There is no doubt in my mind that, if you really want to tame the Helicopter, you need pedals. Not just any pedals, but responsive ones that react more to thought than to actual movement.

Thats why I designed these ones. They look like real chopper pedals and use a 1meg potentiometer as the main link to the computer to give incredible accuracy. They are fully adjustable to give you the desired "feel", as well as the desired amount of movement for your style of flying.

As you can see from the above picture, the design has linkages made from model aircraft parts that not only turn the potentiometer, but also give fore/aft movement to the pedals.

So, when you push 1 pedal forward, it not only turns the pot in the required direction, but makes the other pedal move back in the opposite direction.

The main housing is 2.5 inch square plastic pipe. Most hardware stores sell it as "rain gutter" for about 8 bucks Canadian for a 12 foot length. I epoxied and screwed this to a peice of 1/2" plywood 16" wide by 22" long.

The pedals themselves are made from 3/4"x1/8" metal bent at right angles and sized to fit my feet. The footrests are bicycle handlebar grips.

To give you an idea of scale, the main housing is only 8 inches long, so you should get a good idea of the size.

Make them to fit you, as you will be spending many hours flying the helicopter, and you will need to be comfortable.

I am a firm believer in the old addage that a picture is worth a thousand words. So I will give you lots of pictures on these pedals for you to see how I built them.