Pantera at Ircha SE

[Hotwings]

Well there were two Pantera's at Ircha SE.

One flew, went up and did auto's for a tank, then entered the auto contest where it self destructed. Something happened with the tail, then boom strike then total destruction, chicken dance.

I don't believe the other one flew as the pilot lost his mx-400 in the sun and crashed, ruined his day. but he flew his four blade no flybar craft the day before and it rocked!!!

[Gearswinger]

That's too bad. Any idea what happened with the tail on the one? It's essentially the same tail as the Tiger aside from the thrust bearings, which has proven to be reliable.

[Hotwings]

it appeared that the tail fin broke and went into the blades, didn't talk to jeff after the crash as he was busy. Ron Lund had been autoing it before the contest and it seemed fine.

[Gearswinger]

Ugh, what a crappy way to lose a heli. Gotta wonder how a tail fin breaks in flight. I've broken plenty of them, but it always involved contact with the ground.

Maybe I'm reading your post wrong, did it happen on the ground, or in flight? I know that the fin is kinda short (or just flexy) , and it's easy to tap the tail blades on the ground. I've done it twice at the end of autos before I started consciously keeping the tail high.

[Hotwings]

No, it happened about 5 feet in the air, just after liftoff, he turned to climb out and when he goosed it, it got ugly. Ron

[Foxden]

The vert tail fin was broken clean right across where the bottom mounting bolt was, it almost sounded like the gov didn't grab because the head speed was pretty high, we did notice the tail fin had a shake but the canopy seemed fine. Even if the head speed was say 2300 the 6mm head should have been able to maintain it, I know when I first fired up the Hurrican with the same TJ Pro setting from the tiger my head speed was 2300 and it was fine, I just don't like running my heads over 2K.

I'm not sure if Jeff had a chance to disect it and see if he found anything.

Clyde

[Gearswinger]

Damn, hopefully, it's an isolated incident.

[jbiter]

Hi all,

I had a chance to do a post mortem after I got home. From what the witnesses described to me, I do believe the cause of this crash was the tail fin breakage. I'm not sure whether it might have been damaged before the incident though as I didn't really inspect the heli after Ron and I had flown it that morning.

Some people have been asking me whether the tail grip let go. No. in this case the new design is working great and the tail hub and blades were intact.

I'm not sure what was going on with the governor. 2300 might have been an aggageration but it was definetely higher than it was suppose to be. I will find out when we get the repairs done. The damage wasn't really all that bad, just the typical parts ie boom, spindle, mainshaft, landing gear, and of course a counter gear. Frames and my cyclic servos were unscathed.

Oh well, definetely a new way to crash for me but we'll get through it. Anybody have a pair of 600 Radix they want to part with? I'm suddenly in the market :)

Jeff