HectorD

Yesterday when I was flying a multi practicing Vmc and stuff, I noticed that my fingers began to hurt. I found relief by holding the wheel with both hands and released pressure from my left hand. This has happened to me before when I fly but it pretty much goes away when I go into cruise or just stop doing maneuvers. This is probably just muscle strain or something but does this happen to anyone else? do you recommend I start doing hand exercises like a stress ball or something? I do hold the wheel pretty tightly though.

This only happens when I fly so I doubt it is arthritis or something.
I'm 18.

socal swede

Sounds like it's just some anxiety related muscle issue,,try to relax and don't tense up on the controls. You'll feel the plane much better if you lighten your grip and relax.

jedinein

Contrary to popular belief, one can not squeeze orange juice or blood from the yoke. In older models, particularly the Cessna twins, the yoke had a habit of breaking off should the pilot grip too tightly. If you have another pilot or instructor on board, ask them to spare a second from fearing for their life to check on if your knuckles are white while doing a maneuver. If your knuckles are white, you're gripping too tightly.

There's a bunch of medical things that could be going wrong, especially if you spend plenty of time typing on a computer. Most will continue to hurt after the stressor is gone (i.e. releasing death grip on yoke).

rickair7777

It happens to me in training too. Once you get into normal professional flying where you don't manipulate the controls a lot it won't bother you.

You could use one of those hand-squeeze exercisers.

bcrosier

When I instructed, I occasionally had students fly with a pen or pencil between their fingers so they couldn't get a death grip on the yoke.

It's a bit hard to describe, but if you can imagine the pencil oriented parallel to the first row of knuckles (perpendicular to the fingers), with the middle and ring finger gripping the yoke and the pencil on top of those two fingers. The index and little finger holding the pencil in place between the first and second knuckles. When you start to tense up, the pencil presses hard into the backs of your middle and ring finger and hurts immediately. This immediate feedback gets your attention and teaches you to relax and not try and grip the yoke so hard (otherwise, you aren't aware you're doing it until your hand hurts, as you've already discovered). Try it, it just might help you!

Pharo351

This used to happen to me as a young pilot. It went away when I received my instrument rateing. Why? Because the trim switch, or trim wheel became my best buddy. Do a flight useing just the trim wheel. Maybe not take-off, or the flare during landing. But everything else. Practice holding altitude within ten feet, and heading within 1 degree useing trim only. Its actually very easy to do and supriseing how little it takes. Then you will learn to grip the yoke with your fingertips only and keep your elbows on the arm-rests more often. Works pretty well in most non-electric trim aircraft. This was a technique taught to me by an old head who flew Military Lockheed Constellations in the Gulf of Mexico during Hurricanes. You well develop that feather touch that will be the envy of all other pilot's. In a Boeing or an RJ its a little bit of a different ball game, but still sound advice.

Bug Smasher

My very first instructor ( I went through many ) did me a huge favor by saying, "let go of the yoke" about once every two or three minutes, until I learned to trim. He could tell when I was hanging on for dear life - and he'd bust me on it. There's several good hints in the posts above - Just remember, most trainers are positively stable - all they need is a hint of where to go, and they'll do most of the work. Kind of like my neighbor's cows - they know the way to the barn, but without a little bit of guidance, they'll be out, well, " 'till the cows come home."

As Pharo says, once you've got the touch, it doesn't go away, and your captains down the road will appreciate it when you got your jet trimmed so that you can just turn loose for a few moments to adjust the climb power, take a sip of your coke, or to slather some fresh gel onto your hair. (sorry, just kidding on the last one!) Seriously, it'll make a world of difference in your flying.