[Natsu]

Back in college, one of my advisors was a control systems engineer. He showed me the matrix of PDEs for the helicopter & the control system. There was also a simulator where the height of the helicopter was fixed and you could just tilt the main rotor forward or back to move and you could try this with or without a control system.

The helicopter was completely uncontrollable without the control system. In the simulator you'd just end up spinning around or something, but that was only because it held you at a fixed height for demonstration purposes.

Seeing that demo made me realize how incredible it is that people have made helicopters work to begin with. They really don't seem to be very cooperative without a lot of work in controlling them.

[TeMPOraL]

Nowhere near the same level, but one of my proudest moments in gaming as a teenager was being able to complete a single mission in Search and Rescue 4. It took many, many hours of futzing with the game interface, and even more hours reading up on helicopter controls on the Internet. Without the latter, I couldn't really understand what's going on with the controls.

I know it's just a videogame, but it gave me a deep respect for helicopters, in a way that normal flight sims didn't give me for jet planes.

In the process, I've also learned a bit about the mechanics surrounding the drive train and the main rotor blade, and to this day I'm impressed by how it was made to work. You have a couple tons of metal, + fuel and people, hanging from the sky off a spinning rod with lots of tiny, rotating parts. The more I think about it, the more I realize I still don't have a good intuition for strength and wear-resistance of materials involved.

I wish I could fly one for real. Maybe in another life, when I'm someone with more time, money and risk tolerance. For now, I'll just wait for someone to build a nice VR simulator, and maybe my friend and I can resume our high-school competition in autorotating after simulated engine failure in bad weather.

[mLuby]

> I wish I could fly one for real. Maybe in another life, when I'm someone with more time, money and risk tolerance.

That dream is much more attainable than you might realize. "Discovery flights" are pretty cheap, and of course you're going up with a seasoned instructor who guides you through a few maneuvers. Highly recommend it!

[TeMPOraL]

Thanks! I didn't realize "discovery flights" are a thing!

[45ure]

>but it gave me a deep respect for helicopters

You should check out Felix Baumgartner and Fred North on Instagram.

https://www.instagram.com/therealfelixbaumgartner/

https://www.instagram.com/fred_north/

(login required, unfortunately, or you can get Barinsta from F-Droid)

[nradov]

I haven't tried it myself but DCS supposedly has a fairly accurate helicopter simulator.

https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/products/helicopte...

[zdkl]

The old line of rotary-wing aircraft "beating the air into submission" is so gloriously accurate on every level. Those pilots are wired different, kind of like submariners (checklists, roles/responsability, ...) in order to deal with their complex environment.

[exDM69]

There still are helicopters that are controlled purely mechanically with no assistance from electronics etc. There are lots of small helicopters, not unlike the craft in the article, flying every day.

Flying helicopters is pretty difficult (I've only done it in sims, and I'm moderately good at it after a lot of hours), but most of them are not like unstable jet fighters that can't fly without computer control.

That said, autopilots and gyro stabilization are pretty common in modern helicopters.

[alisonkisk]

There's an old joke that anyone who studies physics knows that helicopters are imposible.

[Natsu]

I saw those scary looking matrices and the stack of papers you needed to understand to do anything with them, so I can believe it.