Howto:Fly a helicopter: Difference between revisions

Once you have loaded FlightGear, take a moment to centralize the controls by moving them around. In particular the collective is often at maximum on startup.

The helicopter is controlled by four functions. The stick (joystick) controls two of them, the inclination of the rotor disc (and thus the inclination of the helicopter) to the right/ left and forwards/back. Together these functions are called “cyclic blade control”. Next there is the “collective blade control”, which is controlled by the thrust controller. This causes a change of the thrust produced by the rotor. Since the powering of the main rotor transfers a torque to the fuselage, this must be compensated by the tail rotor. Since the torque is dependent on the collective and on the flight condition as well as wind can add additional torque on the fuselage, the tail rotor is also controlled by the pilot using the the pedals. If you push the right pedal, the helicopter turns to the right (!). The pedals are not a steering wheel. Using the pedals you can yaw helicopter around the vertical axis. The number of revolutions of the rotor is kept constant (if possible) by the aircraft.

== Lift-Off ==