Practical Flight Lessons

Your training will consist of a number of flight hours until you and your instructors decide that you can meet the minimum requirements in all training exercises. This can be achieved in a relatively short time, but expect to need a solid understanding of gyroplane principles as well as the muscle memory to handle most situations, including stressful ones. This knowledge will come through ground briefings with instructors alongside practical lessons, and through reading the theory material.

The minimum number of flight hours in basic training for a UL certificate is 25. Students who already hold a valid flight certificate in another class need a minimum of 10 flight hours when converting to UL-gyro.

To make flight lessons as efficient as possible and keep training as short and affordable as possible, it is important to come prepared before each lesson.

For UL-gyro certificate training, use the Student Handbook NUF UL-Gyroplane and the safety material on the club's Safety Portal.

For UL-A or UL-B certificate training, use the respective Student Handbook.

When booking flight times via Myweblog, take account of the recommended schedule (login required).

After each flight you should, together with your instructor, plan the next lesson. Typically during the first few lessons you will mix exercises covering aircraft handling, before progressing to take-offs and landings as you gain confidence. It is difficult to plan exactly which exercise to do next as it depends on the weather and how much time has passed since your last flight. Read through the planned exercises in the handbooks carefully. Read through the quick reference guide on the club's Safety Portal (particularly relevant for UL-gyro).

Each flight lesson should ideally consist of a brief recap of previous lessons, the instructor's demonstration of new exercises, and time for your own practice. Communicate with your instructor. Learn to use "I have control" / "You have control". Ask questions. Tell your instructor if you feel uncertain about anything.

You decide your own pace. Anything from a couple of hours a day to a couple of hours a month is fine. Our experience shows that the best results are achieved by flying a couple of hours per week.

Some video clips from our practical UL-gyro lessons are available on YouTube.

Practical exercises UL-gyro

Organised according to the Student Handbook NUF UL-Gyroplane (available to club members via the SGK members' pages).

1: Preparation, introductory flight

This lesson is usually conducted as a trial lesson where you sit in the back seat if you have no previous flying experience. The instructor lets you handle the controls as much as possible and you perform most of the simpler manoeuvres. During the flight you will receive information about the club's regulations, information about costs, training, and so on.

2: Taxiing, rotor handling

This lesson rarely needs to be treated separately, since taxiing to and from the runway during training is usually enough to gain sufficient knowledge of taxiing and handling the rotor in different wind conditions. Otherwise, an extremely important lesson. A gyroplane pilot must have a full understanding of how a passive rotor works and how it is controlled.

3: Rotor disc and controls

The instructor demonstrates what happens when you use the stick, pedals and throttle, explaining the gyroplane's yaw, pitch and roll axes as well as the function of the throttle.

4: Straight and level flight

This exercise does not need to take much time. Early on, the instructor will remind you to maintain heading, altitude and speed, check engine readings at regular intervals, watch for other traffic and listen to the radio.

5: Climbing, gliding and power-off descents

This lesson differs somewhat from fixed-wing training. It is very important to be able to transition from full throttle to idle and back while maintaining speed and flying cleanly. Prepare for a demanding session that requires a lot of concentration. Come prepared.

6: Turns in level flight

This exercise usually does not take much time. The goal is to be able to perform turns up to 45° bank while maintaining speed and altitude, with a planned and controlled entry and exit. Looking around before starting a turn must become a habit.

7: Turns during climb and glide

This exercise resembles the previous one. You need to get used to the correct nose attitude when making a steeper turn at idle power, and understand that there is no point in making steep turns if you want to climb.

8: Sideslipping

This exercise is practised during training with the instructor's help. The goal is to test your ability to manage several parameters simultaneously and to understand the risks such manoeuvres can involve. Read about bunting on the Safety Portal.

9: Vertical descent, altitude reduction

An effective way to reduce your altitude, for example if you find yourself too high on final approach. It is very important to understand the height/velocity diagram.

10: Balancing on the main gear

You will spend a couple of sessions refining the technique of keeping the nose wheel off the ground and taxiing on the main gear, including weaving while doing so. The exercise requires a headwind on the runway and a lot of concentration.

11: Circuit, take-offs and landings

You start flying the circuit once you can perform the basic exercises with acceptable precision and feel sufficiently relaxed. This is where you start using the radio.

12: Spot landings

As your take-offs and touchdowns start to improve, you continue with landings without the help of engine power. The goal is to be able to land where you plan, in various wind conditions, without using the engine, while going through the emergency checklist.

13: Effect of wind

It is often said that a gyroplane can handle almost any amount of wind, and that the real limiting factor is the pilot's flying technique. With luck you will fly in fairly strong winds and varying wind directions with the instructor's help, but after training it is important to keep progressing gradually in favourable conditions to raise the bar in small steps. Read about windy weather, take-off in strong winds, kiting and blade flapping/sailing on the Safety Portal.

14: Crosswind take-offs and landings

You should be able to perform take-offs and landings in stronger crosswinds with minimal sideways loading of the landing gear. Read about take-offs in strong winds, bunting and blade flapping on the Safety Portal.

15: Take-off with reduced rotor rpm

The club's aircraft are equipped with efficient pre-rotator systems, so there is rarely any reason to take off with reduced rotor rpm. It is nevertheless important to practise this to gain an understanding of flapping and blade sailing, which you can read about on the Safety Portal.

16: Steep turns

Such manoeuvres load the rotor system and should generally be avoided, but we practise them because it is important to be able to perform them precisely when needed.

17: Emergency procedures exercise

Here we simulate engine failure several times, work through the checklist before landing and attempt to land first on the runway and then on various recognised fields. You will not pass unless you can maintain concentration to follow simple rules and put the aircraft down where you intend, entirely without engine power. On a couple of occasions we shut the engine off completely, giving you the opportunity to go through the checklist, perform an in-flight restart and make a couple of landings with the engine off.

18: Flying at maximum and minimum weight

For almost the whole of your training you fly at maximum weight with your not-so-light instructor in the cabin. Here we talk about how it will feel when you make your first solo flight. To help simulate the feeling you will have the first time you take off without weight in the passenger seat, the instructor applies a little pressure on the stick that corresponds to a shifted centre of gravity in the gyroplane. After such a lesson, when you start flying solo, you will not be surprised by the gyroplane's different behaviour.

19: First solo flight

This is something you will remember for the rest of your life. Your first solo flight is really a natural continuation of your training. You have already completed emergency exercises with a passing result, obtained your student permit and received your medical certificate. Your instructor has stayed quiet in the back seat during your last few flights. You both agree that you are ready to solo. After the instructor steps out and gives you clear instructions on what to do, you continue flying by yourself. The first time you make a few take-offs and landings, and later go on to accumulate at least five solo hours and at least 30 solo landings, which are required for the UL certificate.

20: Navigation flight

This exercise is practised with instructors until you are ready to carry it out safely on your own. The navigation route should be around 1.5 hours, ideally through controlled airspace, with at least one landing at another aerodrome. The entire navigation flight is carried out using an ordinary aviation chart, a watch and careful flight preparation. It is also very important that you have read through the manuals for the radio, transponder and GPS and can operate the equipment safely and efficiently, even under stressful conditions.

21: Revision before the flight test

If your training has been spread over a longer period, you may need to revise important exercises, at the instructor's discretion.

Practical exercises UL-A and UL-B

Carried out according to the respective Student Handbook.