Customer Reviews

Stick and Rudder: An Explanation of the Art of Flying

5 star:		(77)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Stick & Rudder is an all time favorite about how an airplane flies. Written over 50 years ago, it explains in a very easy-to-understand manner the basic four forces of flight, the three axis of motion, how an airfoil works, how basic aerodynamics affects flight, and how to perform the fundamental maneuvers. The information is as valid now as the day it was written. As a ground and flight instructor, I have used this as a basic text for all my students for the past 12 years. Discusses in detail straight & level flight, climbs and descents, turns, stalls, takeoffs, landings, torque, various aircraft configurations, and piloting techniques. An absolute "must have" for every pilot from Recreational to Airline Transport certificate, this is the FIRST book every aspiring pilot should read.

Let's start with a fact: I am a pilot.

This book changed how I approached flying and changed how I fly. Let's get the obvious out of the way to assuage the ninnies in the group: Yes it's dated. Elevators are no longer called "flippers" and we don't really call our airplanes "ships." The language is right out of the 1930's. Airplanes today have flaps and tricycle gear. It moves slower than, say, Machado's book. It repeats things. It's basic.

Now the best part: It is an excellent and pure book on the ART of flying. I am amazed by the reviewers here with the 2-second attention span that didn't see this. I'll say it again, this book changed the way I fly and made me a better pilot. It emphasizes safety and it explains in pure form what is safe and what is not. The fundamentals are true and the repetition drives the points home. I took notes as I read this because I wanted to apply what I learned in the cockpit. It works, pure and simple. It teaches you basics that you didn't know you didn't know. Really it does.

Get the book, be patient, absorb what it says. Savor Wolfgang's humor. Read the book thoroughly and don't apply your media-addled, PDA-addicted, 0-attention-span, 2006 mind. Instead read it for what it is; an instructional manual purely about how to handle the stick and rudder to keep you from getting killed. It's not meant to be anything more and you shouldn't expect it to be. I, frankly, loved it. This should be required reading by the FAA. You want to glide shallower?, push the nose down! What? Amazing. It imparts information that will make you a safer pilot. It's an art form, not "Top Gun." Enough said.

I'm a student pilot with only a few hours under my belt. There is a lot of information to absorb while learning: Simple operation of the craft, radio communications, navigation, even just becoming familiar enough with the instruments to be able to read them at a glance.

Stick and Rudder provided me with a clear understanding of what would happen - and why - when I manipulated the controls, before I ever left the ground. Best of all, it's written in a concise format, easy to read and understand.

My CFI uses the FAA Flight Training Handbook as a text. Stick and Rudder helped me interpret the required FAA text and in fact the latter seems to have cribbed material from the former.

Definitely get this book. Learning to fly is complex enough and the more tools you have to simplify the process, the better. This is one of the best.

"Get rid at the outset of the idea that the airplane is only an air-going sort of automobile. It isn't. It may sound like one and smell like one, and it may have been interior decorated to look like one; but the difference is -- it goes on wings."

Still the best way to get the fundamentals straight. In the 1930's test pilot Wolfgang noticed that the words and the realities of piloting did not seem to agree. After careful thought, he published a series of articles for Air Facts magazine that analyzed the true actions of stick and rudder. The book was released in 1944 and has been in print ever since. Some of the writing shows its age -- I don't think any flight instructor will talk about the airplane's flippers -- but the actual actions of the flight controls has not changed. If you are a pilot and you don't have this book, you need to add it to your professional bookshelf.

As a flight instructor, I recommend this book to all my students. Although over 50 years old, it still tells exactly why an airplane acts the way it does, and he tells it in layman's terms. This book is a Must-Read for every person working toward a pilot's license.

Firstly, let me tell you all not to be misled by the negative comments about this book. This is a MUST READ for all pilots and prospective pilots. Flying a plane should be an instinct, and in order to develop that instinct, it is imperative to understand flight dynamics and mechanics very very clearly. This is where this book excels, bar none! It presents potentially complex flight dynamics in a completely lay-man's language, without any engineering or mathematic mumbo-jumbo. It is repetitive in some cases, but I find that repetition to be very effective in ingraining the most critical and fundamental aspects of flying. You'll be a MUCH BETTER AND MORE SKILLED pilot after understanding and remembering what this book has to tell you.

But, this book is good ONLY for that purpose alone. It is not a book about every other aspect of flying, from radio comm, to nav, and everything else. This book is a flying 101 and only that. Which is why I took one star away.

After you master the concepts presented in this book, I highly recommend getting "Rod Machado's Private Pilot Handbook: The Ultimate Private Pilot Book" for understanding everything else.

I first read "Stick and Rudder" in 1965 when I was learning to fly. I had difficulty accepting the explanations and reasons taught to me about how an aeroplane works. The adoption of the "Bernoulli" theory did not make sense, especially as at that time I was an engineering student who was studying the Bernoulli theories in some depth and their application to the "theory" of flight seemed to be a case of manipulating the laws of physics to suit the answers as far as I was concerned.

Wolfgang Langeweische became for me the "messiah of flight". Here is an explanation of flight that makes sense. Isaac Newton can now rest peacefully that we are coming to our senses I thought at the time. Now, 35 years later, my 20 year old daughter is learning to fly and lo and behold, the same old books are being prescribed, the same theories are taught and explanations given about "how aeroplanes fly". There are hundreds of books written on the subject of "Flight Principles" and "Theory of Flight". Each author in turn plagerises the same rubbish from his predecessors that they themselves had copied from someone else. THERE IS NO ORIGINAL THOUGHT PUT INTO THESE BOOKS,ESPECIALLY WHEN IT COMES TO AN EXPLANATION OF HOW AN AEROPLANE FLIES !!! Surely by now, after nearly 100 years of powered flight, we can progress from "theory" to the "Laws of Flight"??? Many years and many hundreds of hours flying a wide variety of aerobatic aircraft from Tiger Moths, Stampes and Chipmunks to Citabrias and Pitts Specials, having all types of aerofoil sections, has taught me to appreciate and respect the wisdom of Langeweische's explanations of the art of flying. ON MANY AN OCCASION MY NECK WAS SAVED - thanks to Mr. Langeweische. In my opinion, "Stick and Rudder" should be COMPULSORY reading for EVERY pilot, from student to astronaut!!!

This book has been around longer than most of the population of the planet. There's a reason: it explains flying without all the technical mumbo-jumbo that engineers like to use. Especially if you want to learn to fly a taildragger, but no matter what you want to fly, just buy this book. You'll read a unique yet very valuable explanation of what makes planes fly, and how pilots should fly them.

"Stick and Rudder" is absolutely, without a doubt, the best book ever written on the actual mechanics of making an airplane fly. It discusses, in clear, understandable terms, what good pilots do when flying airplanes. I first read this book while I was a student pilot struggling with landings. After I read it, I began applying the techniques the author discusses, and noticed an immediate improvement in my flying. Now that I'm a CFI, I recommend this book to all my students. In my opinion, this should be THE book used to teach basic flight maneuvers!

I had trouble handling stalls...this book definitely helped me understand why a stall happens, and in turn that helped me recover better when I perform them. Don't let the publishing date on this book fool you...it's holds just a true today, even with the evolution of general aviation aircraft.