home/ history/ 2004/ november/ 20041126 BAD crashToday lunch time the weather was fine, slightly overcast with quite some sun and the fog vanishingI took the plane, and after some work I went for a flight after 4 pm. First flight was fine, although it was a bit dark already. On the first flight I used the video mode on the Sony DSC-T1 for the first time - my 120 MB Memory Stick allows for a bit more than 5 minutes of 640x480 video. Flight was fine, battery as well, so I moved the video over to the laptop and went for a second flight. Plane went up fine as always since I have the new Hacker motor, and I was cruising around about 100m above ground, when suddenly the plane started to make weird moves
Jerky moves stopped when the plane went into a steeeeeep dive. Whatever I did on the RC, the plane did not respond to it.
It fell into the forest bordering the river and was stopped just 2m above ground in tree that was easy to climb. Videos
So what happened? I guess the the turbulences unlocked the elevator servo. To see the power of the turbulences, notice the green stuff at the right bottom corner (5 seconds after the start of the big crash video). This is the receiver battery attached firmly with rubber bands. If it was moving up and down like that, the plane must have hit some hard air up there. I am just glad I did not loose any of my expensive equipment (camera, Lipoly battery or brushless motoro and controller) and the whole thing looks somehow repairable.
Long flights with cold fingers | Fixing the plane | Spring Flight
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