Flew with a Robinson factory pilot today..

Kevin: Are you still planning on going to the Central Sierra Helicopter
Fly-In? Would love to meet you and talk about some of the things you
learned as well as maybe talk you into an article about some of your
experiences.

--
Stuart Fields
Experimental Helo magazine
P. O. Box 1585
Inyokern, CA 93527
(760) 377-4478
(760) 408-9747 general and layout cell
(760) 608-1299 technical and advertising cell

www.vkss.com
www.experimentalhelo.com


"The OTHER Kevin in San Diego" skiddz "AT" adelphia "DOT" net wrote in
message ...
On Thu, 27 Apr 2006 17:59:27 GMT, Don W
wrote:

Hi Kevin,

You didn't say, but I'm assuming that you were
flying a R22, and not the R44. I've only done
about 3 autos in the R22, but what you are saying
makes sense to me, and was also the way I was
taught. As long as you don't let the rotor RPM
get into the red, you are fine, and the additional
rotational momentum will be a good thing when you
go to set it down.

OTOH, I personally would tend to keep the rotor on
the high end and avoid getting even close to the
90% because of the possibility of a blade stall,
and the unrecoverable fatal consequences.

Oh, yeah, R22. (Can't afford the 44 right now) I'd also prefer to
keep the rotor RPM on the high side, but best glide in both the 44 and
the 22 is 90% @ 75kts.. I was always "fearful" (for lack of a more
appropriate term) of letting the nose get too low in an auto for fear
of decaying rotor RPM but this guy showed me you could push the nose
over as far as 20 degrees coming out of a zero airspeed auto to build
airspeed for the flare - without touching the collective. It was VERY
educational and a lot of fun to do..

I'm going to head up to the school in a little while and schedule some
time with the head instructor to work on some of these new skills
while they're still fresh in my mind.