Brief flight report

[Chook]

I uploaded this video to YouTube for this thread thinking that it would be interesting for members who were still not sure about blade flapping/sailing at very low Rrpms and it complimented the subject.
YouTube allows you to see how many people watched you video and how long they stayed with it.
The results are interesting and I'm not sure what to conclude from them.
View attachment 1159821

First, it only got 25 views, which could show that there is very little interest in the subject unless only about 25 guys are actually following the thread. It could also mean that we only have about 25 guys who are really active on the forum.

This is a 6:42 minute video (so not too long) and 50% of viewers dropped out after 1:45 minutes, suggesting it wasn't very interesting.

Only 21% of viewers actually got to the end, most having dropped out after 3 minutes.

It makes me wonder about how to justify the effort in searching for this old video on old hard drives and the time it took to upload it to YT on my slow server.

Mike G

Mike, Human factors "it will never happen to me".
Keep up the good work.
Regards.........Chook.

 

[Gyro-nut]

Hello Mike, I personally believe what you are doing is going to save lives and definitely has the potential to do so; a worthwhile endeavor if ppl are watching your video or not.

From a video perspective, I have no idea what I'm watching, so after a couple minutes, I'd probably click off as well. This is not meant to bash your video what-so-ever, but a simple voice over explaining what you are doing and what the numbers are on the screen (that are barely visible... maybe add a text box that shows the values along the way) would go a long way to capture viewers attention and keep them engaged.

I am by no means an expert videographer, but I wanted to give you potential insight into why it's not viewed for the entirety of the video... not because of the 'unimportance' of what you are accomplishing, but a lack of understanding of what is being watched and learned from the video.

If you could get this in the hands of instructors and have them on 2 place machines so prospective students would understand how this works, and how it could save them going forward; then you'd hit your target audience more so than those who already fly and have the mindset Chook mentioned above.

 

[Resasi]

Good/helpful advice there.

 

[Resasi]

Tall tails maybe ugly to some but sure are nice in this aspect.

I too thought tall tails 'ugly'.

Right now I have fallen in love with them and bless mine every time I fly Blue.

Keeping the gyro properly aligned is effortless, it almost does it itself... and, with no adverse yaw effects for power application or reduction no matter how rapid.

The VX2 is not as nimble/sprightly as the lighter VX1 but I put this down to the weight difference and inertia. Keeping in tight formation on Denis when he is cutting loose does take an effort, that was simply not there when I flew Denis's machine.

Of the various singles I have flown, ( Bensen, Hornet, Cricket, Merlin, Layzelle, my Besnsen was lightest on the controls followed by the VX1, the difference being that I was convinced that if I released my hold on the stick with the Bensen...I would die, all the others felt very stable with no qualms on my part about flying hands off...for differing periods of time I will ad.

 

[Mike G]

Hi Mike,

It's hard to generate a cost/benefit analysis on an endeavor like yours. It would appear to me that "someone" has been saved from damage, or even death, by your system. Even if it is only "one" that "one" should be important to all of us.

I hope you decide to continue your efforts to educate us on the advantages of the GWS. Probably a reason you do this work is because it is the right thing to do. I appreciate your efforts.

Jim

Jim

I suspect my “endeavours” that you are referring to are about the GWS. My post was really about the interest, or not, in investing in putting together and posting information on the RWF.

Jim to avoid this post drifting off subject, I’ll answer your post in the GWS thread your comments are interesting to me. My post here was more about trying to help members actually see what we were discussing i.e. flapping at very low Rrpm.

Mike

 

[Mike G]

Mike,
Something like this is quite esoteric for the general population, but absolutely does not detract from the importance of what you have done for the gyro community. For me flapping / blade sailing or whatever one chooses to call it is one of those things in aviation like stalling; we should train ourselves to avoid coming anywhere close to these potentially disastrous events.

Loftus

I agree, I don’t expect everyone to be as anal as I am regarding the detail workings of rotor flapping/sailing.

I’m just surprised there was so little interest and asked if it was because there are lots of RWF members who aren’t interested or because there a not that many RWF members who actually participate. In either case it’s difficult to justify my time and energy (I’m retired so I have lots of time but less energy) trying to present some thing of educational value to a group that appears to be not interested enough in learning something to watch a 6-minute video.

Mike

 

[Mike G]

Mike, Human factors "it will never happen to me".
Keep up the good work.
Regards.........Chook.

Chook, I think you’re spot on if you’re talking about pilot’s reaction to the GWS.

 

[Mike G]

Hello Mike, I personally believe what you are doing is going to save lives and definitely has the potential to do so; a worthwhile endeavor if ppl are watching your video or not.

From a video perspective, I have no idea what I'm watching, so after a couple minutes, I'd probably click off as well. This is not meant to bash your video what-so-ever, but a simple voice over explaining what you are doing and what the numbers are on the screen (that are barely visible... maybe add a text box that shows the values along the way) would go a long way to capture viewers attention and keep them engaged.

I am by no means an expert videographer, but I wanted to give you potential insight into why it's not viewed for the entirety of the video... not because of the 'unimportance' of what you are accomplishing, but a lack of understanding of what is being watched and learned from the video.

If you could get this in the hands of instructors and have them on 2 place machines so prospective students would understand how this works, and how it could save them going forward; then you'd hit your target audience more so than those who already fly and have the mindset Chook mentioned above.

Thanks for the feedback, it was a video, one of many I did for myself during GWS development, that I simply dumped onto YouTube thinking that any gyro pilot would be able to see what was happening and it would help in this particular discussion

I would hope that any competent instructor was already doing something like this with his pupils on a windy day to demonstrate the flapping problem.

I agree the video was pretty poor due to the sun reflections etc, and a voice over would have been useful but since there were so few guys who were actually interested it sort of justifies my not making the effort to edit it.

Mike