Unlimited Aerobatics

Some time ago I wrote about the aerobatic competition categories, as they are in Australia, and the key changes from lower to the next.  I stopped at Advanced, as that was where I was then.   It was early days Advanced also, now I'm in a similar position with Unlimited.   Probably presumptious of me to write anything with any credence!   But, then it is the person starting out and feeling there way that crave information and may glean something here they can apply.  The experienced Unlimited pilot doesn't have to agree with my observations, and would have discovered his/her own methods.   I'd love to hear from some of them and milk their experience, it would save me many dead ends I am sure.   I joked to Paul at the Boot Camp, that once you get to ADV/UNL level, all assistance stops!

What do you need to learn going from Advanced to Unlimited?  The key new figures are:  Negative flicks/snaps, tailslides, and inside/outside rollers.   Not much huh?   Excepte that all the rolls, all the flicks, can occur on all the lines, i.e. up, down, 45's.   And every roller in the book seems fair game.

First the rollers:    You can practice these anytime, at any level.   Have a crack.  They shouldn't hurt and practice plus technique will make them better.  Technique?   Lead with rudder and get the first 20 degrees or so cheap.   Keep the nose above the horizon, don't let it slide down as it will be very hard to recover.   The nose actually bobs up and down in a rhythm when you get it right, not stay on, and roll, around the horizon.  Sacrilege you say?  Well, each to their own, but I challenge you to fly a 180 one roll roller without lifting the nose.   Done nicely you won't be running out of rudder.

Negative Flicks:   Like diving off the high board for the first time, you just have to do it at some point.   Start gentle from an inverted  45 up line.   Get the 'hang' of it, as at first it feels strange hanging in the straps looking out as you get flung around!   Cool!   Then try from level inverted at low speed.   Try different feet - I like left footers, but others like right.   To me they go in easier with left foot.  This isn't ideal, as you will get more diversion from the flight path and larger cone angle with left foot (like for right foot upright snaps).  And, as for 3/4 down snaps in Advanced, you need 3/4 up and down, with either foot, in Unlimited!   My current project is right foot neg snaps, I've got them biting, but the exits are untidy.   The picture just looks different.

It may be my aircraft, but I seem to get more 'feel' in the neg snaps.   You pitch, then feed in rudder, and at a point you feel it break into autorotation, then you can unload and it accelerates.   The pos snaps seem more graunchy in comparison.   Possibly my wimpy push prevents 'burying it' as I tend to do for pos snaps.

Tailslides:  Mmmmm.   Hard for me to give advice, as mine are terribly unreliable still.    Cheat is all I can say, and cop the downgrade.   It sounds obvious, but a well set, stable vertical is very important, then try and centralise rudders (hard to do), and watch your tell-tail for the slide, then stick forward or back, as required.   Aggressive (as in ALL) rudder on the low wing side can sometimes salvage a poorly set vertical.

And what to do when it all goes wrong when flicking or sliding?    Power - IDLE, Controls - CENTRALISE (both hands), and wait for god's g to take over, then recover.   This will only work if you have enough altitude, obviously.  Don't say I didn't tell you so, Captain.

So that's it.  Go out and cut sick.  Once all that is working to some degree, you need to try it in a sequence, in a box, for judges.    That's where some extra techniques to make life easier may come in handy.   I called them 'cheats' in an interview recently, and that hasn't gone down so well.   So we'll stick to 'skills and techniques', with 'cheating the wind' being just that.

Thanks to my friend (as in FB), Thierry, for the video.

Que Sera Sera

In the past I have written often about aspects of the sport of aerobatics, and alluded to whether it is, or should be, made into a form of public entertainment.   This may seem like heresy to those of us that participate in the sport, and naturally wish that we can evangelically ‘spread the word’ and show our sport to the world (big note ourselves?).   Do not for a minute think that I don’t also want this, or that I wish the sport to be (some would say, remain) ‘exclusive’!   In contrast, I want to make the sport more accessible to all those people and pilots out there who want the opportunity to participate.

But public consumption of the sport is a different thing to mass participation – think about it.

The media space is dominated by high-profile events with corporate backing.   Minor sports get little or no airtime, particularly and quite obviously, if the media outlet has no financial association with the sport in question.   Even major international sporting events get little or no airtime on competing commercial channels.   Only anti-syphoning laws and sports of national public interest are referred to in competitor broadcasts.   In a similar fashion, key dates such as long weekends and national holidays are dominated and ‘owned’ by major sporting and corporate media backed events.

This is the environment in which we live as minnows, and challenging for coverage, even a mention, at those key times, will not reward the time and effort invested.

So far I have only sketched out the environment we live in, without acknowledging the quite obvious:  That watching competitive aerobatics is like watching paint dry!   This maybe too harsh, but would be a difficult position to defeat in a debate.   We all know it, the action is high, far, and usually in a poor position for public viewing unless the public happens to be located with the judges.   Then, the sequences are repetitive, of varying quality, the scoring method arcane, and scores slow to be released, with no immediacy to allow the viewers to make qualitative and quantitative links between the flights they have just watched.   Also, and importantly, the participants are remote from the public, encased in an aircraft, and don’t wear lycra (imagine the sight...).   Additionally, most people do not fly, and are shit scared of small aeroplanes.   It is thus difficult for the viewer to associate with the sport at all, unlike cycling, motor racing or football (insert preferred code here).

Yes, I may be overly negative here – playing the devil’s advocate.   But these are the problems we face.

The upside:   Yes, with the advent of small video cameras, automated score processing, digital editing and emerging sports oriented channels looking for content, plus the internet, we could possibly put together a highlights package suitable for broadcast.   The cost of production and ‘gifting’ (at best) of the programme to a broadcaster would be at our expense, from my investigations.   Recouping the costs via advertising is the obvious reply to this.

Neglecting the ‘chicken or the egg’ question, how then do we satisfy the sponsors we wish to attract?  Branding of aircraft and uniforms/racegear is the obvious answer.   Association with the Australian Aerobatic Team may be saleable.   Provide exclusive hospitality at events, sponsors can network with like souls, drinking free champagne and eating otolin while the flying takes place unnoticed?   What more pervasive demands may be made?  Changing the format of the flying, streamlining the scoring process, removing the lower categories from Tier One events.....?

This may be Ok, provided the sponsorship $$ was sufficient to cover the cost of all this, including the wages for someone to arrange it all while we, the AAC, focus on running the event.   Money would also need to be sufficient to support development programmes and lower category competitions (Tier Two?), otherwise the pool at the top will dry up.   In short, we are talking about a substantial amount of money in sponsorship, and a substantial amount of management time to make it happen.   The equal amount of either could probably send several teams, including aircraft, to World Championships!!

Rob Morgan Eulogy

It is always a tragedy when one of our members has an accident.   A savage reminder that what we do and love can kill us if it goes wrong.

You can be lucky, and you can be unlucky, but overwhelminingly the accident statistics show human error as a factor.   It used to be around 75% in fact, when I was more current with those matters.

We must all train our mind, as well as our body.   Don't make poor decisions that back you into a corner, always have an 'out', stick to your go/no go altitude limits.   Self-discipline.

No one knows yet why Rob crashed, and we may never know with the current policy of the ATSB not to investigate sport aviation accidents.   Messrs Scwherdt and Sperou, both long time members,  are gathering what dtata they can and hopefully that will provide a factual picture of the circumstances of the crash.

I insert below Chris Sperou's eulogyto Rob, read at his memorial service last Friday: