And now for something completely...... harder!

If you like living on the edge, this is the one for you!

It goes without saying that you should be very confident in doing rolling circles before you try this one out. Unlike a rolling circle which at least offers a regular series of control inputs, a rolling loop has nothing like this. The reason is because gravity has a major effect on the model airspeeed. It's similar to to difference between a circle and a loop.

As you climb in a standard loop, the airspeed bleeds off, reaches a minimum at the top of the loop, then increases again on the way down. You compensate for this by increasing the throttle on the way up then decreasing the up elevator and throttle "over the top" then increasing the throttle again on the way down. So far so good. If you are rolling at the same time, the rate at which you roll will decrease as your airspeed decreases and vice versa.

You've really got to try this out for yourself as there is no way to "tell" you what the timing should be as you go round the loop. However, we''ll try!

Pull some up and start rolling. As the model comes to the inverted position, you need to push in some down to continue in the loop. This is a lot more than you would normally use for inverted flight.

As you continue through the next half roll, you will have to input quite a bit of up elevator to stay on track. Since the airspeed and roll rate are decreasing, the timing for the application of up elevator is slightly longer than the previous use of elevator.

As the model approaches the top of the loop, the up and down elevator inputs are less than they were at the bottom of the loop.

Now it gets tricky! If you think about it, the model wil be upright or inverted as it rolls over the top. You must be watching the model closely here to know what to do next. If it is upright, then the next elevator input will be down. If it is inverted, the next elevator input will be up. This means that if the input slightly before the top was down, then you repeat the down - if it was up, you repeat the up elevator. This is confusing because your timing has to change. You also have to decrease the throttle over the top otherwise you're going to rocket down the second half of the loop.

Continue rolling down the second half of the loop but now the airspeed is increasing so the time between up and down inputs decreases as the roll rate increases.

As with a rolling circle, the last quarter is the scariest! This time the model is coming down - and fast and the Döppler effect tels you it coming down even faster. This combines with a need to get the up and down elevator inputs in even faster - a good reason for having a low roll rate set up. You also need to increase the throttle for levelling out - not an immediate impulse with a model rolling on the way down!

This maneuver is certain to take a lot of practice. The good thing is, if it's beyond your current capabilities, it'll all go wrong when the model is still on the way up - you'll not get to the top of the loop relying on luck for the control inputs!

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