Tonystott
03-03-2007, 07:41 AM
Well today I had the luckiest escape imaginable! We had the AP Trex 450 really high (maybe 200+ feet) when a "jetstream" got a hold of it, and Mike, who was flying at the time wasn't able to stop it being blown downwind away from the flying field. He even turned off the Spartan stabiliser and applied full down elevator and full pitch, so the nose was pointed way down into the wind, but it still kept going downwind. He put gain back in and kept trying, until it started dropping below the tree line. He then decided (very wisely) that a runaway model would be lost forever, so he went for maximum stabiliser gain and throttle hold as it disappeared....
He found it 200+ yards downwind lying on its side on a concrete path. I had stayed back at the flying site looking after all the gear and other helis, fully expecting to hear that a plastic bag was needed.
Imagine my amazement when I got a phone call saying that it looked OK!!
Askman's mount saved the heli in the impact, after the Spartan had kept it level on the way down and the 4 degrees neg pitch in throttle hold must have limited the terminal velocity
What we think happened was it landed hard, a little more on the starboard side.
* The legs flexed until they came out of the cross bar, breaking the tab off one side of the front one.
* One of the ball joints in the camera mount gimbal broke,
* The bottom of the camera bracket snapped out of the vertical piece (a simple glue job to fix).
* The camera was smashed up into the chassis, enough to dent the outer lens (so the lens won't retract now), but the camera still works fine (!).
* The servo arm on the tilt servo snapped off and the link has been lost.
AND THAT IS ALL!!!!! I spun it up tonight, and there are no wobbles or obvious problems or marks on the mechancs, apart from the slightest mark on the boom from the gentlest of boom "kisses", other than the gyro mount needing regluing...
My advice is for everyone to fit a Spartan, because it was flying the heli for about the last 15-20 seconds, sight unseen!
Lottery tickets purchased!!!!
He found it 200+ yards downwind lying on its side on a concrete path. I had stayed back at the flying site looking after all the gear and other helis, fully expecting to hear that a plastic bag was needed.
Imagine my amazement when I got a phone call saying that it looked OK!!
Askman's mount saved the heli in the impact, after the Spartan had kept it level on the way down and the 4 degrees neg pitch in throttle hold must have limited the terminal velocity
What we think happened was it landed hard, a little more on the starboard side.
* The legs flexed until they came out of the cross bar, breaking the tab off one side of the front one.
* One of the ball joints in the camera mount gimbal broke,
* The bottom of the camera bracket snapped out of the vertical piece (a simple glue job to fix).
* The camera was smashed up into the chassis, enough to dent the outer lens (so the lens won't retract now), but the camera still works fine (!).
* The servo arm on the tilt servo snapped off and the link has been lost.
AND THAT IS ALL!!!!! I spun it up tonight, and there are no wobbles or obvious problems or marks on the mechancs, apart from the slightest mark on the boom from the gentlest of boom "kisses", other than the gyro mount needing regluing...
My advice is for everyone to fit a Spartan, because it was flying the heli for about the last 15-20 seconds, sight unseen!
Lottery tickets purchased!!!!