Remote control airplanes.

[helomech]

I used to fly a lot, but since we moved to Texas I have not flown. So it has been about 10 years that my planes sat in the shed. A guy at work flies them and got me to dig mine out. He gave me a engine because mine was locked up. Took forever to get the engine running right. So today I took of for the first time. Well storage was not good for the plane, the aileron flew off after about 45 seconds in the air. That caused all kinds of damage. The wing has a huge hole in it, the fuselage is cracked only the skin is holding it together. It is broken in many places, but I did manage to land it safely. So I saved the engine and radio gear, now to buy a new one.

Here is where the fuselage is cracked.

[bacpacker]

Bad day for the plane. What is it made of? A buddy of mine has a couple that are foam for the most part. Surprisingly they hold up pretty well.

[helomech]

It is balsa wood, under the skin. It is just a very lightweight design, and it sat in a hot shed for the last 10 years. It made the skin real brittle, but I thought it would be okay. I believe that the glue that held the aileron hinge in came unglued and pulled off the plane. That made the plane flutter real bad, and that is what caused the cracks everywhere.

[bacpacker]

Sucks. Good looking plane though.

[helomech]

Going to order this one tomorrow.
http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin...?&I=LXDUJC&P=0

[Domeguy]

At least you got her down in one piece.

[realist]

Those things are not cheap! I'm looking at buying a quad-copter. I want to be the first on my block with a drone.............

[Sniper-T]

^ Now, those things are not cheap!! Really cool, but not cheap.

A guy on a local forum has one, with the cameras etc, and they are really wild! He's got as much ca$h into that thing as I paid for my truck!

I don't know if you have to be a member on the forum to see the pics/vid but it is here:

http://www.trackshare.com/forum/showthread.php?t=79304

[helomech]

Going to order this one tomorrow.
http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin...?&I=LXDUJC&P=0

I was surprised when I landed and saw the damage. It still flew fairly well.

- - - Updated - - -

Those things are not cheap! I'm looking at buying a quad-copter. I want to be the first on my block with a drone.............

A guy in our flying club has 2 real nice quad copters. One is over 100k, but it is his business. He uses it to take pics and video of the refineries around here. It has thermal, and regular camera. Range is about 10 miles and it flies on one battery for over 45 minutes. It does not even have a remote to use it, just a large thing that looks like a ipad.

His other one he can fly with a tablet, or with a normal remote. Both have live video. Neat stuff.

[Stormfeather]

Quadcopters have actually gotten quite economical lately with all the buzz happening about them. I have a few of them and play around with them quite a bit. I got the AR Parrot Spider Mini for Xmas, and its a fun little entry level drone for a hundred bucks. You can use a tablet or smartphone to control it, has internal camera for pictures or film, and is a great way to get into the field without breaking the bank!

http://www.parrot.com/usa/products/minidrones/

and I also have a generic version of the AR Parrot as well, its for sale if anyones interested! $150. and you too can get into the Drone game!