I have been practicing rolling harriers for a couple of months now on the simulator and now seem to have the hang of it. The question i have is when doing the rolling harrier how much overlap of the sticks is there in the transition from the knife edge portion to the upright or inverted portion and how much deflection on the elevator and rudder is needed. Do you go full 3d rate elevator and rudder and aileron. It seems like i am holding the rudder portion untill almost inverted or upright. Looks like im doing it correct but just not sure. Should the rudder return to neutral as soon as you are past the full knife edge.

It depends on your setup and the plane, but your transition in and out of elevator and rudder should be smooth, so you should not be fully off the rudder until you are almost back upright (or inverted). Same goes with elevator - you shouldn't be fully out of elevator until you are in knife edge.

HAve a look at this thread

http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_4459958/tm.htm

Videos are included

Stop thinking, just fly.

and make it look good.

You wont know until you are flying the real thing,it will be different.The heading change will most likely be the biggest factor on the rudder timing.Practice and practice...

yeah, i just learned to turn them where i want, and when i go flying, its all i want to do. i hope i don't crash an expensive plane. there is a good chance i will.

I practiced it on the sim till I was blue in the face then moved onto the foamy and I got it in about 3 flights.(Only rolling to the left though.)But when I done it with the SPA3DT I couldnt do it.The spad doesnt have a fuse for good K.E so when it passes the K.E point and rudder input is given it behaves irratically and out of control.I then tried it with elevator only and it was perfect,a bit more difficult to keep it smooth though,but it looks good with practice.So sim practice does help a lot and every plane and setup definitly affects the way you do it.

yep...once you understand the basic inputs, its all about muscle memory. burn fuel and it will come. when it happens you will realize that you are not even thinking about it, you just do it. Once you get used to it, it does not look as fast and you can make subtle corrections to adjust your path, angle of attack and altitude all at the same time. Its just like riding a bike. Hard to explain, you just practice until it happens. [8D]


Funny thing, a friend and i were just discussing this while I was flying last week. I intentionally started trying to think about the inputs and I got totally screwed up. That is a true story. Its happening so fast, you just have to do it..

the scary thing is when you are having a merry time, rolling a $1000+ airplane all over the field and then you realize... I AM NOT THINKING ABOUT THIS....

you are then faced with a choice.. freak out and slam it into the ground full power, or accept it and keep going.

Whaturi,, Did you see the video I posted the other day that was shot of one of my flights last weekend?? I sortof lived out your poser......About halfway through the video I get it down about 1' off the ground in a RH and everything was going great until I started thinking, for a second things got pretty dicey,,, but of course, I never had a doubt[8D]...

Thats why I have a couple little 46 size glow planes for practicing 3D. Most of the time the engine and electronics will survive a crash. Another $150 for a new airframe and your flying again in a week. Maybe $300--$400 in a little airplane. Crash it--buy a new airplane and put all your gear in it. Go do it again.

Get smooth on a little 46 size plane and then grab your big plane and start doing it up about 100'. It's a lot easier to do it with a bigger plane, so if you can get a little 46 plane to do it--you'll be lookin' like a pro when you grab the gasser.

mike east, i have not seen that one, could you give me a link? thanks

[link=http://www.dodvideos.com/laborday_mikeeast_640480.wmv]Saturday goofing off with friends. [/link][8D]

very cool video.. yeah i think things got close at that one point, but you stayed cool.

you seem to be a "to the right roller" i naturally roll to the left. it is so hard for me to do it to the right, but to the left, i can usually feel pretty comfortable. have you tried left rolls much yet? how are they for you if so?

that plane is beautiful, looks like a lot of fun to fly too.

As to the original Q, I remember one time asking Pappy Boyington how much right rudder a corsair needed on take off. He gave me an evil look and said, "as much as it takes."

Here is something to try out that helped me some. When you do RH put your ailerons on low rates so that way you can have a nice slow roll and have time to see what is needed to correct.

On high rates I found myself starting off fine then rolling faster and faster till i couldn't keep up what was going on. I had a hard time repeating a consistent slow roll on high rates. On low rates it rolls fairly slow so I was able to pretty much use full aileron and not have to worry about the rolls speeding up. That was one less thing to keep up with. After that the rest came much easier as I could see what was going on.

Also I found that I use very little elevator to keep high angle of attack but that all depends on what plane u are flying. I mostly use the rudder and then get heavy with the elevator to make my turns then back out to go straight. I found that I start to transition elevator and rudder at the exact same time during knife edge to start making my turn. As it turns I back out elevator from rudder.

I am no pro by all means but this is something that helps me out.

I agree with the slower RH are easier to pick up,my X100 and UCD both do very slow RH,(using low rates ail),with throttle control,I can vary the angle,higher alpha makes them even slower,those are the ones I try to bring down lower,have plenty of time to react. I dont feel confident enough yet to get low with the fast ones but I've been doing the slower ones enough to want to get DOD.I use elevator to turn when RH,I watch for the wings to be about 45% angle of bank,when I hit the elev,it has a partial rudder effect since its not fully horizontal,it steers the RH nice and slow,we were talking about it last night,about when you get good at the RH, you can keep em straight or turn either way,thats when I realize I've been turning either way I want and keep them fairly straight too. A year ago I never even thought I could do a RH,after hundreds of attempts,its coming together. Thats the key,hundreds of attempts and gallons of fuel,to me, the RH and TR are the ones that require tons of practice.

Any tips on how to control the vertical plane in a RH,I havent even tried that variation, I guess it involves less throttle but then you might need more throw? Just guessing,any tips on this from you better flyers? It sounds like it would be better to have a controlled decent rather than start one low. I also have tried starting RH from a harrier but cant,the ail dont have enough roll control,I start them from a level attitude and then crank em up.

Any tips on how to control the vertical plane in a RH,I havent even tried that variation, I guess it involves less throttle but then you might need more throw? Just guessing,any tips on this from you better flyers? It sounds like it would be better to have a controlled decent rather than start one low. I also have tried starting RH from a harrier but cant,the ail dont have enough roll control,I start them from a level attitude and then crank em up.

I have found if the roll rate is speeding up, you're letting the nose drop too much. So keep it up, through feeding in rudder and elevator and it will stay nice and slow and look better too. As far as altitude is concerned, remember in a normal harrier one of the best ways to descend is to pull the nose up without adding power. Same thing in a rolling harrier. Get the nose up and let it slow down and it will begin to descend. You can then impede this descent by adding power. I find I'm working the throttle all the time in this move. Hope it helps!
Dave

It makes sense,I cut power gradually in a harrier to come down,I have my elevator buried all the way so I have to use throttle for elevation. I think it might get a little touchier in a RH though,although I've done the opposite of coming down in RH,I add more throttle to get the nose higher and thus a slower RH,guess it will take a fine touch. Also, I've heard of the term "RH Elevator-same idea,less throttle while doing the RH,must get sluggish if too little throttle-again-the touch. Man I'd love to do that from 20 ft. up down to the deck! Pucker!!!

I agree. That is how its done. Reducing throw can have a similar effect, but the problem is not aileron throw it is angle of attack. The higher you get the nose up the less the ailerons are effected by forward flight and the more throw you will need to maintain roll rate. You let the nose drop and forward flight begins to effect lift and the wing starts to fly and roll rate picks up. You can get the aileron throw too high, but 35-40 degrees is probably not too much generally speaking. It really depends on the airplane, but I would try getting the nose up before you start reducing rates because you are going to need those max aileron rates to control the speed of a torque roll on most planes.

One other thing I've noticed about the RH,on both my U-Can-Do and X100 its the rudder that "kicks" in the roll. I hold the ail to the limit but if I dont use rudder to the limit ,the RH is not as axial and doesnt seem to have that "snap" at the beginning of each roll. Come to think of it,my rolling harriers do not have a constant roll rate,they do seem to hesitate a little before the rudder kicks the wing over.