1/8 RC B-52 Destroyed in crash

Sep 02, 2004 57 Replies

Some of you may remember the recent discussion about the massive radio controlled B52 model.



This highly impressive aircraft costing 30,000 GBP to build and featured 8 Wren Gas turbine engines sadly crashed at the weekend at the British Nats, completely destroying itself. The only recoverable parts were two of the engines and a couple of wing servos. The rest of it was vapourised when the on board fuel did it's impression of a mushroom cloud.



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Well worth watching, too bad for the model though ... looked a bit heavy and unstable ?

Erik Wauters, Belgium

"Steve Jahn" schreef in bericht news: snipped-for-privacy@comcast.com...

Any idea how much it cost to build the 1/8th SAM site that brought it down?

Impressive model. Less impressed with weather conditions.

WmB

To reply, get the HECK out of there snipped-for-privacy@earthlink.net

The link as a whole wouldn't load, said "action canceled". I manually typed in everything except b52.wmv and it said the site was under construction, try back later.

When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return. --Leonardo Da Vinci EAA # 729686 delete .mil.nav to email

It seemed to come back into level flight OK - so I wouldn't have expected a stall from loosing speed in the turn - Almost have to believe a surface stuck in place or came loose during the turn. Any indication from the folks there what actually caused the crash.

I once saw a guy fly a new plane where he had stuck the control rod connection pads to the fresh paint on the elevators to initially position them and check the operation and then forgot to add the little screws. Really nice large racing plane. Everything looked fine and checked out OK on the ground - the surfaces moved as expected. Made a nice take-off, then the pads popped off and it nosed into the ground. It didn't burn - just a small cloud of balsa wood fragments.

There is a link to the video of the actual crash of this model on

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for info Shame as it initially looks impressive in the air before plunging into the field next door. The wind can clearly be heard gusting on the video so yes it was blowing a bit that day.

Regards........Mark.

My father (American Airlines 45 1/2 years) watched the video, and his thought was the wind was too much, combined with the steep turn the operator tried. And as he pointed out, it bore remarkable similarity to a real B 52 crash, where a wing commander tried an almost identical turn low over his own base and crashed..

I was also there, trying to fly control line (!) The wind was terrible most of the weekend, which makes a 500+ mile round trip hard to justify to swmbo. As to the B-52, I also have it on video. He had been flying it the previous day in less gusty conditions, and whereas most scale flyers try to put on a scale-like performance, this guy did fly a teeny bit enthusiastically. Real Buffs certainly don't bank and turn like that. So when he flew it on a very windy day, we were somewhat surprised to see a downwind turn with that angle of bank. Looks to our eyes like it simply stalled as it turned downwind, not difficult should a sudden gust come at an inopportune moment. Very sad to see, but the number of crashes in my discipling (C/L Carrier) was also considerable. Like the loss of the FAA Firefly, people are getting more and more competitive, and flying closer to the edge all the time. Look what happened next to the Roman Empire..... N

Here is the link from

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for those of you who want to see the video

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Regards..........Mark

Same here, I believe it's an AOL transgression. hth

The Keeper (of too much crap!)

No, I have AOL and although it took about ten minutes to download, it came through alright. Pity about that Buff, it was beautiful.

-- John The history of things that didn't happen has never been written. . - - - Henry Kissinger

That was so sad. Not just the cost, but all the time and hard work put into it. The model was the most impressive RC model I have ever seen. Larry Engesath

Reminds me of the time a good friend of mine built a P-51 Mustang. He was flying in an open field near a highway, the plane drifted over the highway, he lost radio control, and it went straight into the front of a semi trailer. Would have loved to see the look on the drivers face when he saw a P-51 headed straight for him. Bad deal about the plane though....nothing at all left of it. Mike G.

It's not the only B-52 to meet a sorry end. My younger brother used to buy those video crash compilations with the crappy music and video wipe effects and that had one on it. Isn't it right that for those larger aircraft one needs a special licence as those things can kill.

On another point, the funniest clip is of a jet being run up before display and in a panic and not having a fire extinguisher at hand one guy ends up kicking his prized aircraft to bits to put it out.

Richard.

That's too bad. I was impressed at the amount of work that went up in flames. Sad I should say. There was a RC guy out in California that had a B-36. Saw it at the air show and it was really a heart stopper. This was all back in the mid 80s where they make all that apple cider at in Northern Calif. I am getting tired of keeping log of my travels so fill in the blanks? Lazy Boy :-) Mike IPMS. Lazy Boy :-)

---------------------------------------------------- A recent aeromodelling magazine has a feature article on this model. Very impressive.

The jet noise was very realistic. The model looks too fast for scale speed effect. How much fuel does it carry to result in such a smoke filled demise? What kind of fuel is it? I would expect most model aircraft fuels to burn cleanly and colorlessly.

One can hear the wind noise on the videocam's mike. Wouldn't any sort of wind preclude risking flying such a monster model - cost, time, danger, risk loss of control, etc.

This model has plenty of excess payload capacity. Shouldn't such models have a stowed parachute in case of loss of control or loss of flight stability to be able to bring it down safely? It will look like a strung up chicken coming down but I would, anyone would, prefer to see it fly another day.

Ther jet noise was REAL !!! 8 12lb thrust Wren engines, are real jet engines ! The B 52 held 22 liters of Jet A

Real jet engines have been around for RC A/C for a long while now

Everyone who I've shown the video says the same thing. "It seemed awful windy that day"

Lets hope the people feel like building another :-)

Have they got around to making a radio transmitter artificial horizon yet ? I know there's a radio altimeter as my brother used to be heavily involved with RC.

One of the big problems with distance is that at some point you lose sight of the fact that the aircraft might be at a different attitude than you thought it was i.e, is the aircraft banking away from me or towards me. I suppose the obvious thing to do is to put a miniature radio camera in the cockpit and relay visuals back to the ground.

Richard.

Actually, this looked more like some sort of control failure to me - either rudder or spoilers/ailerons. Definately a failure to respond to a right hand roll input.

Anyone got a link to what the pilot had to say afterward?

http://www.$*+@##&&****!!!!.com

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