Howdy folks, I go by Colin, a little easier to say than my username. Anyway, I completed and maidened my FT Explorer a few weeks ago. I built the 3 channel wing and took it out to my local golf driving range. All checks went well, wind at the surface was nil and it was a bright sunny day. I had a buddy launch it and away it went. I was surprised how unresponsive the aircraft became once I got up to about 50 feet. It was then that I realized that I was above the treetops, and with a 2500 foot peak just behind me, winds aloft were screaming. I managed to land it on some soft snow, but by then it had flown about 300 yards downrange. It was upright so I just gave her full throttle and she willingly lifted.
A few more turns in the pattern and I was feeling pretty confident, so I took her for a nice lazy loop around the edge of the field. It was then that I realized my eyes aren't as good as they used to be, because the 60' tall cottonwood looked a lot further away. We watched in horror as the beautiful beast smacked into the rats nest of tall branches, hung for a second before the wing departed and fluttered to the ground like an oversized maple seed.
She was stuck! I wasn't so much worried about the $39 foam board kit as I was the brand new rx, esc, motor, battery and servos. I hiked across the field with the transmitter still on thinking I could power it up and plow through the branches. When I arrived, to my horror I saw that the prop nut had backed off, and my motor was spinning away happily with the prop sitting still. After a few minutes I conceded defeat, accepted my sacrifice to the RC gods, and drove home. Two weeks later I decided to go check on the wreck, and to my surprise, the crippled explorer was gone. A quick hike found the fuselage completely intact at the base of the tree, and aside from a little bit of paper peeling at the edges, was totally flyable. The nose and battery were laying a few feet away. Everything was soaking wet from the solid Kodiak rains but I decided to plug it in just to see. I figured everything would be a loss but when I plugged it in, the little plane beeped and jiggled to life! I hiked back to my truck, tossed the Explorer in the back seat and called my dogs over. As I was closing the back door, my enthusiastic Australian Shepherd ran past and wormed his way into the back seat, landing directly on the explorer, completely crushing it!
So now I have my complete B pack, a miraculously still good battery and all my radio gear. My wife got me a new B pack for my birthday before I recovered the Explorer, so now the only thing left to do is decide which one to build next (and wait for a calmer day)
Cheers!
