Learning the Pattern...

I've always admired such skill, and want to work on some of it my self. Aside from "practice, practice, practice," (I play the violin, so I know about that part) and occasionally "crash, crash, crash," what tips have any of you about how you went about learning the maneuvers? I can stagger through some of them, of course, but before I start the crashing part, I thought I'd seek sage advice in hope of minimizing my repaair time. Did you have a mentor? Did you work on one or two manuevers at a time, or did you learn to stagger through them all and then hone your skills for precision? Is there a logical order in which to learn them? I'm sure everyone is different, but I'm curious how long it took you to become "comfortable" with the pattern?

Kim Elmore

"I don't know about this tuned pipe business. I practiced on that thing until my lips turned blue, and I still can't play a stinkin note."
"Homer J. Simpson"

I "learned" some of the maneuvers with a 15 sized plane (Sig Acromaster) which I felt had a lot of bounce to it (and I needed that bounce).

The pattern consists of four maneuvers: level flight, inverted flight, inside loops, and outside loops. (One could argue whether the wingover is basic.) If you can do these maneuvers without stress and strain, you are ready to learn the pattern. Read the rulebook and understand what a maneuver is supposed to be. You can now go out and fly the pattern up through the triangles. A square loop or a triangle is just a very poor inside or outside round loop . The 8's, houerglass and clover are just loops strung together.

Get yourself a stopwatch so you know how long your flight is going to be and quit doing maneuvers before you crash. Once I could do approximations of all the maneuvers, I flew the pattern each flight. Others prefer to practice individual maneuvers more.

When I started learning there were no other fliers within 90 miles so I learned by myself which meant it went slowly. Probably made every mistake there is except for the crashing part managed to skip that one.

Did you work on one or two manuevers at a time, or did you learn to stagger through them all and then hone your skills for precision?

When first learning after learning inside and outside loops I would practice them in sets so many insides then the same outsides, after learning the rounds and squares the 8's were next.

Is there a logical order in which to learn them? I'm sure
>everyone is different, but I'm curious how long it took you
>to become "comfortable" with the pattern?

My order of learning (after level flight) was inside rounds, reverse S until able to fly inverted (kept saying "down is beautiful" when inverted) outside rounds, round 8's, square loops, square 8's then the rest of the pattern. The RWO was my last maneuver. Started learning about 20 years ago, still not "comfortable".

A profile such as a ringmaster, flitestreak, Banshee, tutor,etc, monokote the wing, clear paint on the fuselage, BIG LARGE tires flown over grass is the way. Agree with the statement to get several inexpensive engines (OS LA 25-40, Fox 35, Enya 19-35). Buy wood and use the kits as templates to build the planes 2 or 3 at a time.

As a fellow professional violinist, I feel obligated to give you a helping hand.

Floyd Carter

p.s. I have recently acquired, at great expense, a 1800 violin made by Francois Breton (France).

Maybe I should yield a quick self-assessement of my skills and equipment. I may be on the right track. Airplane is a SIG Banshee (which is still being trimmed after 30 years of neglect) covered in MonoKote, and a Fox 35 with zero offset. I have three Foxes, but one isn't broken in. Engine runs are still inconsistent, but they're getting better. I also have a SuperTiger G21-35, but it's a combat engine and doesn't have the right venturi to run on suction; it probably wouldn't make a good stunt engine in any case. I'm building a Stunt Stick (similar to a Ukey but with the engine mounted upright), have one yet to build, and will soon have a 15-sized version of same. Joe Gilbert recommended the Stunt Stick over the Ukey, and I persuaded Mike Ogren to make up a couple for me.

Skills: Upright and inverted flight, no sweat. Loops, inside and outside, no sweat. Consecutive loops in the same air aren't there yet. Reverse wingovers are OK, but I don't do hard, square cornesr at the bottom and bottoms are too high. Lazy horizontal 8's are no sweat, but these aren't round. Everything but upright and iverted level flight ends too high. I do all my flying over grass as I know from experience what hard surfaces do to airplanes and engines.

At one point in my distant past (30 years ago), I could do squares, round horizontal and vertical 8's, overhead 8's and 4-leaf clovers. I never had the cajones to try an hourglass or triangle, but the description of them as poor loops/8's (as in not round) makes them less scary. All of this I learned on my own, as there weren't any other stunt fliers that I knew back then.

I'll try to hook up with Larry and get pointers from him; I'm sure he will have many and that they will all be very helpful. He'll also be very helpful in getting my airplane trimmed, as reading here shows that seems to be half the battle. He's already pointed out an obvious wing-warp that I need to re-check.

Kim Elmore

The secret to triangles is patience. Don't get in a hurry. When you make your first turn let the plane fly to the top of the circle then make the second turn, don't expect the third turn to be perfect.
Make the triangle big and work on size when you get the shape.

>I'll try to hook up with Larry and get pointers from him;
>I'm sure he will have many and that they will all be very
>helpful. He'll also be very helpful in getting my airplane
>trimmed, as reading here shows that seems to be half the
>battle. He's already pointed out an obvious wing-warp that I
>need to re-check.
>
>Kim Elmore

Kim,
Your're very, very lucky in that Larry is one of the finest stunters in our district. The bottoms of his tricks are as good as anyones.
If you can get him to coach you you'll be in good shape in no time.

Iwould suggest what the rest have said. Get a Skyray 35 (my favorite since you can trace the parts onto more wood and have another kit ready to build), or Ukey 35, a "low" cost engine (LA 25??) and DO NOT spend much time on the finish. Just make it straight and fuel proof. Get comfortable with inside/outside loops, and inverted flight. Don't worry about bottoms or 45* yet. Get good shapes. Work on landings and take offs. Then you can put them together for the complex manuevers. Learn how trim changes affect the plane, and get a consistent engine run.
Your bottoms will come down when you begin to fly closer to 45* tops, and you have already developed the shapes.
Bill <><

I have learned more in the last 2 months than in the previous year and a half. I can now fly the full beginner pattern and am working on smoothing it out so that other people can identify the maneuvers I'm doing. One of the judges in the first stunt contest I entered in 50 years commented that my overhead 8 was a very nice overhead cloverleaf, so there is still much work to do.

The key, is to get the airplane and engine working right first, then stick with it. Many of the other suggestions for airplanes were very good and there are lots of good engines available, so this part is not too difficult. I do agree that it should be a profile to simplify the set-up and maintenance.

Steve
The older I get, the better I used to fly!

I could not let a fellow "Kim" struggle.

Before we get to the field, let's look at a couple of things on the plane. If the plane does not balance within 1/4 inch of the spar (back of spar forward)add some lead till it does. Close is not close enough. We do not want to be fighting the plane.

From the trailing edge, measure the distance to the spar. Go to inboard the tip and mark off the same distance. Measure one inch back (toward the trailing edge) and position your leadouts at this point. We need enough pull to ensuer that we have a good feedback mechanism and to keep the plane at the end of the lines.

Make sure that the center line of your tank is 3/8" above the center of your needle valve. We want this thing to run the same right side up as inverted. This is a good starting point.

Get yourself an adjustable handle. (Hardpoint or cable)Set the lines no more than 3 3/4 inches apart, balanced with relationship to the four fingers on your hand. We don't want the controls to be too fast or slow and we need a neutral point to start triming the handle.

Engine run:

We want a run that will yield about a five second lap on sixty foot lines. I would like you to set the engine right between a fast four cycle and an intermittent 2 cycle. Use a Thunderbolt four stroke plug or K&B idle bar plug. If you need more speed use more pitch if you need less use less pitch.

Let's Fly!

I would like you to make two or three flights where all you will do is take the plane up to 45 degrees and give it FULL up for three loops and then fly inverted one lap and repeat the exercise with outside loops.(FULL DOWN) Which ever loop is larger, move the line on the handle 1/8 of an inch toward the center of the handle. keep doing this until there is no apparent difference in the size of the loops.
It helps if you have someone validate your observation at this point.

Now for some manoeuvres. I do not want you to fly wing-overs! They are too hard by far and just mess other things up.

Pick a point above the normal level flight height that you are comfortable with. It does not matter how high this is. Fifteen to twenty feet is fine although lower is ok if you can do all of your manoeuvres with a consistent bottom at this height. This is your new level flight height. We will NOT be going lower than this height except for take-off and landing.

Try the following sequence. Take-off "level flight" - 4 laps, three inside loops exiting inverted, three outside loops exiting at level height,two inside square loops exiting level, and finally two backward "Z" shaped manoeurves. (climb the same amount above forty five that your bottom height is above the regular level flight height and execute an outside corner followed by a vertical dive and pullout to upright level flight.

Make sure that you test the wind on the back of your neck and the front of your face EVERY TIME YOU TURN AROUND! Pick a reference mark for dead downwind and upwind. They must be in a line right through the point where you are standing. Always turn a counter circle to the model. i.e. walk backwards away from the plane so that you can always add power to the plane by drawing your hand in or taking power away by moving your hand toward the plane or steping in. We are not going to practice this yet but I need you to start walking the circle properly.

As you approach the downwind point, take a bigger step to the left and orient your body square to the wind and pointing directly at the downwind point. The plane will now be just off to your right and as it flies "into frame" commence your manoeuvre. Do not be timid, especially in the rounds. The squares are so obviously sharper that this is not normally a problem.

The airplane will only go where you let it. DO NOT LET IT GO ANYWHERE YOU DO NOT WANT IT TO GO! (simple eh!) Have a firm mental picture of what the size and shape should be and stick with that same size and shape until you have seen a better image.

Concentrate on positioning your manoeuvres with respect to the wind. Light wind - do everything dead downwind. Stronger wind start your single inside manoeuvres a few feet to the left of center, outsides to the right of center. Play with this until you aware of why you would want to do this and by how much.

Concentrate on repeatability. It is not so important what size your manoeuvres are as long as they are consistent and you can repeat the performance on your next flight.

Repeat the above schedule until you are able to fly five patterns in a row with an observer judging you on the shape and ability to overlay each successive pass on top of one another. A good 200 -300 flights!

Now you are ready to learn everything else and will have a solid foundation upon which to do so.

"The airplane will only go where you let it. DO NOT LET IT GO ANYWHERE YOU DO NOT WANT IT TO GO! (simple eh!)"

However, my planes seem to have a mind of their own. As, they go wherever they darn well please! Now, if I could only whisper to my planes not to go anywhere I don't want them to go, I could be flying Expert next week.

Bigiron

Keep 'em coming! I'm all, um, eyes.

Kim Elmore

Uh-oh. Did I misquote Neil Williams?
EDIT: Naw, Just being silly

How soon to get comfortable? Well, let's see...after about 45 years off and on, well over 3,000 patterns, way too many dead airplanes to remember, I'll let you know when it happens to me......

Seriously, since you're never more than a couple of seconds from the ground, and usually a whole lot less I'm not so sure about "comfortable".

Each of us is different. For me comfortable usually turns to careless so I try to have that little "edge" when I have hundreds of hours work a few feet from the ground rather than being too comfortable.

You've gotten some great advice so far so let me try to catch a couple of odd corners.

It's a long way from learning to not fall down dizzy to being able to put a respectable airplane up for a 500 pt pattern in front of experts. Respect the goal but if you can't "enjoy the trip" you'll never get there. Take it in small steps and have fun. Use the skill classes and enjoy the trip up the ladder. hAVE FUN LEARNING!

If I were starting over, I'd grab the ARF Flite streak and put an LA 25 on it. Don't get fancy, but learn to "feed it and fly it". They are cheap, instantly replaceable and capable of flying a real pattern. More than that, set up with fairly slow controls they're great for learning the basics.

I've help many people over the years. Inside loops then lazy eights to inverted and outsides are my idea of the best way to get the basics. Try to spend MORE time inverted and on the outside loops than on the insides. Personally I like to use a lot of arm and shoulder on round maneuvers, but some of the world's best flyers like Bill Werwage, nearly lock the arm and fly more from the wrist. What's best? Whatever work's for you.

WIND-WIND-WIND! You need to learn TWO things to get the basics right. First: how to make the bird go where you want. Second: where in the circle that SHOULD be for each maneuver and related to the wind. Every lap of Every flight you should learn to sense and know exactly where exact upwind and exact downwind is. For me, I feel a slight bump in my eardrums when my head is exactly downwind or upwind as the wind hits both ears the same momentarily, almost a "stereo" effect. Turning around in the wind and feeling what cues your senses give, then making that instinctive is incredibly important.

Once you get to the point of sensing and understanding wind and being able to make the plane do basic round manuevers and fly inverted almost as comfortably as upright, and can do them at the right altitudes, go to the wingover as the first square corner maneuver. Upright is fine, but learn the reverse as soon as possible. I wish I had spent much more time early learning to do them.

I'd learn and compete with the beginner's pattern first. Get it right. Get yourself tossed out of beginner quickly if you can, but when it's second nature take the rest of the regular maneuvers a couple at a time. Planes fly differently with full and 3/4 empty tanks due to CG change so practice the stuff you'd fly early in the pattern early in your flights and late maneuvers late in the flight.

When you get to where you can safely and more or less recognizably do all the maneuvers, I'd do about every other flight as a full pattern and work on the weak spots in between.

Concentrate on position and smoothness. Think of square maneuvers not as a series of tight corners but as a series of straight, smooth lines with a corner at each end. Guaranteed, a judge who see's 4 equal, straight and well placed sides on a square will look more favorably than at four dead sharp corners with wobbly sides. Fly the Sides.

Next, intersections. Few things get points like the judge seeing you climb up the same phone pole 4 times during the horizontal eights. On the rare time I really nail the intersections, it's almost like it blinds the judges to my other errors. In a perfect world the first time the judge saw that phone pole was during the reverse wingover.

Last: "free Points". There are some that are free or nearly free. Be organized and look like a pro in your starting and procedures. Make them start out thinking you're really good. These same habits will save you a few airplanes over time.
The most overlooked nearly free points I see are on takeoff and landing. Look at them and watch the pro's. A 15' ground roll and a smooth, distinct, climb to 4-5" with a clear round out exactly at 1/4 lap from release is the target. It's not that hard and you can get high 30's here long before you get that score elsewhere. I like to takoff facing 1/4 lap ahead of my release point with my arm pointed straight out from the shoulder. That way I'm facing the exact spot where I want to reach level flight and don't need to move my body until then. Then remember the next two laps are also being judged so keep it dead smooth and at that altitude, plus add the 2 laps between maneuvers. It works for me but there are many good ways.
Landing. Again, it's not just the touchdown. You don't need to start at 4-6' although that's an arguing point. You need a smooth, distinct descent. The ONLY visible control inputs should be entering the descent and rounding out ONE time at the bottom. With a flapped airplane, try applying full down as soon as you touch the ground. You'll be pleasantly surprized. Every extra movement is an error so so level flight until the speed drops (after the engine quits)-- a one motion smooth descent-- and a smooth roundout/flare with the nose just above the horizon. Don't force it. Learn to let the speed bleed off properly and the model will almost fly itself in. Usally a model will land itself better than you can if you set it up and let it do its thing.
Most of my landings are mid 30's with even an occasional 40.

Take off and landing points are the most overlooked thing in many patterns.

Last thing: Don't "over engineer". You don't need to get every part of your plane to the standard of the world's champion at this stage. It needs to be absolutly predictable and dependable. A perfect 2-4 break is wonderful on a full stunter. Something like an LA 25 Streak might run nearly at a 2 cycle and be perfect to learn. As you learn to fly you need to be able to concentrate on flying, not engineering. That will come with time and experiance.

Welcome to the sport and have fun.

I'll complete a couple of stunt trainers soon, and I still have my old SIG Banshee. I'll nab a simple flight streak ARF or two along with a 25, and I'll probably get a Cardinal ARF at some point (maybe Santa Claus will come through! Family is always all over me about what I want for Christmas and, as a ham radio operator, I'd love an Alpha 86, or a TenTec Orion with a full complement of filters, but at $3600 a pop, that's a bit much to ask for...).

I've no delusions about becoming a world-beater because I can't realistically free up the time required to practice that much. Still, I'd like to try my hand at competition one of these days and meet some of the obviously fine people who post here. And, I want to introduce my kids (still very young, at 4 and 6) to this hobby, along with ham radio and full scale aviation, partly
becasue of the fine people they'll meet.

Some activities are filled with more than their standard share of Good People, and I'm convinced that CL Stunt is one of them.

Kim Elmore

Jeff:
The rule book states the take off to have a minimum roll of 15' to a maximum 1/4 lap with a smooth ascent reaching level flight over the point of release. You need a longer ascent to get into the 36+ point range.

I recently found I had crossed an invisible line with squares and triangles. Previously I had between struggling and sweating to make the plane go through each corner (always adding a bit of Insurance Up to the last corner, resulting in a bounce).

Then one day, I noticed that something had changed. It was now more like watching my arm and wrist and plane do the square/triangle thing, with the last corner looking more like the others. It was a distinctly different sensation from before--a lot less work and a lot more fun.

I'm convinced that this is what happens when you just keep going out to the field one more time, filling the tank one more time, repairing the !%@$* Ukey/Streak/Clown one more time . . . This is the reward (or one of them) for practice, the almost magic moments when some piece of the pattern starts to come together for you. It's a very good feeling, and that first taste sure keeps me coming back for more.

Good flying,

Kim Mortimore
Alameda Aeronuts

>One of the
>judges in the first stunt contest I entered in 50 years
>commented that my overhead 8 was a very nice overhead
>cloverleaf, so there is still much work to do.
LOL!!!

I stand corrected. For some reason (like creeping senility) I have gotten into the 1/4 lap bad habit this year and no on has commented. Oddly enough, I've still been getting high points most of the time.

When an old dog learn's a new trick, it's usually a bad habit!

Thanks for the input.

I would expect Larry would be happy to offer suggestions on your airplanes trim and tell you how your maneuvers look outside the circle, as well as give a few pointers for survival in the more difficult maneuvers but you will need to ask him. For that matter, so would I and there are one or two others who might could help.

Larry has a lot of natural ability, is relatively young, practices a lot, and has been flying pretty much continuously for 25-30 years. He always knows exactly how his airplane is going to perform in any conditions. That's what is needed to fly like he does.As he is fairly low profile and flies classic(or at least non-piped) airplanes, he is notoriously underscored by many judges.

As to a true"coach", there's not really anyone locally though anyone will offer helpful suggestions if asked. That, plus our poor weather most of the year and treacherous circles make this a pretty tough place to fly stunt.

I finally started getting through a recognizable full pattern about 3 years ago after a 30 year layoff on my third Sig Twister/OS FP 40/11-4(an LA 40 would work as well or better) which is a pretty good combo here for beginner and into intermediate. The first two Twisters were wind/insufficient power for conditions/lack of recent experience casualties. The Twister is very capable, easy to build and cheap which is why I am suggesting it. Plan on losing a couple if you fly in marginal conditions or plan on not flying much.

Then the pilot did lie down and flew several maneuvers on his back.

Yeah, I was impressed...