ICARUS Field Test: Helicopter Instrument Training Device

All right, so earlier we were flying with just foggles on. How would you rate the Icarus compared to having the foggles on? Just a normal pair of foggles that you, you know, you normally see is what we were having on earlier.

I've definitely lost all of my peripheral vision.

We're gonna get right back to that video. That's two people going out. Chris Hauser, our instrument instructor, along with Chris Nelson, one of our Hogs members that owns the R22. They're flying. So they're comparing foggles to the ICKERS device. Many of us been flying with these forever. So Chris Nelson has experience with this and so does Hauser. And they're going out for the first time and trying. This video is a little bit long, but we're going to leave the most of it there just so you can see a real evaluation from two guys going out and trying it for the first time. I think the product is phenomenal. So we'll get right back to that video as soon as I tell you about a free PDF down below for our Amazon bestseller, Private Pilot. 101. Free to anybody as a PDF down below. All kinds of questions about getting a private pilot rating and tons of great resources in that book. So let's get back to the video.

Yeah. So here we are playing with the Icarus today. What we'll do is we'll depart into the wind and then we'll just go up to, I don't know, 2000ft, maybe 2500, something like that. Whatever you want to do. It's starting to clear up here, so.

Yep.

And we will play with the Icarus and see how. How we like it.

Sounds good.

All right, so let's see if this works. As we're climbing, let's see what happens here. Anything happening?

Not yet.

Okay, Correction for water traffic. 73.

Okay.

So what this should be representing, if I'm reading this right, is one mile of Viz.

I would say that's pretty accurate.

I was gonna say, how's it look like looking out? Yeah, it's right now. Like, what. What's. What can you see looking outside right now? Like, how far out you think realistically?

Probably about three miles.

Okay.

But that's just because there's a lot of shade difference between trees and the Gotcha fields.

Like, can you see those. That power. Those power lines running up there?

Yes.

Okay. I'd say those probably are. I agree with you. Probably a couple miles in front of us. And I believe what this means is one mile. It's the film on there is 50% opaque.

Okay. All right, so where's 000? And we're 2,000ft. All right.

Yeah, come. Yeah, come right to 010. See what that does for us real quick.

Okay. 010.

Thinking. Still got about mile. Two miles, maybe biz out there.

Yep.

All right, let's try. And you kept going because you decided that you didn't want to turn around. And. Quebec. Is it getting worse or not?

Way worse.

Okay. Way worse. Okay, now what. What do you think your visibility outside is? 00 right now.

Yeah. Okay.

So if you look.

Yeah.

If you looking outside, straight above the instruments. 00%.

Right now I can barely. I can just make out the. The bar that right here in the middle of the helicopter.

Okay. Like right in front of us. Okay.

That's it.

You can't see anything outside?

Nope. All right.

All right. So we're continuing on flying. I've switched. I've switched it back a little bit.

Oh, okay. Yep. I can see a little bit now.

Think it's better or worse than the first time that we. So right now I got it on the 1 mile, but I increased the opaque. The opacity. OPEC. I don't know the scene through. Does it seem worse than the very first start or not?

No.

Okay. All right. Hitting a half mile now. Let's see what happens. Area traffic, helicopter 403 Papa Hotel left downwind for Runway four.

Yeah, that's. I can just make out just barely, the buildings, a little bit of trees.

Okay.

But not very much.

All right, so we're about a half mile biz right now. All right, let's make a. Let's make a right turn. 090.

Right turn. 090. Maintaining 2000. Nice.

Standard right turn. Maintain 2000. How do you feel? So it's. It was overcast this morning, and now we've got broken. So with the sun out, does it feel like that? That's a really. A glare or anything in your eyes or not?

No.

Water. Traffic Baron. We do have Delta Tango 7 to the south inbound 25. Cold water. We do have the sun behind this, so I want to try it once we turn into the sun a little bit, see if that bothers you at all. All right. So like a fool, we decided that we were going to continue on.

Yeah, it looks pretty dark now.

I feel like it got worse.

Yep.

That will give us a little bit of carb heat and cold water. Traffic. 584. Traffic will be number two. So this should be less than a half mil Is here. Would you agree with that?

Yes. That's definitely less than a half. All right.

All right. So earlier we were flying with just foggles on. How would you rate the Icarus compared to having the foggles on? Just a normal pair of foggles that you, you know, you normally see is what we were having on earlier.

I've definitely lost all of my peripheral vision. See or make out any on the. On the far outsides of my eyes. So they're definitely more of a viewing obstruction than the standard foggles.

Gotcha. What about looking like, you know, like looking at your feet? Can you see the ground? Like, can you see your feet and out the, like the bottom of the windows or anything?

A little bit. I think the, you know, the positioning of. Of the devices. Important on the hat, you know.

Gotcha.

But it's now I can see all my instruments, so I feel very comfortable and safe in it.

All right, let's go. Tell me if anything changes.

Yeah, it's getting a little bit lighter.

Okay.

What do you think? A lot lighter.

A lot lighter.

50%. Okay. Kind of looks like I'm underneath a cloud ceiling right now.

What would you rate your biz outside?

About 50. Put that.

Put that miles.

About five miles.

Michigan city traffic. Skylane 2 4, 3, 5 Charlie.

Want to go much more.

Fuel. Okay.

Away from the airfield.

Right. Okay, let's make a right turn to 180.

Right turn. 180. Maintaining 2,000. Yep.

We're about five miles out.

So.

So what do you it. What's it doing now?

Getting darker.

Okay, I'm going to turn you into the sun and just kind of see what it looks like. Maybe into the sun. See if there's any type of glare.

Yeah, there's a glare right there.

Okay, so is it kind of hard to. This is like distracting glare or kind of blinding glare or.

Yes, definitely blinding glare. Where I can. It's obstructed almost probably about 80% of visibility.

Okay, but I mean, you can still see the instruments, right?

Oh, yeah.

Okay. But just the sun coming through is making it kind of bright or whatever.

Yep.

I don't remember. Do foggles do that? Poggles kind of do that too. Right.

With. With that. That dark blue band I have on mine. It doesn't.

Oh, okay.

But if you have like a see through kind of band, it will.

Gotcha.

Or a lighter color.

All right, how's your vision now?

Now it's at almost zero. Good. Zero.

So you can't even see really out in front of the aircraft?

No. All Right.

Perfect. So right now we've got less than a half mile and I put it at 98% opaque. So really should be totally in the blind.

Really? Yep. I would agree. Cool.

What I'll do is I'll set you up for a right base into 2 7.

Okay.

So overall, since today we were out doing instrument training and earlier we were flying with Foggles. And then we're playing with the Icarus right now. We're going to play with it more later off camera. What would your opinion and value be for it?

You definitely can't cheat using these. Lost all visibility besides your instruments and definitely is a lot more like being in the clouds than with their standard fog.

So like you said earlier, you've lost your peripheral. How about the comfort level? So these clip to a bill of a hat and then a wire comes off to the side and connects to the battery pack. How does that feel? Does it. You feel like any discomfort and come to left 180 for me. And if you want to come left 180, come down to 1500 if you like, please.

Down to 1500. 180.

So comfort level as opposed to the Foggles, you know. So now you have to wear a hat. It clips onto the bill of your hat. Any issues with. With that kind of stuff or your.

I think it's more. The only issue I have right now is that I wish the hat would be a little bit tighter. Okay.

Which is not the fault of the Icarus, right? Or are you talking about the mount? Yeah, right.

It's just the hat is a little big for my head. So I would say somebody needs to have a well fitting hatch for the weight of the device on the bill.

Which isn't really that much. Right. It's very lightweight. Right?

Yeah. It's not uncomfortable to wear whatsoever. You just. The hat can tilt, I guess, you know, down further and obstruct your view of the instruments more.

And why don't you come to. Let's try 1160 for me.

160 get you lined up a little bit better.

So overall comfort's good. You got a little bit of glare. We're flying into the sun currently, but I believe Foggles that as well. But yours is a little different. I think you have a stripe or something, you said.

Yeah.

But. Well, in your professional pilot opinion, what would you give this device?

I would give it an 8 out of 10, I think. Nice. I think with a little bit more adjustment and a little bit more time in it, I think I could definitely see the benefits from a student standpoint, it just needs a little. We kind of threw this together pretty quickly, and I could see having a little bit more. A little more time to play with it.

Yeah. And we should mention that you're not wearing your hat. So that's the issue there. And for the people out there, Icarus is an app that you would download to your phone or iPad. And I'm running the visibility right now off of my phone, giving him different visibility scenarios here. Right now we're running under less than a quarter of a mile of vis. Not too bad. The Icarus connected by Bluetooth to my phone. It wasn't that hard. There is a battery pack. Obviously, you want to make sure that's charged up before you go out flying. And then, of course, like you said, download the Icarus app onto your phone and then you just got to connect it. But overall, I haven't really had a chance to use it yet, so I can't really give my opinion. I played with it a little bit at home. I think it's. I think it's damn good. I mean, I definitely like that you can't cheat looking outside. You know, I like that idea. And getting as real as we can is the name of the game here. All right, we're on about if you want to call. We're about ready to turn base to final here about a mile out. So you want to call Warsaw, right? Base final two seven Warsaw.

Traffic Helicopter zero four, uniforms on our right. Base for two seven Warsaw.

All right. And if you want to come right 270and just give me a nice normal descent and I'll take you right into the Runway.

All right.

Turn it right and actually make it about a 300 because I. As I was talking and I got you. I passed the approach here.

Okay, 3. 00.

I'll get you lined it up here.

Yep.

All right, go ahead and level out there and continue to come down. And as we get lower, visibility is going to get better because we're coming out of the clouds. All right, looking good.

Now.

How's viz?

Good. Almost back to normal. All right. Yep.

So I got it on the 1 mile viz still, but I took the dope. Opacity, man, I don't even know how to say it. The opaqueness. Is that a word?

Yeah.

Down to almost like 20%. So you should see. Yeah, looking good. All right. And then don't get scared here. I'm gonna push this button to see clearly all the way. Or no, what I can do is I push this safety button and it should go right back to 10 miles. Vis change.

Yeah. All right.

Perfect.

Yeah. It's actually harder to fly with them. You notice, like, I was struggling with my speed.

Yeah, I saw you come down a little bit.

Yeah. So it's definitely takes some getting used to, but would be way better.

That's good. But the helicopter industry needs a good tool because obviously we don't have us as, you know, we're out here instructing. We don't have access to a sim. You know, not many flight schools have a helicopter simulator. So, you know, we got to do the best that we can do. And until these came along, Foggles was kind of it. But of course, we all know that if you have any, if you've done any instrument training with Foggles on, you can see below them, you can see your peripheral. You can, you know, but at the time, that's the best we had.

Right.

I think with this device, it's going to be a game changer here. So shout out to you, Nick. Good job on developing it. I can't wait to play with it. So we're gonna land here and we're gonna go out and play with it some more. Peace out. When you feel the pressure to fly, but know the right decision is to stay on the ground, Hit the hogs. No. Go and live to fly another day. Helicopterground.com com.