Kenny Keller (YouTube) explains what a "good setup" for a helicopter approach means and demonstrates it in a live example at Warsaw. Core elements he emphasizes: be lined up at roughly 300 AGL to begin the approach, hold about 60 knots, be in trim with zero rate of descent/climb, and intercept at the planned altitude (he references ~1150 ft at Warsaw). He also recommends going around and re-setting if the approach isn't properly set up rather than trying to correct everything on final.
Questions this video answers
About 300 AGL.
About 60 knots.
About 1,150 ft.
About 850 ft.
October 15, 2025.
Chapters
Back to another video. 30 videos over 30 days covering 30 topics of things we've seen of 30 checkrides over the last 30 months. I didn't make that up. It's the real deal. That's why when we thought of this, we thought this would be a good little series. We got the R44 30 months ago, started doing these final approach courses. And so we're just gonna tell you what we've seen and what we're seeing. I'm getting ready to step a normal approach. And a thousand times the videos I've preached, what's the key to a good approach, good setup. When I ask somebody usually they'll know that and I'll go, what does that really mean? Well, it means set the approach up nice. Okay, well what's that consist of? Well, you know, I'm like, no, I don't know. Tell me what exactly is a good setup? So to cover what a good setup is, we want to be lined up at about 300 AGL to start our approach. That's textbook. Okay. And we're about 850 here at Warsaw. So I want to be about 1150 when I intercept my approach. And I want to be zero here, I want to be 60 here, I want to be about 1150 here. And I want to be in trim. So that's what I'm going to start working for. So I'll make a radio call real quick. Warsaw traffic, helicopter one like Bravo, right, base, turning final for one eight, Warsaw. All right, so I'm got a little descent going on. Got just above 60 on my air speed. I got plenty of time to line up, bringing it around, putting a trim, gonna line up with the Runway. So I got my 60 about 1300. So I need to lose another 150ft. I got plenty of time, but now I'm lined up with the Runway. A little more aggressive with that collective. Got it in trim by the strings. The ball doesn't match.
78 miles final on the RNF7, circle two still.
Get her down there. All right, so they got my 60. Raise a little collective so I don't go any lower. Get rid of that rate of set. So there's 60, there's my 1150. And I'm coming up on my angle for my normal approach. So 60, just a hair below, but there we're there. 60, 1150, zero rate ascent. Now I can start flying my approach. So that's when we say good setup. That's what's in my mind, what I'm thinking. Zero rate of Descent in trim, you're not climbing, descending, you have your airspeed. And then we just start slowly, gradually slowing the aircraft down as we come in. Electric controls the angle, cyclic controls the speed. And if you set it up nice and you feel good about it when you enter it, the approach is probably going to come out pretty nice. If you come out and you're rolling into final and you're going, oh, I'm too fast, I'm too slow, I'm out of trim. And you're trying to fix everything. When you get to your approach angle, it's probably going to be sloppy the rest of the way down.
So it's 70 final. RNA seven five miles. Circle two five.
Much easier. It's much easier just to go around. Just go around, set it up again. That's a good skill to have. A lot of people don't want to go around, and you should. Examiners appreciate it. Just a good habit of just if it's not. If it's not good, it's not set up nice, go around, set it up again. Set up nice. It'll be nice. Warsaw traffic, helicopter 1 Mike Bravo departing 18 for right traffic or so. So do us a favor, subscribe the channel, click the bell, be notified of the next video coming out, and leave us some comments down below. Leave us some feedback. Have you heard about the Keto? Good setup. Have you heard that before? Do you use it? Or are you going to tell me just how wrong I am and how that's a bunch of baloney because people love doing that on YouTube.
Traffic session eight four my kilo. Turning left base, Runway 184.
All right, see you next video. Peace out.
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