A short YouTube segment by Kenny Keller describing a common helicopter-pilot control habit he calls “stirring the pot” — excessive, often unconscious cyclic movement during maneuvers. Keller uses student anecdotes (e.g., Tom in Panama, a trainee named Mark) to show the behavior is common, advises pilots to relax, and briefly promotes his helicopter checkride book.
But it's like you're searching, you know, and that cycle just goes the phenomenon, stirring the pot. This came up in a question from one of our ground school members, and he's emailed me a couple times and said, I'm working with two CFIs, and they're telling me my hands going too much this way and too much up and down. And what it boils down to is stirring the pot. And for this member, Tom in Panama, he said, well, my CFIs say I'm moving it too much, and I don't think I am. Well, that's the phenomenon, right? That's the part of the stirring the pot. You as the student preparing for a rating or you're just learning or whatever you're doing, you don't realize you're doing it. A lot of, you know, Mark, that just went through a checkride with me, we just did it in the instrument. We're getting ready for his checkride, and he's flying all the maneuvers. He was stirring the pot. I'd say, what are you doing stirring a pot? What are you talking about? I go, your cyclic's all over the place. He didn't realize he was doing it. So it's very common. You know, I'm going to show you. It's something like this. He's in the auto, and here he is going a pretty nice entry, starts his turn. We're doing the 180 turn speed, and everything looks good. And he starts going like this, and there's no need for it. Why do people do it? I don't know. It's like you're searching for something, but you all do it right. And it's called stirring the pot. And some of you may have other terms for it, but it's very common, very common in the autos where somebody's just doing this and they do it sometimes when the aircraft is fairly stable, not enough time, not being comfortable, or maybe been a while since you've flown as a CFI and you CFIs, chime in if you know what I'm talking about, because most of you probably do. We've all seen it. And again, I'm going to mention again, just like Tom. Well, I don't think I am. And I simply said in my return email, it sounds like stirring the pot. And you probably are doing that. You have two CFIs telling you that you're doing it. Good possibility, you're doing it. Okay, I'm giggling because I just kind of want you to relax about it and understand that stirring the pot in whatever maneuver. It's very common. Sometimes person even does it when everything's looking pretty good. It's not necessarily that everything's really bad, but it's like you're searching, you know, and that cycle just goes. And it could be and it is almost a circle. And it might be a little more one direction than the other, but you'll feel the student going almost around in a circle. Kind of jerky. Stirring a Pot we do have lots of copies left of our Amazon best selling book. I'll highlight Colicopter Checkride today. That's my favorite, my first book ever. Jump down below. Check out those links. Leave us your comments. All right, see you then. Stir in the pot.
