In this video lesson you will go through how to learn to fly figure 8’s.  This is the next step beyond learning to fly in circles and will help you groove in your circles even better.  Figure 8’s are great to practice to improve your orientation and advance your 3d flight.  In the bonus section you will see morphing figure 8’s, stall turns with changing orientation and side on tic-tocs.  Make sure you practice this every night and keep trying until you can complete 5 figure 8’s in a row without crashing in each orientation.

Click here for the complete training guide

Finally the start of some real flying.  In this step you will learn to fly in circles.  It is really important that before you move into this level that you have a really good grasp on upright and inverted hovering.  If you can’t hover in an orientation you can’t fly in it.  A lot of people get started learning figure 8’s first but I like to focus on circles first.  The reason is without good practice in grooving a circles you end up doing lazy figure 8’s.  In lazy 8’s the circles are elongated and cross like an x in the middle.  If you learn circles first you will be able to focus on the transition in a figure 8 and not so much how to maintain flight.    I’ll leave it for a later lesson but the transition in a figure 8 is the key to a lot of 3D flight maneuvers.

Keep up your hard work on this lesson.  You will likely crash every time but just keep trying the flight directions equally.  It will pay off in the end and you will eventually get it!

For more information and video check out the flight school section of the site.

Learning to hover inverted can be challenging and frustrating.  But in the last few years simulators and computers have really advanced.  So learning to fly upside down can be as easy as upright.  If you want to learn to fly 3D and are just getting started make sure you start on this step within the first couple of months.  Once your brain realizes that RC helicopters can hover upside down as easily as upright you will be well on your way.  Make sure you practice Nose in, side in and tail in inverted hovering.

It will take some time for this to sink in completely.   Just keep practicing 30 minutes a night and it will come to you.  When you first try this at the field make sure you have a lot of altitude and know which way you want to bail out.

For more information and video check out the flight school section of the site.

This video describes some of the first steps to learning radio controlled 3D flight. It is important that you have a solid foundation of skills in order to advance to the next level of flying. When I first started I searched high and low for information on how to learn to fly 3D. What I found was a lot of outdated information from an era before simulators. Hopefully this video series will help guide people on how to advance quickly with a simulator.

Remember to slowly transition what you learn in the sim to the field. Things don’t always go as well in real life. But learning tail-in, side-in and nose-in hovering will really boost your confidence and get you started.

For more information and video check out the flight school section of the site.

I’m working on how to capture my simulator motions with voice and the stick movement enabled.  For this test I am using Phoenix 2.0n.  Once I get this setup working the way I want I will start recording short videos for the Training guide.  The first video will be “upright hovering level 1″

It turns out that talking and flying at the same time while being recorded wasn’t as easy as I thought.  And in order to get everything smooth I am flying in a small window on my screen.  But I will adjust in time.

Phoenix simulator demo 1 02-10-2010: YoutTube_HD

Flight school v1.1:  This is a beginner to advanced remote control helicopter training guide for using a simulator. It used to be hard to learn to fly RC Heli’s. But now with computers and great simulators it is much easier. Watch the training videos in the flight school to get tips on how to learn and improve your skills.

This is not intended to be the only way to learn and progress flying a remote control helicopter it is only a suggested method to improve and develop more advanced skills.  When I started flying I couldn’t find any documented method to practice.

Make sure you practice each step and are very confident doing these moves before trying them at the field.  It is assumed that the pilot can hover tail in before starting these exercises.   Good luck and most of all I hope you have fun with your improved flying or at the very least that this makes the sim more interesting.

This guide includes sections called stretch and bonus moves.  These are items out of your current skill level to try but keep in mind you should prefect  them later.  So moves you are just trying as a bonus or stretch level should not be attempted at the field just yet.

Well, this is my first post and first blog. This site will be used as a tool to help direct and guide other RC heli enthusiasts in their quest to learn how to fly. I’m not the best 3D pilot but I have spent the last 2 1/2 years learning how to fly. In that time I have worked with a number of people and searched the internet high and low for material. I didn’t find any substantial place to get help on how to practice and fly so I figured I would start this site.

I’m not sponsored and I am doing this on my own free time. For right now if you have suggestions or would like to help please contact me via Runryder or Helifreak. My user ID is floop.