Joining the quad gang - Tony's quad log

[Graham Lawrie]

LOL Me to Tony low and close, dont think my heart would survive another like today:)

[Tony]

LOL Me to Tony low and close, dont think my heart would survive another like today:)

Haha, it's scary alright, last time I flew fpv was with Lee, it was turbo charging along the beach, I had to give TX to Lee to recover it.... Lol, was funny though

[danhampson]

Good luck you two if you go out tomorrow.

[Graham Lawrie]

I will be out Dan:) heart attack at the ready:) but my 600, 450 as well:)

[Tony]

Do some vids of your helis Graham...

[pvolcko]

Careful flying behind yourself. I know in a big open field what's is matter, right? Well, if you have people around, cars and stuff, or in just about all other flying situations the area behind you is a no go zone. If you find yourself back there do what you did: halt the aircraft, orient it tail in or however you need to to regain positive control, and then get it back onto your declared flying area safely and as fast as possible.

And be careful flying close to yourself. Those props will definitely leave a mark.

Looking better in the field vid, though. And I like that storage container/garage area there in the earlier vid. Keep it low (below the roof line) and in that area for flight training purposes. I'd stay away from cars, the RV, the house, etc. Even if you feel confident of flying ability, you never know when something is going to go sideways and result in cracked glass, scraped sheet metal, etc.

[Tony]

Thanks for the Paul, that field is a good place to practice as you rarely see anyone. It's miles from anywhere and if anyone did come it would be in a car and I'd hear it.. Going behind me wasn't intentional, I did emit a few choice words to myself when it happened...lol

The RV and Jag I was flying near are mine, and although I wouldn't like to damage them, it's a handy place to fly for short bursts... Yeah I'll keep it below those garage roofs in future.

Thanks for the tips

[Tony]

Well I went to the field today with 5 packs in my bag, hoping to try some fpv again..

First pack flying LOS, doing some rough figure of 8's (it was windy).. Starting doing some big circles, closest part being around 10 feet away from me. Doing pretty well for me anyway...lol, keeping the same height was an issue, but I managed (a bit). Lol

After about 4 circles it was coming towards me but still about 15 feet away, and it stopped responding to TX, anyway it headed straight for me. I quickly tried full throttle leaving go of cyclic, but it was still coming at me... I turned around and it hit me in the back, I had quite a thick coat on so no pain..lol.

I had a look at it and all seemed ok, so I changed lipo, waited for blue led to settle down, locked in... And tried to arm it, but nothing happened... So I thought it was knackered and headed home.

On checking it out at home I noticed the RX light wasn't on!! Couldn't see that outside, mind I probs never looked...pushed all the plugs back in one at a time till it came on. It was the plug that goes in the FC board from the RX... It must have come adrift during flight.....

So, nothing broke, although my SJ4000 came off when it hit me but it's only on with elastic bands, intentionally of course...

No damage to me or quad, lost some time at field though as its bloody raining now.... Typical..

[KevG]

Unlucky Tony but if you are having trouble with loose plugs maybe a bit of hot glue to keep them in place

[Tony]

I was thinking that myself Kev, thanks mate. It's the first time it's happened. I'm just jinxed with anything that flies... Lol

[Tony]

LOS flying yesterday with my new quad, just practicing and getting used to how she handles, pretty awesome really considering I built it.... Lol, anyway I got through 4 packs doing some banked turns in the garden. Nose in hovering etc...

I set the timer for 6 minutes on TX, when I recharged lipos it only put average of 1100ma back in. These are 2200 lipos. So I think I need to increase timer to probs 8-9 mins to get a better discharge.

No onboard camera yet to record flights and Mrs nowhere to be seen...lol
More flying today... Boscam vtx ordered this morn which means I'll have everything for fpv again soon..

[Graham Lawrie]

Nice one Tony:) I found if i was hovering and not doing much i got about 9 minutes:) Now i am moving more i am averaging 6 and batteries are always warm:)

I have also had a couple of flights low level where i have been having a good flight and got "greedy" and nearly run flat:(

[Tony]

Yes, I wasn't doing much in the garden, some figure of 8's practicing banked turns which sometimes didn't work out....lol

[Derek]

....at least you're getting your practice in, Tony! Nice job!!!

[Tony]

Thanks Derek, yes practice, practice... Going out later on today if the weather holds. Looks like rain though....some black clouds looming around...

[pvolcko]

New quad? Thought you were hanging up the hobby. glad you got a new one together. Any retrieval/safety additions this time?

[Tony]

We're you been Paul....lmao.... I have a new thread on this build, got all the parts off Graham and Dan.. I just thought it better to continue this flight log...

Give up.... That should be censored... how can one really give up this hobby....

[Tony]

Had a mishap with today's flying, stupid mistake, was doing some FFF and all of a sudden one of the props flew off, of course it summersaulted to the deck with a thud...

Cause, one of the motors had a left hand thread holding the prop on, and of course I had it on a CW motor... We'll eventually it was going to unscrew itself off... Only thing I lost was the left hand nut, nothing broke. So when I got it home I didn't have another left hand nut. But did have another motor with right hand thread. Thanks to Graham for sending me extra motors, so I just changed the motor, recal'd it in the software and we are up and running again... Ready for tomorrow.

[Stambo]

Nice one Tony, good to hear you are back in the air.
Maybe some nylock nuts are in order.

[Tony]

I've got some Stambo but the threads on the motors are not long enough so they don't screw on far enough to reach the nylon bit so I've threadlocked it. These will do great for now I think. Maybe later get some new motors... I'm flying at mo, so that's great.