Originally Posted by
bampilot06
Thats pretty sweet. I never did the rc plane thing. I don’t know how they land them.
Thankfully the planes are very strong relative to their weight, and you don't have to deal with the limits of human physiology. I would imagine that most landings of model airplanes if scaled up would seriously injure any occupants
Lots of bouncing.
Originally Posted by
genejockey
My fear with RC planes is that I'd end up flying it out of control range and it would just keep going till it ran out of gas (because the ones when I was young had little gas engines) and fall out of the sky.
I've only flown little stuff, so by the time the airplane was out of receiver range it was already too far away to see.
Flyaways are a thing with sailplanes, though. Get one hooked up in a really strong thermal and you'll need to say goodbye.
Originally Posted by
ls01
I lost my first plane that way. Dead reciever battery. I forgot to shut the reciever power off after charging it. I drove to a buddys house in the country to fly it 45 minutes away. The failsafe position was all flight surfaces neutral with a touch of left rudder. But as the engine ran the nose became lighter and lighter. We followed it in a car, as it climbed higher and higher cycling in the sky. It sounded like a mosquito in the bedroom at night.
When it ran out of fuel it was up there, but without the engine sound I couldn't find it. Until it was quite low, coming down like a lawn dart.
I salvaged the tail, a damaged wing. Most of the radio gear.
I didn't try it again for 15 years. I joined a club. Signed up for their flight school. Learned how to fly. Crashed a couple planes. Became an instructor. Taught for a couple years. Had an absolute blast. I dabled in aerobatic competition before I gave it up for my second marriage. (Crashed and burned) took it up again after the economic melt down to take my dad out flying. Now a days we fly Styrofoam planes with electric motors out of China. I have 4 or 5 of those. But we havent been active for a couple years. his health and lack of time on my part.
I have a basement full of stuff, 6 or 8 wood Models. A 1/4 scale Edge540, thats all carbon fiber and foam, I completely scratch built. 75"wingspan, 45cc chainsaw engine, that I converted. It was a lot of fun.
I don't know what to dovwith all of it.. haven't touched it in years.
The hobby is so much easier to get in to now, I think. Quality has gone way up and price has gone way down. I remember when LiPo batteries and brushless motors first came out into the hobby world and they were stupid expensive. Now you can go down to a hobby store and pick up a ready to fly 4 channel brushless
Pitts S1 for $200 that's even got a gyro inside which compensates for wind gusts and makes the little thing fly like a much larger airplane. It's crazy.
Plus with the 2.4Ghz stuff you don't have to worry about someone not checking the channel board and wrecking you when they turn their transmitter on.