Hi;
I thought I found a great new place to toss around a parkflyer last weekend - the park was a little crowded (for my flying ability, anyway), so I happened upon this soccer field next to an elementary school. It was deserted and, I thought, perfect.
So I get the plane up in the air, going in widening circles. When the plane's path crosses about the middle of the field it suddenly takes a full-throttle power dive into the earth, almost as if I had purposely driven it in!
I went and picked up the pieces - there was pretty much damage up front to the nose area, but still repairable. Like an idiot, I thought to myself "bad battery connections."
I made my repairs, came back another day, and with nice, tight battery connections this time, I launched again, and again, discovered it had nothing to do with batteries - another full-throttle dive into the earth, hard enough this time to knock the motor free of the plane (still repairable, though. Man, I love foam!)
As I'm walking to the plane this time, I'm looking around and (I had missed this before) there seems to be some sort of electrical box, just over a rise, out of sight from where I launch. I can only imagine it is some sort of transformer, powering the lights around the small sports track next to the soccer field, and the cause of my glitches. Seems odd, though, almost as if it is designed to send out a "full down elevator and full throttle" signal. It is remarkable how straight (and how fast) the plane plunged right into the earth.
The receiver, if you're interested, was a Hitec 555 Dual Conversion (which survived both of these crashes, plus a few others to boot), although I don't blame the receiver at all. I think I sent it into a bad, bad environment. Also, at this time, I have to re-think my strategy of keeping the antenna wire bundled around the inside of the plane, although, I suppose if a bad signal is going to interfere with a good signal, they both have equal access to the antenna, wherever it is...
Dan.