Sitting in the plane or not ?

[Ed Deaver]

I never sit in the cockpit, but rather ride on the rudder in my mind.  I 
works for me to picture my eye on the rudder post or directly behind it, and 
rudder corrections became automatic for me.

As Eric said, better "in the zone" also.

A friend of mine equated inverted rudder, or rudder looking at the bottom of 
the plane on vertical as balancing a broom stick on your finger(or a bat or 
whatever.)  As the top of the broom stick begins to veer and fall, you have 
to move the hand(tail of the plane) back under the broom stick to keep it 
from falling.  Same thing with pull or push the rudder when inverted or on 
verticals.  We have to move the tail of the plane back under the nose to 
correct a heading.

Ed


>From: Rodney Tanner <rodney19821982 at yahoo.com>
>Reply-To: discussion at nsrca.org
>To: discussion at nsrca.org
>Subject: Re: Sitting in the plane or not ?
>Date: Mon, 9 Feb 2004 17:39:42 -0800 (PST)
>
>Anthony, here is the Don Ramsey page, if you don´t already have it.
>
>www.cox-internet.com/donramsey/
>
>R
>
>Anthony Abdullah <aabdu at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
>Keith, I am intrigued. Other than crosswind flying my biggest weakness is 
>correct rudder inputs. I am still somewhat unclear on what you mean by 
>"push the tail". If you are inverted flying left to right and past yourself 
>and you want to correct heading "in" toward the flight line, you want to 
>push the tail out or input left rudder? Is that the correct way of thinking 
>or am I still as confused as I look (take my word on that one).
>Keith Black <tkeithb at comcast.net> wrote: I'll weigh in on this conversation 
>from the viewpoint of a fairly new
>pattern pilot that's had to learn to fly with rudder in the last year and a
>half.
>
>When I first learned to fly RC I was also told to "get into the cockpit",
>however for me personally I couldn't make this work and had to resort to
>mentally remembering to push opposite ailerons when the plane was coming
>towards me. After enough hours it became natural and I stopped thinking
>about which way I move the ailerons.
>
>When I started pattern 1 1/2 years ago I began flying rudder for the first
>time ever. Initially it was difficult even right-side-up due to the lack of
>mental coordination with the left hand, however since the controls were the
>same direction as ailerons I got the knack of it pretty quickly. However,
>inverted flight with rudder was a total mind boggler for me. I read all the
>forums and found multiple schools of thought. 1) Get inside the plane, 2)
>practice flying a helicopter inverted on a simulator, 3) push the tail when
>going away, push the nose with coming at you.
>
>Once again I attempted #1, "get in the plane", and I absolutely could NOT
>get things straight in my mind when inverted (without standing on my head).
>Flying away, flying towards me, up, down, etc. was just a total brain 
>teaser
>for me. A funny side note is when this thread first started I did the 
>mental
>exercise again as I was reading one of the replies and thought I had it
>right, until I mentally got "out of the plane" and realized I was applying
>wrong rudder, and this was with time to think about it (not sure what that
>says for my spatial mental abilities).
>
>What finally worked for me was none of the above. Actually it was a
>modification of #3. The "push the tail" immediately gave me a mental tool
>that I could easily "think through" when flying and it worked great when
>going away or uplines with the belly facing me. And the "push the nose"
>worked when the plane was clearly coming at me. However, both of these 
>rules
>together had two down sides for me. One, I had to remember when to apply 
>the
>correct rule. Secondly, when the plane was directly in front of me, like
>doing a centered loop for example, I would get totally confused if I should
>be driving the tail or the nose.
>
>To resolve this I dropped the drive the nose portion of the rule and now 
>use
>only the "push the tail" part of the rule. This means that mentally I 
>always
>have to be thinking from behind the plane which is actually similar to
>getting into the cockpit. However, I never "mentally" roll upside down, I
>just remember to push the tail if I'm inverted or use normal rudder if not
>inverted. Now when flying past center or doing centered maneuvers, like a
>loop for example, I don't have any mental transition points at least
>relative to pushing the nose of the tail. Granted I have to mentally
>transition from right side up to inverted but I can handle that.
>
>At this point rudder control is beginning to become more instinctive and I
>don't think about the rules as much, but they're still there to help out
>when I get confused.
>
>As I said initially, this is from a new guys point of view and may not be
>the best approach, but it was definitely the method that helped me the 
>most.
>
>Keith
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "JOddino"
>To:
>Sent: Monday, February 09, 2004 11:47 AM
>Subject: Re: Sitting in the plane or not ?
>
>
> > Ron,
> > Thanks for the straight scoop. After reading they should put themselves
>in
> > the cockpit, I wonder how many guys went out and tried to visualize the
> > earth above them when they flew inverted. Everyone should forget that
>idea
> > and do what Ron does.
> > Jim
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From:
> > To:
> > Sent: Monday, February 09, 2004 6:15 AM
> > Subject: Re: Sitting in the plane or not ?
> >
> >
> > > If "sitting in the cockpit" means visualizing the view the
> > > airborne pilot would have - I defintely don't do that.
> > >
> > > I watch the model in general- for a constant visual and
> > > cognitive lock on pitch, roll, and yaw.
> > >
> > > I also try to watch a big picture that includes the horizon,
> > > box center and box end end comming up. That's required to
> > > establish size, positioning, and wind correction of maneuvers.
> > > Really prominent box marking, stripes on ground, or large
> > > poles that contrast with background are an obvious help.
> > >
> > > Somewhere in here we also need a cognitive lock on airspeed for
> > > aircraft handling characteristics, and ground speed for positioning.
> > >
> > > Later,
> > > Ron Lockhart
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
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