So this past Saturday, I got a Baby Blender up in the air for the first time, and things did NOT go well.
Unfortunately, I have no pictures or video of the flight, but I managed to get the thing up off the ground and have it flying, only to hear from everyone behind me, "You ok with it?!?"
I took off, got it into the air going from right to left on our runway, and things seemed to be going ok. Then I turned it to the right to bring it around and do a simple circuit of the field, only to have it just go into a roll and end up inverted at about 30 feet up. I backed off the throttle a bit, got it flipped over, and then it started dropping like it was nose heavy. I pulled back, punched the throttle, and it SLOOOOOOWLY came back up, then started porpoising - climb, stall, dive, climb, stall, dive - as I tried to get it leveled out, all the while rolling a little to the left each time.
Our fixed wing chair came over and started offering help with trimming it, and kept telling me to throttle up, but that wasn't helping - I as at about 95% throttle and it wouldn't fly smoothly. I finally told him, "I'm just gonna bring it in, something's wrong with it."
I managed to get it down to about a foot off the ground with no throttle, flared, and somewhat touched down on the runway, only for it to nose over immediately upon touchdown, just on the far side of the runway. I walked out to retrieve it, and fortunately, no damage to the plane, but I found out what the problem was as soon as I walked over to it.
Turns out that the velcro I had attached to the battery and the top of the bottom wing wasn't of the best strength, and the battery had been sliding around and shifting during flight. This resulted in the plane's CG drastically changing, becoming tail heavy, then nose heavy, and back, causing the erratic flight. The roll that I was experiencing was just from not having it trimmed out properly on the ailerons, and had the battery not been shifting, I could have gotten that corrected out easily enough, but it was adding to the mix.
As for the power, well...I was flying a 920kv motor with a 9x6 prop, on a 3S battery. It just didn't have quite the oomph I needed, and I think I'm gonna end up moving to a 10x6 for the next flight. I'm not looking for tons of speed, just enough thrust to keep the plane flying smoothly and cruise with it.
Unfortunately, I have no pictures or video of the flight, but I managed to get the thing up off the ground and have it flying, only to hear from everyone behind me, "You ok with it?!?"
I took off, got it into the air going from right to left on our runway, and things seemed to be going ok. Then I turned it to the right to bring it around and do a simple circuit of the field, only to have it just go into a roll and end up inverted at about 30 feet up. I backed off the throttle a bit, got it flipped over, and then it started dropping like it was nose heavy. I pulled back, punched the throttle, and it SLOOOOOOWLY came back up, then started porpoising - climb, stall, dive, climb, stall, dive - as I tried to get it leveled out, all the while rolling a little to the left each time.
Our fixed wing chair came over and started offering help with trimming it, and kept telling me to throttle up, but that wasn't helping - I as at about 95% throttle and it wouldn't fly smoothly. I finally told him, "I'm just gonna bring it in, something's wrong with it."
I managed to get it down to about a foot off the ground with no throttle, flared, and somewhat touched down on the runway, only for it to nose over immediately upon touchdown, just on the far side of the runway. I walked out to retrieve it, and fortunately, no damage to the plane, but I found out what the problem was as soon as I walked over to it.
Turns out that the velcro I had attached to the battery and the top of the bottom wing wasn't of the best strength, and the battery had been sliding around and shifting during flight. This resulted in the plane's CG drastically changing, becoming tail heavy, then nose heavy, and back, causing the erratic flight. The roll that I was experiencing was just from not having it trimmed out properly on the ailerons, and had the battery not been shifting, I could have gotten that corrected out easily enough, but it was adding to the mix.
As for the power, well...I was flying a 920kv motor with a 9x6 prop, on a 3S battery. It just didn't have quite the oomph I needed, and I think I'm gonna end up moving to a 10x6 for the next flight. I'm not looking for tons of speed, just enough thrust to keep the plane flying smoothly and cruise with it.
