My synthesis of the recent accident discussions

[Mike G]

I’ve read the different threads concerning gyro accidents with great interest.

What I’ve understood to be that the causes can be broken down into 3 main headings:

• Training
• Design
• Social/economic selection of owners.

• Training seems to revolve around the need for an agreed global training program with or without Glider/balancing on the mains and perhaps PIO training?? Read posts by just about everybody.
• Designs need to reduce/eliminate “coffin corners”, so eliminate the need for RLV to be part of gyro stability, eliminate linked nose wheels plus make all pre rotators flex drive. Read posts by Doug Riley, Chuck Beaty and Magni owners.
• Owners tend to be richer, older and ex FW. Read thread started by Ron Award.

Proposed solutions.

There don’t appear to be many detailed solutions proposed, more a wish list of things that the authors are doing, or have done and want others to do or simply things that they think others should be doing.

One solution proposed (by Phil Bennett) is legislation which is probably the only way to move things along but I personally reject totally. We have more than enough rules and regulations already.

Another is some sort of warning device.

My take on this is:

• To globalize a training program across the world is simply a Utopian dream. Phil Harwood’s program is a good attempt and will, I hope, gain traction. Each country might manage to improve their training program but with the politics of today it will probably never extend beyond their borders, especially as everybody has much bigger fish to fry such as Covid and the financial disaster that will probably follow. The PRA effort to create a re-testing program seems to be a worthy effort for the USA.
  Added to the above is my observation that CFIs tend to fall into 2 groups, those that welcome discussion and potential criticism and change to their methods and those that believe they are right, full stop. Getting all CFIs to follow a common program would seem impossible to me.
• The desire to change the designs is admirable but again a Utopian dream. Current manufactures simply cannot change their designs without admitting that their original design was wrong (a commercial and marketing disaster) and opening the door to claims for retro fits and even legal claims for damages from previous accidents.
• Ron Awards point is, IMHO, very valid and probably the major cause of our current crop of accidents, linked also to the training issue. It is obvious that many baby boomers have managed to retire with pensions and funds that their children and grand children can only dream of. Added to which they were brought up in the 50s & 60s when flying and pilots were role models. Today’s young have Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerbugger as role models and don’t have a spare 100k to spend on a toy. So it’s a simple fact of life that until the baby boomers reach their 80s and stop flying we’re going to have these accidents.

As a simple retired engineer I have no skills or competence to help advance any of the 3 subjects above and cannot see any of them coming to fruition in the near future. However as an engineer I can use my experience and knowledge to advance a stop gap solution that could be available this year.

Last year I proposed a warning system that would :

• Warn the pilot of an impending rotor flap/sailing.
• Warn the pilot he was behind the curve and then behind the power curve.
• Warn the pilot he was approaching a bunt.
• Warn the pilot he was at the maximum airspeed for his rotor.
• Record the parameters of the last flight for post crash analysis
• Allow instructors to create alarms to train students to react correctly.
• Would give the warnings via a recorded message over the intercom direct to the pilot.

The prototype of this system exists and is installed and working well on my gyro.

Mike G

 

[PJB]

Good post. On regulation the big drum I bang is around differences training. In the UK we have some documented process and it isn't particularly overly involved. If you learn to fly in/on an AutoGyro Sport and then want to fly a Cavalon you need a minimum of 2 hours in a Cavalon with an instructor. If he is happy to sign you off then you are done. If you look at almost all of the recent accidents had that kind of process been around for the territories the accidents happened you likely didn't have the accident.

When I can watch the film and then become aware of the [frankly] idiocy around the Utah accident then short of a medical event it would not and could not have happened in the UK. FACT. I don't see the intelligence of any push back over that kind of regulation. If nothing else it protects those involved in the process who have a mechanism to tell the stubborn / wilful new owner from getting airborne.

Your system would be a nice system, although it would be nice to see working and the various parameters / attention getters would obviously need to gain the attention in the appropriate way - differences training I guess!

As for the other instructor methods and systems. The Harwood initiative is for the most part pretty good. Where it falls over and where it starts to irritate is

A) the rate of change in fundamentals that really need to be established. i.e. If you do nothing more than read his published written books and then refer to his website in areas like take off [something you might think is reasonably fundamental] there are few consistencies and such that in 2020 the raw pilot is just fundamentally overloaded. Lets be frank here his system have been established [such that changes are "established!] for long enough and yet the accident rate is still as it is and I believe AutoGyro USA are adopters, arguably the most accident prone gyroplanes globally.

B) there is a self serving nature in almost all of his work/view
C) there is a focus upon reinvention of wheels that have been long established in aviation for the sake of "branding" purposes.
D) there is a poor wider understanding of aviation that leads to dangerous unintended consequences which then become intrenched because its been defended so hard in the first place - see the latest view of not taking off on full power for example.

Yet as you say the concept of having a standardised training program is good but it would be good to standardise not only on the "right" program but standardising means fixing upon what is agreed and as I see it his offering is anything but fixed.

 

[Doug Riley]

Mike:

The notion the designers cannot change a design without admitting that the prior design was flawed is urban legend.

First, the narrow legal viewpoint. Evidence of subsequent "remedial measures" to correct a product defect is not admissible in court in the U.S. (Uniform Rules of Evidence and Federal Rules of Evidence #407.) The courts have long recognized that they need to avoid punishing a manufacturer for fixing a defect, so they keep out evidence of post-accident "fixes." They want to encourage these fixes, not discourage them.

More broadly, from the P.R. standpoint, a good marketer can easily label a re-design as simply the "latest greatest," omitting any mention of safety improvements.

Safety doesn't sell, anyway. Tell the customer that the new higher-stance 2021 Beta model performs better. This has the incidental side benefit of being true! Raising the crew cabin of a gyro and centering the tail surfaces so they are symmetrical about the center of the prop slipstream will address slip-roll coupling, HTL and torque roll issues -- but it also will reduce overall parasite drag and increase prop efficiency. A wide-chord mast fairing (which also will help with slip-roll coupling) adds to the Buck Rogers look that seems to attract members of the $100K-toy crowd.

Need to explain the longer landing gear that goes with a high-rider layout? Build in some better shock absorption which, in turn, requires long-travel gear.

Finally, providing a free-castering nosewheel and differential brakes (to help with ground-steering accidents) will make a gyro more airplane-like. That should be a marketing plus, too.

Adding differential tail-surface incidence (which can be done on both the vertical and horizontal surfaces without much complication) will address torque roll and yaw, and is a subtle enough change that it need not even be mentioned -- or, if you do mention it in ad copy, emphasize improved hands-off flight and "effortless, fingertip" control.

 

[C. Beaty]

Eurotubs were originated by Vittorio Magni, an airplane mechanic who, by his own words, learned how to design gyros by building a Bensen from plans.
The stability of a Magni gyro, mistakenly credited to the low slung, Lamborghini style layout, comes from the nose heavy rotor blades.
The only gyro to have crossed the Atlantic recently that appears to have been designed by someone with formal engineer training is the 2-place Aviomania owned by Joe Pires.

 

[ventana7]

Interesting thread.
I'll throw in 2 cents worth.

One problem that has traditionally existed is availability and location of CFIs. In the FW world 90% of potential pilots can find a CFI and training aircraft within an hour drive of their home so instruction takes as long as it takes in weeks, months, years until both student and instructor are comfortable. In a full PPL course even after a few solos the student is back in the cockpit with a CFI working on XC work and this provides the CFI the opportunity to review and catch any bad habits that are developing.

In the gyro world most people are taking a week off work traveling to the CFIs location and spending a week of intense training. Thus there is significant pressure on both parties to reach solo or ticket signoff at the end of that week. If there was no pressure to get it done by the end of that time period it is a certainty some students would get more training before signoff. I don't know a solution for this except more CFIs and training locations but until that happens CFIs need to be very vigilant in resisting that pressure to sign students off.

It is worth noting that in the FW world there are 10 day intensive "Get your license" courses and 10 day instrument courses. Both have had much worse outcomes for passing written, oral and flight tests and pilot proficiency. There are benefits to learning to fly over more than just a few days of saturated learning.

Regarding Mike's prescriptive fixes for gyro design. In the ASTM committee work done in the early 2000s to set up S-LSA and E-LSA aircraft for all the different categories "prescriptive" fixes were avoided. The goal was to make aircraft that met criteria for example for stability, PIO, etc but not to dictate that this be done with prescriptions such as steerable nose wheels or flexible pre-rotators or such and such tail surfaces. If the future of gyros is factory ready LSA aircraft that go through the ASTM approval process it would be important to keep that in mind.

Regarding Mike's specific recommendations- My Xenon gyro has a linked nose wheel and also an extremely wide wheelbase- wider than auto-gyro or Magni for sure. As far as I know there have been no Xenon rollover accidents despite a linked nose wheel. When the Xenon was first introduced a prominent CFI was concerned about the linked nose wheel and to allay his concerns we did multiple demonstrations of touching the nose wheel down during high speed balancing with rudder input - while it certainly gets your attention there is not even a hint it wants to roll. On landing the wide wheelbase makes landing a far easier and more foregiving experience as again there is zero tendency to duck walk or want to tip over.

My generation 2 Xenon also has a solid shaft pre-rotator with 90 degree gear box. I think the later generations with the flexible shaft provides an improvement and makes it a bit easier to start pre-rotation at the hold short line or spin up blades for taxiing on rough ground, but other than those minor conviences I am unaware of any safety issue stemming from not having a flexible shaft pre-rotator.

Rob

 

[Doug Riley]

Rob, I'd agree that a particular design fix should not be PRESCRIBED by any certification regs. It saves time, money, and lives, however, to review what has (and hasn't) worked in the past. That's especially true given that so many gyro designers aren't aircraft engineers.

Linked nosewheel steering may be made to work with just the right leverage ratios and spring constants, but it's a tricky balance to strike. You usually end up with steering that's either so soft that it won't necessarily comply when you need to turn, or so stiff that it swerves when the nose wheel comes down if you happen to be holding rudder. My Air Command, with linked pedals and nosewheel, behaved in the latter manner; all my other gyros have had separate ground steering and rudder. My Kolb Firestar UL plane had super-soft linked (tailwheel) steering. It was so vague, though, that I eventually added differential braking to avoid running off into the rough at the airport.

The Xenon seems to have incorporated most of the proven design tactics to avoid PPO, torque roll, torque yaw and proverse slip-roll coupling. Good for Xenon.

Sport Copter has done much the same with the SC 2, although they MAY have reintroduced torque-related issues by reverting to a Magni-style tail group.

 

[Mike G]

Doug and Chuck

It’s very difficult to write anything that is totally clear to the reader and I get the impression from your posts that you feel that I’m criticizing your ideas.

It was perhaps not clear from my initial post that I actually agree with all of the arguments that I listed.

• I agree that we need a better training system/program/procedure. I was trained to pre-rotate, stick back and fire wall the throttle for takeoff, but during the testing of my warning system have spent many hours with ultra low Rrpm and behind the curve TOs. This has made me appreciate the importance of the old school balancing on the mains technique and I agree with those who say that it is a valuable experience for learning rotor management.
• I agree with you that gyros need to be re engineered to avoid coffin corners. I bow to Doug’s superior knowledge of USA regulation and happily withdraw my comment about the risk of legal claims for damages. Rob, I don't propose any "prescriptive" fixes, I'm just listing examples of regularly proposed "engineered solutions" made by others. I happen to think that they are good ideas but that's a personal opinion.
• I agree with Ron that there is a major problem due to the age and FW experience of the new pilots.
• The pragmatist in me even agrees with Phil Bennett that legislation is probably the only way things will change, even though the individualist in me hates the idea.

The problem I see is that we have been having this discussion ever since I joined this forum, and it was probably going on before then, but NOTHING HAS CHANGED.

We still don’t have any sort of agreed training method and the value of Phil Harwood’s method seems to be up for debate already in this thread.

Except for Rob’s input about the Xenon pre rotator change to flex drive, I haven’t seen any of the discussed design changes being made by any of the manufacturers. Perhaps they have poor marketing departments.

Because of the diversity of the current population of gyro pilots and CFIs and lack of a powerful worldwide PRA-type organisation, I don’t see anything changing in the near future and I don’t see what I can do to help make any of those changes. That is why I’ve developed a warning system as an available partial stop gap solution. The real solutions are listed above and if they were in place I wouldn’t need to develop a warning system.
Mike G

 

[schmoe90]

One point I'd like to make about the differences training is insurance - when I got my M-16, I was required to have 15 hours of instruction in type before my insurers would cover me to fly without an instructor.

 

[Doug Riley]

Mike: I was responding to your comment that design changes are a "Utopian dream" -- meaning, I presume, that they are not likely to happen.

Yes, we've had designer-marketers among us who absolutely would not change their designs, no matter how intelligently we argued that they should, and no matter how many pilots died. In fact, Igor Bensen was probably the most egregious example of this behavior -- the worst because, as an engineer-test pilot, he knew better. We have had more recent examples, too.

But OTOH look at Aviomania, Xenon, and the Sportcopter 2, just as examples. There's a trend in at least part of the community to adopt more wholesome configurations.

Training in the present design environment is a problem. Even Bensen recognized that his customer-pilots had to have some test-pilot-level skills -- skills that pilots of certified aircraft do NOT need. Bensen's training syllabus included mastery of some test-pilot techniques (such as control jabs), although he didn't label them as such.

When chatting with people interested in flying gyros, I have for many years warned them that, to be reasonably safe, they must learn some of the engineering that underlies gyros. (I gradually discovered this for myself!) Why, when a Cessna pilot doesn't? Because sport-gyro designers don't necessarily know enough to have their customers' backs. The customer has to do some thinking and learning (and occasionally second-guessing of the designer) him/herself. That's a little embarrassing for an instructor to admit to a student.

IOW, fix the designs and you'll fix some of the training problems as well. Not all, but some.

 

[Vance]

Good post. On regulation the big drum I bang is around differences training. In the UK we have some documented process and it isn't particularly overly involved. If you learn to fly in/on an AutoGyro Sport and then want to fly a Cavalon you need a minimum of 2 hours in a Cavalon with an instructor. If he is happy to sign you off then you are done. If you look at almost all of the recent accidents had that kind of process been around for the territories the accidents happened you likely didn't have the accident.

When I can watch the film and then become aware of the [frankly] idiocy around the Utah accident then short of a medical event it would not and could not have happened in the UK. FACT. I don't see the intelligence of any push back over that kind of regulation. If nothing else it protects those involved in the process who have a mechanism to tell the stubborn / wilful new owner from getting airborne.

Your system would be a nice system, although it would be nice to see working and the various parameters / attention getters would obviously need to gain the attention in the appropriate way - differences training I guess!

As for the other instructor methods and systems. The Harwood initiative is for the most part pretty good. Where it falls over and where it starts to irritate is

A) the rate of change in fundamentals that really need to be established. i.e. If you do nothing more than read his published written books and then refer to his website in areas like take off [something you might think is reasonably fundamental] there are few consistencies and such that in 2020 the raw pilot is just fundamentally overloaded. Lets be frank here his system have been established [such that changes are "established!] for long enough and yet the accident rate is still as it is and I believe AutoGyro USA are adopters, arguably the most accident prone gyroplanes globally.

B) there is a self serving nature in almost all of his work/view
C) there is a focus upon reinvention of wheels that have been long established in aviation for the sake of "branding" purposes.
D) there is a poor wider understanding of aviation that leads to dangerous unintended consequences which then become intrenched because its been defended so hard in the first place - see the latest view of not taking off on full power for example.

Yet as you say the concept of having a standardised training program is good but it would be good to standardise not only on the "right" program but standardising means fixing upon what is agreed and as I see it his offering is anything but fixed.

In the Utah accident the pilot had transition training from a factory representative in the accident aircraft.

The pilot was an experienced aviator with a lot of trouble free experience in both airplanes and gyroplanes.

Hopefully we will learn more about exactly what happened and find ways to prevent similar accidents.

In my opinion it is idiocy to draw conclusions on such limited information when more will be revealed in time.

Phil Harwood continues to listen to flight instructors from around the world and modify the program as they find something that works better.

I regularly change up what I teach and how I teach it as I find things that work better.

I am on revision twelve on my preflight check list and revision seven on my start up and run up check list and revision three on my shut down list.

I have lost track of the number of revisions in my takeoff procedure and my landing procedure.

Even my radio call sheets have multiple revisions.

For me the definition of insanity is to keep doing the same thing and expect different results.

 

[Rick E]

One of my main concerns regarding all gyro pilots is flight currency with many gyro pilots not flying frequently enough to develop the automatic skill set of reactions required should an emergency situation occur. Many gyro pilots I know are very busy people and find it difficult to find time for even one hour of flying a week.
Perhaps more regular flight checks should be mandatory for inexperienced pilots that fly less than 20 hours per year.
Just a thought.

 

[PJB]

In the Utah accident the pilot had transition training from a factory representative in the accident aircraft.

The pilot was an experienced aviator with a lot of trouble free experience in both airplanes and gyroplanes.

Vance you likely have the same information as me and yet you choose to represent the situation as if things were completed as planned, and to a recommended conclusion. That is not the case. The accident pilot didn’t want to do the suggested training program by the manufacturer for whatever reason but it is fact that what was elected to do was not the week of training with the manufacturer at their facility but a few hours with a pilot whilst familiar with the aircraft was not an FI.

Indeed even this plan B didn't happen as planned, where the intention of the "safety pilot" was to fly all day for 2.5 days but instead only had a few hours in the afternoons as the accident pilot was busy.

The "safety" pilot was unhappy with the progress and ability of the accident pilot to the point they had some harsh words and particulary about his over controlling but the accident pilot flew anyway.

I'm not sure what you consider to be "transition" training but it might seem that the story I relate may allow you to conclude the process that had been gone through wasn't enough transition training.

Differences training as you well know is important and had there been some regulation it would not only have likely saved a life but also the stress of the safety pilot and the manufacturer.

 

[XXavier]

Just one comment. In the three 'almost-accidents' that I have experienced, the cause has been always a distraction. That's why I believe that, in many accidents, the origin of the chain of events ending in a crash is probably a momentary distraction, things then escalate fast, the pilot panics, loses control and crashes.
Anyone can have a momentary distraction, no matter how well-trained he is or how much experience he may have... Of course, we all know that we should always pay attention to what we're doing, specially when piloting a gyro, but we are humans...

 

[loftus]

Unfortunately in many of the accidents poor decisions by the pilots who should have known better appear to be the major factors, including some accidents with CFI's. Probably implanting some type of alarm in our brain that warns us when we are about to make a poor decision would avert most accidents. I agree with XXavier very frequently accidents are the result of a chain of events whether it's actual control loss decisions, weather related accidents etc.

 

[XXavier]

Unfortunately in many of the accidents poor decisions by the pilots who should have known better appear to be the major factors, including some accidents with CFI's. Probably implanting some type of alarm in our brain that warns us when we are about to make a poor decision would avert most accidents. I agree with XXavier very frequently accidents are the result of a chain of events whether it's actual control loss decisions, weather related accidents etc.

The kind of alarm Mike Goodrich is developing may be very interesting, and would be, in my opinion, really useful if it gave a warning tone through the earphones, so that the pilot could immediately be aware that he hasn't enough rotor revs for takeoff (pulsating tone, for example) or that he's too low & slow... (continuous tone).

 

[Sv.grainne]

I'm currently training in a Tango 2 and have been focusing on takeoffs and landings. Most difficult for me has been after prerotation and starting the takeoff maintaining control so as to keep the nose wheel off the ground while accelerating. The Tango seems to know when it wants to fly and it is a matter of getting the airspeed up and then climbing out. My landings are getting better but have to be quick once the nose wheel touches down to get the stick forward and apply brakes to keep from rolling back unless accelerating for another takeoff.

Was amazed at how quickly the machine wants to fly after a quick landing and stop with the rotor still spun up.

Lots of things going on but starting to put them together!

 

[Vance]

I'm currently training in a Tango 2 and have been focusing on takeoffs and landings. Most difficult for me has been after prerotation and starting the takeoff maintaining control so as to keep the nose wheel off the ground while accelerating. The Tango seems to know when it wants to fly and it is a matter of getting the airspeed up and then climbing out. My landings are getting better but have to be quick once the nose wheel touches down to get the stick forward and apply brakes to keep from rolling back unless accelerating for another takeoff.

Was amazed at how quickly the machine wants to fly after a quick landing and stop with the rotor still spun up.

Lots of things going on but starting to put them together!

It reads to me like you are getting a good feel for the rotor and making progress Bobby.

These are new skills and it is normal to take a while to acquire them.

For me almost half the training is takeoffs and landings.

 

[WaspAir]

Perhaps more regular flight checks should be mandatory for inexperienced pilots that fly less than 20 hours per year.
Just a thought.

Many years ago the FAA considered exactly that. Old timers will refer to a "biennial" flight review because that's what it was officially called long ago, but the current part 61.56 doesn't include that word. The FAA were planning to have recreational pilots and those with under 400 hours get reviews every year, with a two year interval for more experienced pilots, so that required a change in vocabulary. The revised regulation was not adopted (after howls of complaint and without good data to show the expected benefit) but the modified vocabulary, with "biennial" excluded, stuck. I fully expected the FAA to collect data and try it again eventually.

 

[Sv.grainne]

I'm currently training in a Tango 2 and have been focusing on takeoffs and landings. Most difficult for me has been after prerotation and starting the takeoff maintaining control so as to keep the nose wheel off the ground while accelerating. The Tango seems to know when it wants to fly and it is a matter of getting the airspeed up and then climbing out. My landings are getting better but have to be quick once the nose wheel touches down to get the stick forward and apply brakes to keep from rolling back unless accelerating for another takeoff.

Was amazed at how quickly the machine wants to fly after a quick landing and stop with the rotor still spun up.

Lots of things going on but starting to put them together!

I may have posted this in the wrong thread, if so I appologize. My big learning experience recently has been to get my head off the instruments, watch the runway and develop a feel for what the machine is doing and telling me. Other than prerotate rrpm I'm listening to the sound of the engine, feel of the stick, what I'm doing with the rudder, and sight picture. Generally feel of what's going on and trying to control everything!

 

[Jean Claude]

You only have to look at most of the filmed accidents posted on the Internet to know that they occur because of running too fast at too low Rrpm.
A detection of limit parameters would be easily achievable, but will always alert the pilot too late, because they evolve too fast during the run.

However, Mike is now able to predict the evolution of the measured parameters that will lead to disaster seconds later if the pilot doesn't react and and it no need to check if a light is blinking.
In my opinion it's as useful an warning system for gyros as the stall warning for FWs
What modern airplane have not a stall warning system? Not useful for instructors, of course.