What's the cheapest crash you have had up to now?

[Jomaba4308]

I just drilled my Mini in hard for the first time since I've had it, I could hear the thump from a good 50 feet away and I managed to hit THa half second before impact. I thought I was going to have to spend good money on parts but I was pleasantly surprised when I picked it up.

One main blade
Feathering shaft
Main shaft

Boom is straight, tail blades fine, servos & arms are fine, canopy perfect. I didn't think it was possible to hit as hard as I did with that little damage. Down side is now I need to wait for blades, I bought the heli used and it came with spare shafts but I don't have more blades.

[Chris Nifty]

Geez, I'm surprised you didn't break at least one blade grip.
Cheapest one I've had is 0$ when doing some low flips and went into the footpath upside down - picked er up, checked it out and kept flying.
Another good one was when I lost power due to a failed owb. Above the tree tops inverted and it too hit with a thud. Still haven't repaired that one but really only looks like tail fin and one grip.

[Aryemis]

I've had a couple crashes with no damage at all when cutting grass inverted on 3S at approx 2000rpm.

As long as you cut the motor fast enough, you're pretty much guaranteed to not have any damage.

Also had it go into failsafe 10m up, but since it was upright and level it went down on the skids with no damage.

Had an OWB failure and then a motor idler pulley failure that caused no other damage, but I managed to get it to land on the skids.

[flint723]

I crashed the Mini for the first time since I got it (maybe 150 flights) yesterday. I flipped inverted into a tic-toc too close to the ground and didn't have quite enough power to climb out. The tail hit first, quickly followed by the main blades. I did not manage to hit TH until after the heli came to rest. Damage was far less than I was expecting though:

Both main grips
One FBL long stand ball was bent
1 main blade
Both tail blades
Both swash driver arm bolts were bent.
Bolt in main gear sheared.

Everything else was fine. Shafts were straight, tail grips fine, all servos and linkages ok. I would have been back in the air today if I had any spare main blades.

[jmtyndall]

I've had quite a few $0 crashes with mine

[rdlohr]

I came down inverted on grass when my pinion gave out and I had no damage (non pinion related). I hit TH when I realized it was losing lift anyhow so blades had lost all momentum.

Rick

[dedados]

Never crashed Had a near miss yesterday though and it could have been the costliest crash ever because it nearly hit me ! I lost orientation and it was two meters away inverted coming towards me! Not fun.
managed to save it though.

Next time I will fly at least 5m away from me and be MUCH more careful, learnt my lesson the easy way luckily.

[MSH-Direct]

One of the funniest was three times in less than 5 minutes in the corn field behind my house. (don't ask )

0 damage except for some minor surface cracks in canopy.

[stevolution]

one time i was doing mini auto and the heli bounced a little on touch down...

Thank god no damage. Cheapest crash to date

[dr dremel]

I mostly fly over soft soil or fields with high grass, so my Minis usually have minimal damage when I crash. I think the worst was 50€ including blades? Mostly it´s the items flint described, these are all sacrificial parts doing their job.

Just last week I was coming out of a loop too deep and sliced into a canola field. I cleaned up the green goo and flew further 4 packs

Most astonishing was this one, lost orientation with the GoPro strapped to the front:




Threw dirt everywhere, but I just bent the feathering shaft. I love this heli.

[waxman]

4 crashes in one flight 2 in to ground cover and 2 in to hard pack dirt last crash claimed the feathering shaft, main shaft and top bearing block so all up around $20. My warp would have cost more than that just in servo gears on average $150 every time the warp crashes. Loo Ving the mini p.

[Jomaba4308]

When mine hit, I thought I was in for a bunch of broken parts like main grips, boom, maybe boom supports, links, link balls. But no, I got off cheap. There was even a hole in the dirt about 4-5 inches long, 1.5 inches wide and 1 inch deep, how did I get off that cheap?

[dl5973]

crash damage depends on how you land.

Generally speaking if you land flat on the skids or flat on the side you get away with minimal or no damage

I have had 4 crashes in two years where I just picked it up and flew again.

I also had a few dumb thumb monents where I go in full negative form 1m off the goung onto its head and this is costly if you have stock servo frames as the main shaft tends to smash though the bottom of the heli and do allot of damage.

If you land sideways on an angle you tend to do a fair bit of damage too.

But I have to agree its a cheap heli to crash. This makes it a great beater heli.

[stevebaker]

I had my second ever crash this evening. The front guide pulley failed on me and the heli lost drive, gliding into a bush. No damage

[waxman]

Are you kidding me, I can't believe how tough this thing is, today I decided it was time to learn autos with the 450. I have never attempted to auto a small heli before. First shot from a long way up I got nervous and flared too high but I did manage to get it level and stationary before it dropped from around 5 ft to the deck and bounced on the skids landing upright. Half a dozen attempts and I was still no closer with a few tipovers hard landings etc. Last attempt I was way to committed to flaring as late as possible that I flew it strait in to the deck at a rate of knots it bounced off the skids and flipped over, I was expecting damage. Had a look and had snapped the tail fin, that's all after all of that abuse just one broken tail fin can't believe it.

[dedados]

Piled mine in yesterday and damage is boom, feathering shaft, blades and blade grip. Hit front sideways, loss of orientation and concentration.

[flyingw]

A few weeks ago had mine hovering up about 100 feet and intended to switch from one tail gyro gain value to the other. Instead by mistake I switched to throttle hold and turned the blasted thing off. In the first second I figured out what I did and calmly said in a normal speaking voice: "sh*t." It didn't occur to me to simply auto her because I never practiced them from altitude (only mini autos from two feet up). At the last second though I did alter the collective (too late) and she thumped loudly into relatively high grass.

I expected to find a crunched mess. On arrival at the crash site however she looked intact. I took off the canopy and did a quick inspection and found nothing wrong except for flattened out Gorilla skids. I checked the linkages and grips, placed her back upright, stepped back about 30 feet, spun her up and hovered for a few seconds and she flew without drama.

Back home I found the frame cracked but not broken in two places near where the skids attach which I repaired with some small strips of carbon fiber and resin. Other than that, no significant damage.

Cheers to MSHeli engineering, and of course high grass.

I keep playing back the crash in my mind. I really want to have that moment back and perform the emergency auto.

[Russell Harding]

My last crash was a 'freebie'...

Flying some fun hard 3d and showing off a bit... Had a combo of 'freestyle planning' problem and dumb thumbs... Hadn't quite planned my next transition and ended up locking up and ditching it about 30 mph backwards inverted... Hit TH early and let it go into the foot deep weeds.

My buddy watching was flabbergasted! I just popped the M2 sacrificial screw and that was it.

I also had a Mini that was having ESC shutdown (eventually traced to a slightly bad motor overheating the esc), and I had a bunch of freebies with that one too.... crashing with no throttle helps a lot.

[dl5973]

I just had a crash where heli nose dived into the ground from 10m up due to loss of power.

cracked both side frames.

vey unlucky

[jmtyndall]

That doesn't sound like a cheap crash. Though 30 meters is quite high

I crashed mine this weekend, piroetting circle and got a little wild with it. Hit on the nose from about 3 meters. Damage was main blades and a scuffed canopy. Replaced and flew