Tom:
In 2021, RTRFM launched Breaking Sound Barriers, a project developed in conjunction with Carers WA. That program provided training for people with lived experience of disability, developing podcasting and radio skills. This is our third and final piece from the 2021 program, which I was involved with. In this piece we’ll hear from Zachery Wibowanto with his submission on helicopter flight simulations.
Zach:
Good day meta gents from the land down under! Drach is your instructor today. For this episode, we’ll talk about when virtual helicopters flip upside-down in a sim game called ‘War Thunder’. Surprisingly, this also applies to digital combat simulators, despite the high simulation levels. By the end of today’s episode, you will have the understanding, and potential to be better at flying pure cyclic and collective helicopters, and as a bonus, you’ll be able to perform diving shots on weak tank tops safely, without worrying about face planting into mother nature. So reject your ejector seats and strap yourself into an awesome episode about flying brisk.
Flipping over in a helicopter can be very scary. If you have flown a helicopter for some time already, chances are you’ve already experienced a flip from over speeding. The flip is a result of an somewhat poorly implemented feature into both DCS and War Thunder called the Rotor Blade Stall or RBS.The RBS in a nutshell is when the blade is too slow to compensate for the asymmetric lift, and stalls at a high angle attack. Such usually happens in real life when rotor speed is too slow with a high collective blade pitch setting, more additionally excessively inputting counter roll and forward cyclic.
War Thunder and DCS are much more simple however where it usually only happens as a result of over speeding. A retreating blade stall in DCS or ‘War Thunder’ results in un-commanded rolls to the side or the retreating blade. However, in real life it also results in a sudden and possibly violent pitch up, meaning a self-correcting. Well, at the expense of possibly slicing your own tail off. Such usually doesn’t exist in ‘War Thunder’ or DCS, so it’s up to the pilot to correct themselves out of what is usually an unrecoverable rolling dive, for fatal impulse to the ground.
Do not fear for long for I have the solution. I have been flying since 2013. I was formerly known as the guy who played with eye-bleedingslideshow slashed frame rates; like I’m literally talking an average of 8 frames per second on some maps. I’m also part of ‘Wings of Veterans’ the leading international duelling squadron, for the simulation committee of ‘War Thunder’. If I can achieve this without good equipment such as VO Head Checking, I’m sure you can too. Anyhow, if you’re in such a state that you still can’t control the roll without too much speed, simply reduce collective, correct your roll accordingly and wait for your SP to drop before resuming to normal flight.
However, if you cannot correct your roll, chances are you’re probably already inverted now headed straight for the ground. If this is you, you are way too fast and the only solution is to turn itself into a perishing blade, and let the gyro procession do all the work for you. To do this, you will need to increase collective, which further stalls the rotor, and you must absolutely pull the stick all the way back. This will re-accelerate your roll into a vomiting state, but trust me, in addition to these inputs you will sister-roll in a direction your helicopter wants to roll, and finally input as much to assist your roll over.
If done right, your helicopter should now transform into frisky and self-upright gyroscopically stable with the nose leading to the horizon. You many now additionally find yourself in a momentary vortex ring state during your transition from horizontal to vertical flight. This should be temporary however. Unfortunately, this technique does not work for sluggish helicopters such as the Mil-MI4, and for DCS players, it will also mean you will have to deal with lots of tail rotor ineffectiveness. But either way, being in a dizzy spin with a loss of tail authority is always preferable to face-planting the Earth. Am I right?
You can always use this new-found knowledge to your advantage. Here’s an example. Those in the Reddit ‘War Thunder’ community may know, a player named Bruce Leroy. He is otherwise known as the ‘Helicopter Stat-Man’, which played in realistic battles with a VR Headset. He provided a strategy in one view on flying the Japanese UH-1B helicopter, otherwise known as the ‘Hiyodori’, by suggesting players climb to altitude, observe what shoots back at you and determine your threats. Identify the best clutter premise, dive on them, and launch as many rockets as required. Proceed to encourage them to dive using my special RBS technique, before proceeding to perform evasive manoeuvres and finish up any deployments required.
I originally saw his tutorial video and I tried out his side-climbing strategy, and I surprisingly managed to wipe out five players in a single dive. Keep in mind that the Japanese Huey is capable of launching a pair of Hydra Fin-Folding Aero Rockets fourteen times. To quote what Bruce said; “If you master rocketry in the UH-1B or heck in the 10 AV205, which has half the rockets, you’re sure to be capable flying any helicopter in the game.” Well, minus that there is roll and pitch, phase and lag effect of some helicopters, but that’s for another time. So, remember, try not to flip, if you do ease that stick back and roll the roll. This is Drachm signing out, I hope to see more whirly birds in the air!
Tom:
And that was Zachery Wibowanto, with our last audio piece from the Breaking Sound Barriers project. Thank you to Carers WA and RTRFM for their support in delivering the project. We hope to bring you some more pieces later in the year, and you can go and re-listen to any of those audio pieces we played on the RTRFM website.
