Hacker News Reader

Comment by elicash | Hacker News Reader

I know nothing about helicopters, but just from driving a car I'd imagine there are a variety of ways the pedal can jam even without something falling in that space. Does a helicopter have an equivalent of shifting your car into neutral? (Which, given you're in the air, might not be a good idea ha. But hopefully you get my gist.)

View on HN

Does a helicopter have an equivalent of shifting your car into neutral?

There really isn't. A helicopter is a coupled collection of parts and power that is working in concert to not immediately return to the ground in a violent manner. And a helicopter's power profile is also working in more dimensions than a car.

Each of the flight controls are critical components that work together. You take one out of the equation and things exponentially get more complex.

The thing about helicopters is they are maintained to an insane level from an outside perspective. Parts have lifespans where you replace them when they’re expired regardless of condition, they go through intense inspections, pilots are experts. Things tend to not just “jam”.

There is a concept of disconnecting the engine from the rotors, but it’s not the kind of thing that happens accidentally.

The automobile equivalent would be something jamming your steering wheel to one side - even if you decoupled the motor from the rotor (and tried to auto-gyro to safety), the helicopter would still be stuck in a sideways spiral.

Yea, autogyro (which I only know about due to this vid[1]) sounds like the answer to OP's question, but that would not (and clearly _did not) save this Chinook from what happened.

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eiTuwQGImNo

The autogyro is a type of airplane:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autogyro

You mean autorotation, I believe:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autorotation

Ah, yea.

An example often given (UK) is a drinks can being stuck under the brake pedal.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com