Re: misery loves company

Yes those things happen. Buy you another plane and put your gear in it. Everything is usually OK except in the most severe crashes. Do a good range check before taking off though. This is not the normal way that things go but it does happen. Most of the time, in my realm of knowledge, you can learn on one plane. I am not blaming your instructor at all but a lot of that does depend on him/her. Many times we tend to rush to let someone solo and get on their own to early. Seen it happen. Don't let this get you down you have many happy times ahead!! I promise. I've been flying 30+ years and still can't get enough. Eddie Fulmer AMA 63713

You're kidding, right? :-) Your experience is pretty much universal rather than an exception. Now you just re-use what you can and go on to the next one. Is this a GREAT hobby or what!!!??

MJC

Well, after purchasing a $400 rtf trainer for my son this past Christamas,
> finally got some decent weather to fly. First outing rather uneventful, 8
> to 10 flights before I ripped the landing off on my first attempt at a
> takeoff. Repaired the damage, went out the next weekend, again several
> uneventful flights, I even made two unassisted landings. However, on the
> proverbial last flight, there appeared to be a radio malfunction and my son
> and instructor nose dived the plane.
>
> After wiping my sons tears away, I'm debating my next steps. I'm told the
> engine(except for broken muffler), recieve, and servos are probably ok and
> could rebuild. I'm just a little disheartened for such a catostrophic crash
> on the 2nd outing! Anyone have similar situations?
>
>

Everybody has similar situations. Don't go around thinking you are special....

Arne

Remember, you are unique, just like everyone else ;>)

Early on, I took a lot of planes home in bags! Yes, the first several crashes are very disheartening (note: "several"), but one of the more positive attributes this hobby develops is endurance, if you and your son can tough it out for a while.

Perhaps, you might look into a foam parkflyer while you're learning - they can be quite a bit less expensive than a .40 glow trainer, and the foam is very repairable, almost to the point of being indestructible. Those planes I took home in bags are, nonetheless, still flying today with a little more epoxy on them (okay, a LOT more). And they are still flying with the original radio equipment. And I've learned a lot with them - how to stay oriented in the air; how much wind is "too much"; how to get planes out of trees, and perhaps most importanly, "the wreck always looks worse at the field than it does back home on the workbench".

Hang in there.

Dan.

That's not TOO bad John... My "instructor" totaled my new trainer on its maiden flight before I even got a chance to fly it! I didn't know of any nearby clubs (I live in a rural area) and was told of a local man who was supposedly experienced in R/C flight. I asked for his help and almost gave up on the hobby. I ended up buying a Zagi, building a few SPADs, and teaching myself to fly before I put together another trainer. After this bumpy start, I found not one but two nearby clubs and have enjoyed the hobby immensely since then.

I guess it would have been even more disappointing had that first plane belonged to a young son rather than myself....

In any event, get him right back on the horse!

Good luck with your flying, Bob Scott

Hey John:

Welcome to the hobby the group and the crowd that have gone before you leaving a large trail footprints for you to follow across the field to your beloved ah well parts bin. We have all been there I didn't even make it through the first flight ( With genius and heroism dripping from my soul) I knew 'I' could do this alone. That beautiful comet came off the ground nearly alive and made the most magnificent figure 9 you have ever seen. Since then I have built several planes and crashed several. This is the primary reason anytime I talk to someone that wants to get into the hobby I tell them to buy and build their first trainer. ( If the person is reasonably close to me location wise I offer to help with the build. ) Oh don't get me wrong I'm not bashing anyone the foamies, the arf's the rtf's there all great. But if you can tell your thumb nail from a hammer you should be able to build a trainer it two weeks or less, and the experience of seeing how everything goes together and what does what will make all those repairs down the road much easier. Now Dry that young lads eye's reach down deep in your back pocket grab that tube of stick-to-it-vness, grab another plane, kit or other wise and prepare yourself for the time of your life. Heck I put one plane back together Eight (8) times and with all that extra glue an sweat an moneykote an bits and pieces it flew just like it was brand new.

Tom

Find out for darn sure about the radio! It's no fun to have a sick radio ruin TWO airplanes.

Here is a partial history of the planes I've wrecked:

Send the receiver back to the manufacturer. They should look at it under warranty.

A friend of mine told me never to discard a broken plane until I'd had plenty of time to look at it. Another friend crashed one of my planes last September. I let it sit until February, then got it flyable in two work sessions. Up until I started pouring glue and scrap pieces of wood into it, I wasn't sure that I could fix it. It flew fine. I got three flights on it at WinterFest.

Trainers do not require the precision of brain surgery. It's amazing how ugly they can look on the ground but still fly OK in the air.

To fix the plane, you probably need three kinds of glue and some scrap wood:

epoxy (15-minute is nice for at home work) for the firewall and landing gear

thin CA for small cracks that fit together well

medium CA for working with pieces that need to be jiggled into place

If there is a BIG break in a piece, back it up with scrap balsa, popsicle sticks, lite ply, or thin plywood.

Distinguish between cosmetic breaks and those in load-bearing structures. The former can be lightly glued, filled with spackle, and sanded. The latter need the scarfs (wood glued behind the break).

You may also need a roll of monokote to repair the covering. You may be able to get the scraps you need from your instructor if it's just a piece here and there that needs re-covering.

Wiggle everything to make sure you find all the loose parts. Check your servo tray. It's no fun to take off with a "repaired" airplane and then discover that the servos are loose (don't ask me how I know that).

Check your servos for broken teeth on the gears. You can do this by gently, gently driving them from one extreme to the other by hand. If you feel a skip, replace the servo. You can buy replacement gear sets if you want to do surgery on the unit. I value my time too much nowadays to do that--with cheap servos, anyway.

I can't emphasize strongly enough that you determine, as best you can, the true cause of the crash. Make sure that gets fixed, whatever it was. It's possible that it was just "dumb thumbs." There's no cure for that but more stick time.

Let us know how it all turns out.

Marty

Good advice, Marty. However, I would send the receiver and transmitter back together.

Dr.1 Driver "There's a Hun in the sun!"

A lot of planes are wrecked on their first flight. No way around the fact that sooner or later it is going to happen. Get another plane. You can reduce the chances of losing a plane by being very diligent with preflight checks. Go over everything before each outing. Good luck.

John VB

Wouldn't you know it, I put ANOTHER plane in a short tree this morning! Depth perception was way off - I thought I was a lot farther out than I was.

I couldn't have flown in straighter if I'd been trying to land in the tree. The plane settled into a nice nose-down position. I walked over to the woods, found a nice long branch with a three-prong fork at the top and lifted the plane out by the nose. Flew for another ten minutes and then went to work!

Dan.

ROFLOL! And *I* thought I was the only one to have a wonderful first instructor, he hit the fence between the spectators and pit area on my first training flight. Broke the airplane but did not total it. I got a new instructor.

Dan, Just after I soloed, the wind required me to do so me right hand approaches and I turned right into a tree because I thought I was too close. I have since learned ways to prevent that from happening.

Let me share with you a few tricks I use with my students to teach them to fly at any field in the world. This method works for me and I rarely park airframes in trees through plain old dumb thumbs since I started using it. When the engines quit, all bets are off!

The first rule is to always point YOUR nose at your plane so the position of your head gives you some clues as to where things are.

Step one. Wait until nobody is in the air and walk out to the centerline (as near to the middle of the length as possible) of the runway. 1A. Stand on the centerline with your shoulders parallel to it. 1B. Lift you arms up (one at a time!) holding your hand as a blade. 1C. Hold them straight over the center line and look over the end of your hand to see what is in your 'sight picture'. Do this for both sides because you may have to do a right hand approach someday.

Step two. Return to the pilot station and stand parallel to the runway. Repeat step 1B with the runway edge as your reference. While your arm is up, move it (AND your head) until you are looking at the same 'sight picture' as in step 1C. This defines the line behind which you do not want your plane to go or it may hit you.

Step three. From the pilot station look straight out ahead of you. Then turn your head (first left then right) about 45 degrees. See what is in your sight picture for some reference but do not make a special point of noticing it because you are supposed to be watching your plane, not the trees and terrain! However, we just defined the places where you should be turning to stay in the pattern properly.

Now to tie it all up into a working methodology. I teach folks to take off and fly straight out until the terrain (and trees - we have them at my field) are far enough below the airplane that we can see 'daylight' between the airframe and the horizon. Then we turn 'crosswind' and proceed to fly keeping our noses on the airplane until we have our heads at a 45 degree angle. This keeps the airplane in about the right position - away from the runway but close enough to recover if the engine quits - about 3 to 400 feet out while on downwind. Then we turn to fly the downwind leg in the same manner until we reach the other 45 degree point. There we turn and establish the base leg which is terminated just before the line we 'drew' in Step one, which is the limit of the final approach corridor.

Hope this helps you stay out of the trees!

Jim Branaum AMA 1428

aka

Six_O'Clock_High@Target_Lock.Guns

You forgot the step where you sneak out at night and saw down the trees....

"Six_O'Clock_High" > Step one. Wait until nobody is in the air and walk out to the centerline

I'll second the motion to rebuild her. A plane that looks like an ugly patchwork of repairs and monokote patches still looks pretty darned good at 200' Also, the part about "reaching into your backpocket"....well get used to that concept. Hey, its still cheaper than golf, and a helluva lot more fun!

No one has mentioned the "multi-plane approach" I try to leave the house with no less than 3 airplanes in the car -everyday. Lunchtime rolls around and i hit the park. In a one-hour lunchbreak, im likely to have at least ONE plane still flying....

Took me about 2 1/2 years of similar pain before I got a RC plane to fly in the

Count yourself lucky that you cxan just write a cheque and get a new one.

We had to build the lot, incldung most of the radio gear.

LOL! I am more brazen that that, just ask the other dezins of this place! I cut them down during the day.