As I had discussed in my last post that we will get to learning rc helicopter flying step by step from next post onwards, so here it is. In today’s post we will get to the first lesson of flying your new radio controlled rc helicopter and that is Learning cyclic control. Let’s begin:
There are few checks which you need to make before get your hands on flying this machine. If you have an instructor with you, he is going to help a lot and check things for you, he will even save you from doing a disaster, if not; you are required to be very careful in following the steps in learning the cyclic control. You need to check if your rc heli is setup the way it was defined in the instructions manual came along with your rc chopper.



Although rc helicopter or regular helicopters can be moved/ tilit through tilting the propeller or rotor but in cyclic controls our rc helicopter controls do not tilt the rotor to achieve the moves but they do something advanced and that is called “Cyclic Control Pitch”. It is done by changing the angle of pitch of the rotor blade on every revolution it makes depending on where you want your rc helicopter to tilt. This is why it is called cyclic pitch control. Elevator (pitch) and aileron (roll) is controlled through cyclic pitch control.



For instance if we want to move our rc helicopter forward, we will have to lift our rotor on the rear half than the front half. So what we do, we give more pitch on the rear half of the rotor disc or in other words the blades will get more pitch when they get to the rear half of the rc helicopter. In fact due to the gyroscopic precession principle, the change starts happening on the blade 90 degrees before it reaches the rear end to cater for the gyroscopic precession. This whole cyclic change in pitch of rotor blades is called cyclic control of rc helicopter.
All these changes in pitch of rotor blades are possible because of swash plate and the rotor head. The swash plate is a mechanical linking to the non rotating parts of the controls and rotating parts. Hence forward cyclic will tilt the rc helicopter forward, rear will move it backwards, right will move it right and left will left. I hope you have got the idea how cyclic controls work, now let’s fly it step by step:

1. Making sure that all the gears are connected and intact is a must.

2. You need to spool up your rc heli and check the controls in spooled up condition. If instructor is with you, let him test fly the rc helicopter so he can make sure that all is well and running good.

3. You can well understand from your training manual that your rc heli can be slowly landed while it has the sideways or back/ forward thrust. You can ask your instructor to demonstrate you what is a sliding heli. It will definitely increase your confidence that slowly decreasing the collective if you lose control. Controlling pitch will require bit of a practice in the beginning, an instructor can guide you in that too.

4. You need to rehearse in your mind what you will be doing practically. It’s always recommended that you put your rc helicopter into the wind. Position yourself at a little distance from your heli to the right or left.

5. Lift your radio controlled heli to a safe height of just 0.1 or 0.2 meters. Yes that is a very little height where your landing gear might touch the ground because of the vibration of your hand when it tries to get familiar with feel of the control. This is all good; when you are able to stable your rc heli at this safe height, lift it to 1m.

6. When you have stabilized the hovering at 1m, give very small inputs and practice sideways only to a distance of 1meter, stop for a hover and then come to your center position. Practice the same for the opposite direction and come back again. This will give your hands a proper feel of the controls.

7. Do the same exercise for forward and backward moves.
Congratulations, you have learned the cyclic controls of an rc helicopter. One thing before ending this post; you should stand at the left of your rc helicopter if you are using right control and vise e versa.

Till next post for the next learning lesson,

Happy flying

I was looking Parson's high transition length body in a book and thought that maybe if I modify my body shape also so that the nose becomes sharper. By sacrificing some interior space, the flow acceleration can be kept for high transition length according the book I was reading this. My modified body looks like this.



Despite the QFLR5 algorithm is not maybe designed for simulating NLF bodies (it is designed for simulating wings), the pressure distribution looks like the same as the wind tunnel data for the Parson's body which makes me think that it might not be that much wrong.

Big Q1 loss at Croatia Airlines

Croatia’s national flag carrier Croatia Airlines has announced its first-quarter loss of 38.3 million Kuna (5.2 million Euros), worse than the 17 million kuna (2.3 million Euro) loss initially expected. The carrier’s CEO has blamed the global economic crisis and falling demand for the bleak result. The airline’s January to March revenues reached only 338 million Kuna (45.8 million Euros), down from 347 million Kuna (47 million Euros) in the first quarter last year, while the total number of passengers fell by 3 percent in the same period. Croatia Airlines’ domestic routes saw a 4% drop in passenger numbers, while its international operations managed to keep about the same number of clients. However, chartered flights registered a 68% drop to mere 2.500 passengers in the first three months of the year. Cargo traffic was down by 16%, reflecting a recession-hit market at home and abroad. Croatia Airlines had an agreement with Cargo Counts for distribution and management of the airliner’s cargo services, but switched to Lufthansa Cargo in early 2009. Direct ticket sales were down by 15% year-on-year, while indirect sales through agents increased by 13%, primarily due to stronger sales on the North American markets.

The management of Croatia Airlines has said it will differ its investments if the negative financial trends continue. One of these investments would be aircraft orders. Croatia Airlines currently has 4 Airbus A319s on order whose deliveries should start in 2012 and it has 4 Bombardier Q400 aircraft on order, 2 of which are expected to arrive this year.

Ever wanted a Star Trek's computer? It is here today:

http://www.wolframalpha.com/

For starters, try out for example: integrate x+y^2
This service is superb.

MAT’s Boeing B737-500 – grounded and empty

A month ago the Macedonian Aviation Agency (CAA) grounded the national carrier’s sole aircraft, a Boeing B737-500, deeming it unsafe for flight. The Agency grounded the airline saying that the aircraft’s front wheel is unsafe. The grounding of the aircraft has brought the airline to the brink of collapse as it is unable to fly to the few destinations it is not banned from. The Boeing aircraft has in recent weeks been flown to Belgrade where Jat Airways, MAT’s potential new owners by the end of summer, offered to fix the front wheel of the aircraft for free, which it did. However, the Macedonian carrier and its 180 employees have received yet another blow from the country’s aviation agency after it refused to re-issue an operating license despite the aircraft in question being repaired. "CAA informs the public that a partial servicing of the MAT plane in Belgrade does not meet the requirements for overhaul of the front leg, for which the deadline has expired", the agency released in a press release. Therefore, the CAA says, “we cannot issue the license until a complete overhaul of the aircraft is carried out”. On Monday, MAT stated that the CAA’s decision is a violent attack aimed at putting the company out of operation. MAT has notified the President, the Prime Minister, the Public Attorney's Office, the Public Prosecutor's Office, the diplomatic core, as well as international institutions such as the ICAO, JAA and ECAC on the issue.

MAT’s other aircraft a CRJ900 is still grounded in Ljubljana. This is because MAT has not payed the Canadian plane maker for the aircraft. If MAT does not provide the required finances to the aircraft manufacturer by the end of June, the CRJ will be leased to another airline. The MAT titles from the aircraft have already been taken off.

What is the meaning of these numbers ?
Where are you likely to find them ?
What sort of aircraft are you likely to find it on. (Several options).


New rules this time;

Have as many guesses as you like.
I will not be responding to any questions until Sunday.

New cabin from this week

Serbia’s national carrier, Jat Airways, will unveil the new look of its business and economy class cabin onboard its Boeing B737 fleet this week. By Sunday, the first Boeing B737-300 will be sporting the new cabins and will be in service. Saša Vlaisalvjević, the airline’s outgoing CEO, confirmed that the B737-300 registered YU-ANJ, which has been at Jat Tehnika for the past few days, will enter into service later this week with the new cabin product. This will mean that Jat will be changing the look of its seats for the first time since 1999. Not much is known about the new look although the current seating configuration with 2X2 in business class and 3X3 in economy class will remain. The finances for the upgraded cabin product have been provided on behalf of the Serbian government which will mark the government’s first investment into Jat in many years. The new cabin product will be installed on all Boeing B737-300s and the B737-400 aircraft by the end of the year. The regional ATR72s will not be getting the new cabin look as the aircraft type is expected to be phased out by the beginning of 2011. YU-ANJ, the first aircraft to receive the new look was also the first aircraft to receive the “flying dots” livery and “Jat Airways” titles in January of 2003.

Jat’s CEO announced that the airline will first purchase 4 ATR72-500 aircraft in early 2010 which will replace the current 5 ATR72-200s. Vlaisavljević says that the 500 series is quieter, quicker and more economical. The airline will then purchase 3 Boeing B737-700 aircraft followed by 3 to 4 regional aircraft with a capacity of 80 to 100 seats. All the funds for the purchase of the new aircraft will be provided on behalf of the Serbian government. After the entire fleet renewal process is complete the government will decide if they will attempt privatise the airline for a second time.

Only a few hours ago it was announced that Saša Vlaisavljević will definitely leave the airline on June 1, 2009. There are currently 3 candidates for Jat’s CEO position. They are Vladimir Ognjenović, Jat’s current commercial director, Stojan Dimitrijević, Jat’s current manager in Germany and Đorđe Brdarsko, Jat’s current director for ground handling. Saša Vlaisavljević will become the manager of the City of Belgrade. However, he will remain in the airline’s board of directors until 2013.