now I'm pretty good at them, yet funnels and hurricanes are giving me fits.

[myxiplx]

I spent a lot of time working on figure 8's and found hurricanes and funnels just kind of came naturally after that.

I do figure 8 circuits with a 90 degree rotation after I complete each 8. So you do a set forwards, facing left, backwards, and facing right.

Once you've done an upright set flip or roll inverted and do the same again. As you get better practice going faster or slower, the fast banked moves are effectively hurricane and funnel practice.

By doing this you practice flying the heli in all orientations and I found that after a few months of sim time all my orientations are solid and I can throw it into hurricanes or funnels and be confident I can catch any mistakes I make.

[Angelo A]

Originally Posted by Otto Rotation

Thanks. For some reason I'm having a hard time with both hurricanes and funnels. I thought piroflips were hard but now I'm pretty good at them, yet funnels and hurricanes are giving me fits.

Ha! Opposite problem here. Circuits came easier than piro maneuvers, though just starting full piro flips! It goes to show that each person learns at their own pace and gains different skills at different intervals. keep at it! Don't you love the feeling of accomplishment when things just 'click'!

[Otto Rotation]

FINALLY.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4hWwqal2Ko

[fly_hawk]

Nice job!

[Jmann841]

you can piroflip and tic toc all day but just now getting the hurricane! very nice!

But Damn, I can hurricane and funnel all day but can't do tic tocs or piroflips like that at all!

[matthewcornell]

I thought the easiest is skids out where you simply speed up a normal circuit. Is that not also a hurricane?

[Aryemis]

Originally Posted by matthewcornell

I thought the easiest is skids out where you simply speed up a normal circuit. Is that not also a hurricane?

Well it depends on the definition. For me a hurricane is a circuit backwards or forwards and upright or inverted with over 45° inclination of the heli, but when they ask for a hurricane in competitions, it's usually backwards inverted.

I agree with the easiest being the ones forwards upright, I can do those pretty well, backwards upright not so good, forward inverted a little worse, and backwards inverted not at all.