"Helicopter flight controls are used to achieve and maintain controlled aerodynamic helicopter flight."
The mechanisms and systems used to control helicopter movement, including the collective, cyclic and anti-torque pedals, and their influence on helicopter performance.
Helicopter Anatomy: Understanding the various parts and components of a helicopter, including the main rotor, tail rotor, transmission, engine, cockpit, and controls.
Flight Instruments: Familiarizing yourself with the different flight instruments used in a helicopter, including the attitude indicator, airspeed indicator, altitude meter, vertical speed indicator, and compass.
Aerodynamics: Understanding the principles of aerodynamics and how they apply to helicopter flight, including lift, drag, thrust, and weight.
Flight Maneuvers: Learning the various flight maneuvers that a helicopter can perform, including takeoff, landing, hover, climb, and descent.
Control Systems: Understanding the different types of control systems used in modern helicopters, including mechanical, hydraulic, and fly-by-wire systems.
Flight Control Surfaces: Familiarizing yourself with the various control surfaces on a helicopter, including the collective, cyclic, and antitorque pedals.
Flight Dynamics: Learning about the different types of helicopter flight dynamics, including autorotation, vortex ring state, and settling with power.
Weather Considerations: Understanding the impact of weather conditions on helicopter flight, including visibility, wind, and turbulence.
Emergency Procedures: Knowing how to respond to emergency situations while in flight, including engine failure, loss of tail rotor control, and electrical failures.
Navigation and Communications: Learning about the various navigation and communication systems used in helicopters, including GPS, radio communication, and flight planning.
Main rotor: The main rotor is the primary flight control that produces lift and allows the helicopter to move up, down, forward, and backward by changing the angle of the rotor blades.
Tail rotor: The tail rotor is responsible for controlling the helicopter's yaw, or its rotation around the vertical axis. It generates a sideways thrust to counteract the torque produced by the main rotor.
Collective pitch control: The collective pitch control manages the pitch angle of all the rotor blades together, allowing the helicopter to climb, descend, and maintain altitude.
Cyclic pitch control: The cyclic pitch control manages the pitch angle of each rotor blade separately, allowing the helicopter to move horizontally in any desired direction.
Anti-torque pedals: The anti-torque pedals control the pitch of the tail rotor blades, enabling the pilot to adjust the amount of thrust and counteract the torque produced by the main rotor.
Electronic stability augmentation system: This system assists the pilot in maintaining the stability and control of the helicopter in challenging situations.
Fly-by-wire: A fly-by-wire system replaces traditional mechanical linkages between the helicopter's cockpit and its control surfaces with electronic signals.
Autopilot: An autopilot system can control many of the helicopter's flight functions without the need for human intervention.
Auto-hover: An auto-hover system allows the helicopter to maintain a stationary hover automatically without input from the pilot.
Trim controls: Trim controls adjust the helicopter's control surfaces to maintain a stable flight path without input from the pilot.
"Changes to the aircraft flight control system transmit mechanically to the rotor, producing aerodynamic effects on the rotor blades that make the helicopter move in a desired way."
"To tilt forward and back (pitch) or sideways (roll) requires that the controls alter the angle of attack of the main rotor blades cyclically during rotation, creating differing amounts of lift at different points in the cycle."
"To increase or decrease overall lift requires that the controls alter the angle of attack for all blades collectively by equal amounts at the same time, resulting in ascent, descent, acceleration and deceleration."
"A typical helicopter has three flight control inputs: the cyclic stick, the collective lever, and the anti-torque pedals."
"Depending on the complexity of the helicopter, the cyclic and collective may be linked together by a mixing unit, a mechanical or hydraulic device that combines the inputs from both and then sends along the 'mixed' input to the control surfaces to achieve the desired result."
"The manual throttle may also be considered a flight control because it is needed to maintain rotor speed on smaller helicopters without governors."
"The governors also help the pilot control the collective pitch on the helicopter's main rotors, to keep a stable, more accurate flight."
"The cyclic stick controls the tilting of the helicopter forward, back, or sideways by altering the angle of attack of the main rotor blades cyclically during rotation."
"The collective lever alters the angle of attack for all blades collectively by equal amounts at the same time, resulting in ascent, descent, acceleration, and deceleration."
"The anti-torque pedals control the amount of thrust produced by the tail rotor, which counteracts the torque generated by the main rotor."
"The mixing unit combines the inputs from both the cyclic and collective controls and sends along the 'mixed' input to the control surfaces to achieve the desired result."
"The governors help the pilot control the collective pitch on the helicopter's main rotors," indicating that not all helicopters have governors.
"The manual throttle is needed to maintain rotor speed on smaller helicopters without governors."
"The governors help the pilot control the collective pitch on the helicopter's main rotors, to keep a stable, more accurate flight."
"Changes to the aircraft flight control system transmit mechanically to the rotor, producing aerodynamic effects on the rotor blades that make the helicopter move in a desired way."
"To tilt forward and back (pitch) or sideways (roll) requires that the controls alter the angle of attack of the main rotor blades cyclically during rotation, creating differing amounts of lift at different points in the cycle."
"Altering the angle of attack for all blades collectively by equal amounts at the same time results in ascent, descent, acceleration, and deceleration."
"Changes to the aircraft flight control system transmit mechanically to the rotor, producing aerodynamic effects on the rotor blades that make the helicopter move in a desired way."
"Helicopter flight controls are used to achieve and maintain controlled aerodynamic helicopter flight."