Originally posted by Ray Smith
Hi Ptarmigan,
No, the buddy box is not a good way to teach beginners to RC flying...and yes, you can learn RC flying much more effectively without them. The reason is that passing the box, either physically (pass the box method) or electronically (buddy box) does not allow the instructor to provide physical feedback to the student. Teaching someone to fly, whether full-size flight training, or R/C model airplane flight training is not just about the instructor saving the plane. It is also about the student learning the "feel" of the stick so they can do the right stick movements to get out of a bad situation or make a good landing. Buddy boxes and "passing the box" take away the feel of the sticks just when the student needs it the most, resulting in a longer learning curve and usually resulting in damage to the airplane when you finally get around to doing landings.
Use of a "kinesthetic" method, (where the student stays on the sticks 100% of the time, and the instructor adds inputs only when necessary), is much more effective and is also much safer. The kinesthetic technique is used by all full-size flight instructors through the use of dual, connected controls. When the student does not input correct control movements, the instructor "guides" the student's control inputs (sometimes quite forcefully), so the airplane will fly correctly, and especially not be damaged by a "hard" landing.
R/C model airplanes are real airplanes. They are just smaller than full-size airplanes, are piloted from outside the airplane instead of from the inside, and they are about 10 times as difficult to learn to land with precision. Students need to learn to land as a first priority in their flight training (full-size airplane or model airplane) and that means doing as many landings as you need with an instructor guiding your stick inputs until you can do repeated good landings without instructor input.
As an R/C Flight Instructor, I use Kinesthetic Instruction to teach people to solo model airplanes. Typical students require more than 500 hands-on, full touch-down landings/touch-n-goes in order to demonstrate solo capability. This is about 10 times as many landings as are required by the average student learning to solo in full-size airplanes. I simply could not do my job, (which includes taking full responsibility for any aircraft damage) if I used a buddy-box.
For more details of the kinesthetic method of flight training, see my web site ( www.hobbiesaloft.com ) under the "Our Secret" option.
Ray Smith
R/C Flight Instructor
Owner, Hobbies Aloft R/C Flight School
I like to use Flight Simulator, Flight Simulator 2002 Professional Edition. That may help, but not always. I do know how to land an airplane in a simulator, which is tricky at times.