Category (Basic, Advanced or Extreme): Basic
Flight with Fighter Combat to see this maneuver:
Super Ride, Power Ride and
The video clip below contains several maneuvers in sequence that starts with a G-Warm-Up Exercise with alternating level 3-G turns, an Inside Loop followed by two Aileron Rolls. Our client “air show pilot”, Teresa, had lots of fun flying with Fighter Combat Instructor Bill Moffat, formerly a Canadian and US Navy F/A-18 pilot. In addition to the Extra, Bill also professionally flys the Boeing 737 and A-4. Below is an explanation of one of the included maneuvers in detail: The Inside Loop.
What’s Happening with the Inside Loop? The Inside Loop is one of the first maneuvers our clients fly during Fighter Combat International’s Flight of Your Life mission profiles. The maneuver is started by aligning the aircraft with a ground reference off the nose (usually a mountain, cloud or pattern of roads) with at least 140 kts of airspeed and at a safe altitude. The pilot and/or customer initiate the maneuver by pulling back on the control stick resulting in a 3.5-4.0 G wings level turn in the vertical plane of motion. As the aircraft reaches 45 to 60 degrees nose-up, the pilot transitions their view to the horizon off the left wing while monitoring the rate of motion of the aircraft’s vertical turn with peripheral vision. As the aircraft passes through the vertical-up position and approaches 45 degrees from the opposite horizon (the aircraft is now upside down), the pilot transitions their view out the top of the canopy to find the horizon. The aircraft is now inverted, usually at an airspeed below the 1-G stall speed, as the nose transitions through the opposite horizon and continues its turn towards the vertical down position. As the airspeed increases past the vertical-down position, G-loading begins to increase as the original upright horizon appears out the top of the canopy. The maneuver terminates as the pilot attains approximately 3.5-4.0 G, 140 kts of airspeed and a wings level flight attitude on the original heading and altitude. Perfecting the maneuver involves corrections for torque, rate vs radius, pitch variations and minor errors in roll. Although the Inside Loop is a basic maneuver, it is quite exhilarating especially when using smoke to highlight the aircraft’s flight path throughout the maneuver. With smoke on, the pilot can see where they started the maneuver and the course taken three dimensionally through the sky. On clear days, family and friends on the Fighter Combat observation deck can watch the smoke trace circles, lines and corkscrews in the sky 🙂
Now come have a look at the Inside Loop video clip! … remember, this clip involves a sequence of three maneuvers starting with two G Warm-Up turns, then an Inside Loop and finishes off with two Aileron Rolls …
Important Note: Without exception, all mission profiles are “challenge by choice” at Fighter Combat International. We will not put anyone through any maneuver without their expressed permission and expressed desire to do so. Each mission profile follows a building block approach from basic maneuvers working towards the client’s self-determined limitations. The customer chooses, at each stage of the building block process, whether to keep it basic and gentle or to move progressively towards the extreme.
