Offbeat Question About Control Stick......

[Crow Horse]

This is probably a silly question, but isn't the control function to climb and descend reversed from traditional movements? I always thought that in a WWII aircraft the pilot pulled back the stick to climb and pushed forward to descend? It seems more natural than the reverse. Maybe I grew up watching too many WWII movies.....

 

[beavo451]

Yes, but a quadcopter operates differently than a fixed wing aircraft. Probably more similar to a helicopter where raising the collective essentially ascends the aircraft.

it makes more sense to have inverted pitch control flying FPV.

 

[Rich QR]

I always thought that in a WWII aircraft the pilot pulled back the stick to climb and pushed forward to descend? It seems more natural than the reverse. Maybe I grew up watching too many WWII movies.....

If you read Wolfgang Langewiesche's "Stick and Rudder" book, you'll understand that pushing the stick forward pitches the nose down and tail up, which causes the airspeed to increase. Likewise, pulling the stick back pitches the plane in the opposite direction and causes the airspeed to decrease. If you want to climb, you have to push the throttle forward. To descend, pull the throttle back.

The actual truth is that, in an airplane, the relationship between the throttle and stick inputs, and the altitude and airspeed outputs, is more complicated than saying "stick controls airspeed, throttle controls altitude", but Langewiesche's simplification is closer to the truth than the alternate simplification that "stick controls altitude, throttle controls airspeed".

Either way, pushing one control forward pitches the airplane forward, and pushing the other control forward increases power consumption and causes the plane to climb. That's the way it works on the small plane I used to fly, and on the drone I still fly.

 

[Cymruflyer]

And if you fly a hang glider, then you push the bar forward to climb and pull the bar backwards towards you to descend. It is all what you get used to.

However, if you hold the controller slightly tilted up at the front, then by pushing the left stick forwards, or now sort of up, in that tilted controller position, it makes much more sense to go up by pushing the left stick up/forward.

You can't compare a 3-axis aircraft to a drone, in the same way you can't compare it to a helicopter. In a 3-axis aircraft you push the throttle forward to increase thrust/speed up the engine, but in a helicopter, you twist a handle on a stick down to one side of you. And to climb the helicopter, you do the twist at the same time you pull up on that stick, to go up (or faster forwards, if you push the control stick forward on the helicopter, at the same time). Pulling up increases the angle of attack on the rotor blades, or using other words, increases the collective pitch of the blades.

Every aircraft type is controlled a little differently, you just have to understand what you are doing and get used to that control method, but never try and compare.

 

[Barbara]

I too have found the default stick configuration somewhat counter-intuitive, At least with the left stick for ascent and descent, having flown single engine aircraft. I suppose the controls are more akin to a helicopter.

My biggest problem, however, arises from my addiction to video games. The general configuration for most game controllers is considerably different and though I've tried reconfiguring my drone controls similar to the game controller, it just doesn't work. So I use the default configuration and try not to mess up.

So far so good.