Arm problems, the ERJ and YOU
 

I'll apologize now for the corny thread title.:D

But seriously, I've been flying the ERJ for about 2 years now and have started to notice pain in my right (flying arm) wrist and elbow where I've never had pain before. I mentioned it to a captain I was flying with and he told me he had experienced a similar thing in his left arm. He said it had something to do with the angle of the ram horns and the weird stress it puts on the tendons in your arm when moving the yoke. I'm 24 and exercise regularly (tennis, swimming and regular gym workouts) so I have a hard time believing I'm starting to get "old timer" aches and pain or carpal tunnel. I'm curious, any one else out there notice anything similar or am I the only one?

2000+ hours in the ERJ and no arm pains. I don't work out regularly so maybe thats your problem.:D

I flew the EMB-120 as well as played tennis in college and yes the awkward horn yoke can apply pressures to your tendons when turning right and left which can cause them to strain. I recommend looking to a Tennis Elbow brace; it should help by relieving some of the stress when applying force to the horns.

This problem probably stems from playing tennis as it did for me. I use the brace and shortly after my elbow returned to normal.

Best of luck!

I haven't experienced any arm pain but let me take this opportunity to say, if there are any Embraer engineers reading this, that I hate that stupid ram's horns yoke, and I hate how the pivot point is different than all the rest of the transport category airliners out there.

The yoke is about as good as the rest of the cockpit's design: terrible. :p

that's nature's way of telling you that you should use the autopilot more!

Interesting that you mention the arm brace because that's what started the conversation with the captain I mentioned. Every time it was his leg, I noticed him put a compression band on his left arm so I asked him about it and he told me about the tendon thing. He said he went down to the employee clinic and told them about the pain and they gave him the brace right then and there. Made me think it must be something they know about or have dealt with in the past. I might have to look into that...

Did you notice anything in your wrist too or just in the elbow? Both problems for me started at about the same time.

Thats just it! I'm not one of those nutballs (ExperimentalAB:D) who handflys everything. I usually handfly to about 10K and then 1000-2000 on down (unless Mr. Honeywell does something goofy). So like a grand total of 10-12 minutes per flight?

well my right arm is as strong as anything, what else am I supposed to do on the overnights but keep myself "entertained":p

Just my elbow, during my Jr year of college I had a real bout with tendonitis in my right elbow and after 3 months of 4 on 3 off, 24+ leg 4 day trips with 8 leg days; my elbow started giving me real fits. So I broke out the old band (yes I looked funny but I didn’t care) and started getting back into my old rehab routine of heating and icing. Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t as bad as it sounds, I just didn’t want it to get as bad as it once was. That's probably more than you need to do but I'll always have issues with my right elbow because of collegiate tennis. Personally I like the CRJ because of its yoke. I don't have the stresses that the horns gave me, plus I'm looking forward to upgrade soon so I can start using my left arm and give my right a break.

So that's why you like monkeys so much. :eek: :D :p