Attn: Carl - Crazy RC Helicopter Tricks

That's Alan Szabo, Jr.; one of the best 3-D pilots in the world. Not a bad FAI pilot either, which is my preferred style of flight... precision maneuvers with exacting accuracy. At one time, I could place top 10 in most FAI competitions (if the really good pilots didn't show up!). I met Alan Jr. during the IRCHA Championships in Muncie, Indiana back in 1999 or 2000, can't remember which year now. At the time, he was about 8 or 9 years old and he was already defying the laws of physics.

It's been years since I've flown and I'm afraid my skills have deteriorated to that of a barnacle covered hull with dry rot. But all is not lost... I bought (and built) an Align 700-E with a flybar-less system and 3G gyro about 6 months ago. I haven't had a chance to fly it yet, but I was hoping to trim it out this summer and start twisting the sticks again.

yet to see anyone handle a r/c chopper better ...

I tried R/C helicopters and my first flight looked just like the video clip ... for about three seconds.

For ANYONE interested in this hobby, do yourself (and innocent bystanders) a BIG favor... purchase a flight simulator. I'm not up to speed on the latest sims, but historically RealFlight has been the defacto standard. Trust me when I tell you, these sims are TRULY proportionate and digitally realistic. There is no need to buy an r/c helicopter anymore. These new sims are as real as it gets.

Flight sims didn't exist when I started flying back in 1986. They came about 12 years later. I've had 53 helicopters over the past 24 years. I buried a couple dozen birds in the first few years. The cost (both in parts & time) is something that can be avoided with a flight sim.

Here's a few pics, back when I had time to fly...

1. Cruising south of the Sunrise Bridge at dusk, just before the Christmas Boat Parade. Later that night, I bolted on my night blades and strapped some cyalume sticks to the skids, then put on a night time air show. VERY SCARY!

2. Touching my skids to the flagstaff while cruising by FLIBS before opening day, circa 2002 to 2003.

3. Off the galley deck of our Broward, while rafted up to several other boats in the intracoastal during the Shell Air & Sea Show in Lauderdale, circa 2004, I did something very dangerous and very stupid... an engine-off autorotation from about 200' to the deck at the end of my flight. There was no recovery had I overshot the landing. (not shown in this pic)

4. This is my speed machine. It's a TSK-60 'MyStar" with a BlackShark fuselage. Top speed about 115 mph. The paint & prep work on that fuse took me nearly 100 hours. Wish I had that kind of time now...

That was an awesome flight.
If that has been a real copter with pax onboard, they would have run out of barf-bags in the first 10 seconds....

http://www.prismdefence.com.au/index.htm

Try this with your Nordhavn....and remember it's the ship yawing, not the copter

WOW !!!

more flying toys

Hi

have a look at http://www.mikrokopter.com/ucwiki/en/MikroKopter

This is a new trend born in Germany.
Look for videos!

I've seen the less advanced version, the QuadCopter, in the local shopping mall. I think it was at Brookstone or Sharper Image. One thing I don't get... how do you maintain heading with these things? There is no head and no tail for visual flight reference. This could disorienting at a distance.

Well you don't... no just kidding.

First of all these things fly extremely stable. If you lost your heading - let go of the sticks and give it some nick (acceleration forward) - where ever it goes = front. As a Kopter pilot you have to learn to trust the Electronics.

If you are totally lost - flip a switch and it returns to its starting position (requiring onboard GPS - and hopefully no obstacle on its direct route home...)

Many people (like me) fly these things with FPV-Setups (First Person View Life Video Transmission) so the heading is always known since it is the direction you are seeing.

But it is true. Keeping your Heading is very difficult and distracting - especially when you are used to fly RC-Helikopters.

Greetings from Hamburg/ Germany
Sebastian

Can these things really do THIS

Coolest R/C Quadrocopter Ever

Yes! And this :-

Fast Transitions of a Quadrocopter Fleet Using Convex Optimization - YouTube

Even more....

Figure 8's, going through windows....

A Swarm of Nano Quadrotors - YouTube

Ten seconds? How about two seconds. The spins and then the elevator rides would do anyone in. The guy is fantastic.

Quad-Copter vs Osprey

Looks like we should have developed a larger version of this quad-copters rather than the problem ridden Osprey aircraft??

Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

There is a 'one man' prototype of the quad.

I saw a video if its first test flight a few weeks ago, but can't find it now.