jwuman said:
is there a more favorable condition that can tent to lead to prop wash issues, ie: stright down rapid decent or any contributing weather factors that will induce or help create the prop wash issue?, i ask becuase i have had 30+ flights and have not once experienced as severe prop wash issue with my vision that would cause a crash,,,,i do decend usually with forward stick but have tested straight down decents controlled and slow but never a loss of full control, i did notice some wobble during decent on a few occasions i asssume this was from a bit of prop wash.
Simple answer is yes-there are conditions that make "settling with power" more likely. 1. if the aircraft is heavy, it's producing more downwash for any given flight state.
2. If you're descending with a tail wind(very common), you are most likely to enter this state, and that's what bites a lot of people.
3. you have to be using some power......this is usually when things get really ugly. You see the wobble, and add throttle, and the aircraft plants itself firmly into the ground. The correct course of action is to reduce power slightly(don't go below 10%).
Most people like to take-off and fly into the wind. However, little thought is given to the descent upon returning from the take-off point. And, it's at this point, as the aircraft is fast approaching your view, you realize it's still too high, so you lower the throttle even more...and you enter the "death wobble".
You can have a 10mph tail wind, and appear to be moving forward at 10mph on your descent, and still get into VRS(settling with power). And, I believe that's where people get confused-because it happens so fast.
Vision props will make this situation much worse-so use extreme caution when flying with the bigger blades, and plan your descent accordingly.
What I do, is descend in steps. For example; if I'm 100 meters up, I will descend to 75 meters(I have FPV and iOSD Mini), and stop the descent/level off.....then another 25 meters, and stop. once I get down to the final 25 meters, I fly a long, crosswind approach to my landing pad. Always know which direction the wind is coming from.
When I'm at about 10 feet, I add power, while still going side-ways(cross wind), and bring the aircraft to a hover.
Always leave yourself some altitude and time to recover. If you see the aircraft start to wobble-immediately apply forward stick....if you know you have a tail-wind, then apply right/left stick as well as forward, and after about a second or two, add some power.
These things recover very quickly from this situation, if you recover quickly. But, when the aircraft is really descending fast in a well developed VRS situation, the controls will be very slow to respond-so full stick movements are necessary.
Never lower your throttle below 10%, to descend. And, always descend at least 1/2 as fast as you went up.
The closer you get to the ground, on your descent, the more you want to know you have control of the aircraft-that's why I recommend you stop the descent high enough to realize you have control-then just slide down a bit more.