How do you fly a radio controlled toy helicopter?

First off, they are very sensitive. It is extremely easy to over-correct for a spin or to jerk the throttle (which controls altitude) and make it rise/fall rapidly and crash into the ceiling/floor. You must use small movements on that left stick.

The first thing any helo pilot learns is hovering; no movement except straight up and down. Teach yourself the throttle control required to control your altitude and your rate of climb/fall.

Second, the trim is often off; that causes it to spin even with your fingers off of the right stick. Adjust the trim until it stops spinning. Again, it doesn’t take much. Just two clicks makes a difference between spinning left and spinning right.

Once you get those two things right, you are ready to go forward. If your helo is like mine, moving forward will cause it to drop slowly as the rotors are trying to split their power between motion and keeping it airborne; you will need to give it a little more gas to maintain altitude, and back off when you stop or else it will climb.

@jerv Thanks so much! This one is supposedly a 3 channel RC flier, which makes it more stable they say. I have a wide backyard but I don’t know why even if I toggle on the stick to back it up or go forward, its response is sluggish and quickly goes on its own merry way towards the fence or the house.

It just doesn’t seem to stick going forward or backward without moving sideways entirely on its own. This happens even if its not windy.

I am forced to land it then to avoid more accidents. I could do hovering but not long enough to make it turn and stay within a limited area. I guess practice, practice, practice? Also, I did not know the battery only runs 7 minutes before it needed recharging for about 1.5 hours.

I don’t know about toys, but a real helicopter has three primary controls: the collective, the cyclic, and the pedals.

The collective controls the pitch of the main rotor blades “collectively” causing the helicopter to rise and fall.

The cyclic controls the pitch of the blades “cyclicly,” i.e. push the cyclic forward and it increases the pitch of the blades more to the aft of the helicopter than the front; the result of this is that the helicopter will pitch forward and fly forward. Of course, you can pull the cyclic in any direction to change the pitch and direction of the helicopter.

The pedals control the pitch of the tail rotor blades, causing the helicopter to spin in place clockwise or counter-clockwise.

Using these three controls, you can fly in any direction: forward, backward, side to side, up, down, and point the front of the helicopter in the direction you want to go.

I assume your toy operates according to similar principles. But without the physical feedback you’d get by actually flying the aircraft on board (like driving a car by remote control), I imagine that would make it more difficult.

It looks like yours is similar to mine; 3 channel, counter-rotating main rotors, and rather tiny. Mine is hard to fly outside because it’s so light that the least little breeze will alter it’s flight. Even flying near stuff does that; the breeze from the rotors will do that too.

I didn’t notice if yours had a little thing on the tail that can slide back and forth, but mine does and that affects it too. Sliding it forward makes it go slowly forward without touching the controls, disables reverse, but increases it’s forward speed. Sliding it to the rear has the opposite effect, so it has to be in just the right spot if I want it to hover without moving. And like the trim, it’s sensitive.

@HungryGuy The blade pitch is fixed, so altitude is controlled solely by the throttle. The tail rotor is horizontal and tilts the whole craft fore/aft and thereby redirects the thrust from the rotor. And turning is done by adjusting the relative speeds of the counter-rotating main rotors.
In other words, the little ones are different from the full-sized or the high-end model helicopters.

@jerv – No wonder he’s having so much trouble with it :-p

@HungryGuy Actually, it works out pretty sweet. But you are correct that it’s easier when your ass is telling your brain what the vehicle is doing than when going by remote control. That is why I despise American mid/full-sized cars too; you can’t feel the road :p