My recent expedition to the airfield ended abruptly on Thursday with a unfortunate nose-dive on takeoff.
I managed to hand launch the Paprika on my own for one flight. After a quick trim, I managed a whole seven minutes of smooth flying and a neat landing with full flaps. The flight only used about 600mAh from my 4S 2600mAh battery, so I could easily stay in the air for over half an hour. The only reason I landed was because the ESC data log was full and I wanted a good snapshot of my flight.
The video camera failed me again. I thought I had just left it on and flattened the battery but after closer inspection I found the power switch had failed. So still no video from the aircraft…
The second flight was less successful. Immediately after launch it pitched down and hit the runway resulting in two snapped prop blades and cracked stabilisers. This was probably caused by shifting the centre of gravity forward without removing the tail trim to compensate.
The worst part was that this happened immediately after my supervisor arrived. This created some scepticism around the story of my first flight, which was not helped by the lack of video (again).
So another night was spent at the workbench putting things back together. I’m a little relieved that I had the chance to improve the strength in the stabiliser joints. There was not much force involved in the crash, so they could just as easily have snapped off in the air during a hard pull-up.
I’ve also ordered new blades and a handful of other things from Esprit Model. They get a special mention as they shipped my parts within 4 hours of me ordering them and their prices are always pretty fantastic.
So the repairs are done, I’m just waiting on the new prop and should be back in the air sometime next week, hopefully with a working camera.
