Marine One

[PRB]

Watched this National Geographic Channel show about Marine 1 and the helicopter squadron that transports the President. Very interesting. They land on the White House lawn, which isn't a very big place, and they have to pass between a couple of giant trees to get there. Then they have to stop, hover, pivot 90 degrees, then land such that the three wheels are set down exactly on these three circular aluminum thingies stuck in the lawn for this purpose. They're only about three feet in diameter! There should be a “pick up the President at the White House” mission in FSX! There's no way I could do this in FS! First of all, I simply cannot detect small amounts of movement when I'm in the hover. Or, to be precise, when I'm trying to hover. My hovers remind me of drunken sailors staggering around a parking lot. But I digress. I always end up going backwards when I'm transitioning to a “hover”, because I can't detect the transition from small forward motion, to stop, to small backwards (or sideways) motion. And I can't look down through the little windows at my feet because then I won't be able to detect changes in attitude, and that's even worse. In the real Marine 1, the co-pilot (or somebody) has his head outside looking down, calling out “three feet left … two feet up … two feet right ...” We don't get that kind of help in FS! No fair. An amazing job those Marine chopper pilots do!

[Skittles]

Don't put yourself down, the majority of heli's in FSX replicate real hovering ability about as well as they replicate the smell of the cockpit.

[Dain Arns]

Watched this National Geographic Channel show about Marine 1 and the helicopter squadron that transports the President. Very interesting. They land on the White House lawn, which isn't a very big place, and they have to pass between a couple of giant trees to get there. Then they have to stop, hover, pivot 90 degrees, then land such that the three wheels are set down exactly on these three circular aluminum thingies stuck in the lawn for this purpose. They're only about three feet in diameter! There should be a “pick up the President at the White House” mission in FSX! There's no way I could do this in FS!

Actually. I can do that in FSX. :icon_lol: (Sorry, I was really trying hard to be humble) :a1310:


Paul, it might help if you focus on a fixed point a distance from where you are trying to hover.
A tree at the edge of a airport boundary, for example.
Then you can use what limited peripheral vision is available with a computer monitor to detect how you are moving.

If you are using the default helo's, that would be a problem too.
The default .cfg's are not very good, especially for the EH-101 and R22.

I would suggest heading over to Hovercontrol.com.
There is a .cfg file for the 206B which is very good.
I'd also recommend flying the 206B first, if you are interested.

Bottomline is practice, practice, practice.

[PRB]

Hehe. I'm not at all surprised to find that people here can fly these Rube Goldberg beasties better that I can! :icon_lol: I have the Hovercontrol FM for the default 206. I've heard that it was very good... I like flying the FS "jelly poppers" (as Fliger747 calls them) but I usually land with a bit of forward motion on (I cheat!) Of couse if you're in one with a tail rotor that can touch the ground with too much "up pitch", you can get into other kinds of trouble while slowing...

I bought the Alphasim S-2 Seasprite, and that one has retractable wheels. How many darn helicopters have retractable wheels? I always forget to put them down!

[Kavehpd]

... Or you can just cheat! http://www.dirkfassbender.de/AFCP/index.html

[Dain Arns]

HTR (Helicopter Total Realism) has Force Trim and Auto Hover features as well. (If that particular helicopter has those features)
Version 1.04 is very good now.
Also features NOTAR physics for the MD902.


http://www.hovercontrol.com/cgi-bin/ifolio/imageFolio.cgi?direct=HTR_-_Helicopter_Total_Realism