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Post by sgmason on Jun 26, 2013 20:53:50 GMT -4
So after reading about how someone lost their PZ P-47 in the bushes and couldn't find it I decided to order a couple of these Signal loss Alarm & Lost Plane Finder www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/uh_viewItem.asp?idProduct=13064Even though most of the time I fly in wide open spaces there is the odd time I will fly where I could possibly lose one of my planes in the woods. My brother wants to learn to fly too so he is cutting a landing strip into the field next to his house. There is enough space to fly in the field, but there is a pretty dense wooded area on one side of the field. I figured for under $4 each its cheap insurance and they will be easy to swap from plane to plane for me. I also ordered the 7 in 1 mega wattmeter, an anemometer, and nav light kit. I am going to put the nav lights on the Sensei just because I can ;D
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Post by sgmason on Jun 27, 2013 8:54:14 GMT -4
I am utterly shocked, I place my HK order at 7:55 pm and it was shipped by 4:30 am Now the waiting begins That is always the hardest part for me, watching my order crawl to its destination through Canada Posts after zooming across an ocean in a day or so
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Post by Valkman on Jun 27, 2013 10:18:24 GMT -4
That buzzer is a handy little thing! Might get one of those myself.
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Post by sgmason on Jun 27, 2013 10:25:30 GMT -4
I never even thought of not being able to find a model once it went down. As you can see in the video I posted I fly in a open space, but if I start flying at my brother's it will be a different story. They have a couple to offer, but I like the one I ordered because it doesn't take up a channel on the Rx and is set off passively when it loses signal. So if the plane goes down and I can't find it all I have to do is shut off the Tx and it will start calling out for me ;D
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Post by Chris Reibert on Jun 28, 2013 14:54:37 GMT -4
My dad built something like that about 15yrs ago but it beeped the entire flight. Our field growing up was next to a private airplane field, woods, and a swamp. Every time planes were lost we would throw a private pilot $20 and he would fly the area to look. Pretty sweet for a kid who loved flying and aviation! I flew my first Cessna at the age of eight.
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Post by sgmason on Jun 28, 2013 19:14:31 GMT -4
I don't think $20 would even get a pilot to turn over his engine with today's fuel prices There are not that many people that fly out of our little airport. Growing up there were only 2, John Ross, who owns Ross Video, and Dr Prins. When I was younger I was lucky enough to get taken up a few times, I was friends with John Ross's son, and Dr Prins was my family Doctor and lived right across the street from us. He still owns the house across the street, but he retired and spends most of the time in Ottawa now. He and his wife still come to town a couple times a month in the summer to do things like yard care on the house.
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Post by sgmason on Jun 29, 2013 17:39:49 GMT -4
Just got home from a successful flight, but it almost sounded like the ESC was kicking in and out like it had a bad connection. It could be that I was hitting the LV cutoff, but I don't think that it would beep like it does when first plugged in and is arming. I am going to go check the pack in a few, I just want to get the new video processing first.
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Post by sgmason on Jul 3, 2013 20:14:41 GMT -4
Figured out why I was getting beeping and low power, a bad connector on the ESC.
I spent the afternoon installing the locator buzzer and nav lights on the plane. The lights took a lot longer than I thought they would. I had to extend all but 3 of the 8 lights. It does look good though. I also checked out the watt meter I got. I now know why my airboat is so hard to control, I am pulling 785 watts with the 9.5 x 7.5 prop and 891 watts with the 12 x 6 prop. I forgot to get the peak amps before disconecting the battery so that measurement is lost.
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Post by sgmason on Jul 4, 2013 8:59:49 GMT -4
I was unable to sleep last night So I went for a walk around 4:30 this morning. It was foggy as all get out, but the wind was dead calm and I could see bits of blue sky through the fog over top of me, so I decided to head home and charge up a couple of batteries and go for a flight. By the time I had a bite to eat for breakfast, a cup of coffee to clear the cobwebs from my brain, and charge two batteries the fog had lifted and the sun was shining. I grabbed all my stuff and headed out to my flying spot, but by the time I had got there the sun had run away and the sky was looking threatening to the west. I figured what the heck I only have 2 batteries, lets get this done before it rains. I had took the camera off the plane last night, and put it on my hat for a change. I think the fog over the river would have been nicer than what I got, but at least it wasn't the same old video I have been posting. My plan was to get in the air and just fly around with the new radio settings, I bumped up the throws on low rate, to get use to them and on the second battery maybe try my first roll First thing I noticed was that those fancy nav lights weren't too visible, then about a minute into the flight the locator alarm started squealing Every now and then if the wing was tipped just right I could see the red or green LED as the plane passed, but that was it . I think I am supposed to plug into the throttle channel and not the gear switch. The instructions are useless because they are written in the worse chinenglish I have ever seen. Other than those two minor problems the flight was great, mind you it was very bland for someone else to watch I hit the one minute warning on the timer and started trying to get lined up to land. I can get lined up fine, but I still really over shoot my landing zone so I waved off a couple times. The last time I tried coming it at a different direction, no wind meant I could land in any direction I wanted. The plane was coming in nicely, even if it was a touch fast, but as usual I over shot where I wanted to touch down. Then I realized that I was going to land on the back side of a small ditch so I gave it a touch of throttle to clear the ditch. That was quickly followed by too much down elevator so I didn't end up on the road . End result was the normal touchdown and tip over to the nose and back to the wheels. One of these days I will nail another landing With the plane on the ground and undamaged I walked over to pick it up and changed out the battery for the second flight. As luck would have it, I popped the battery hatch and it started to rain. Not bad at first, but by the time I finished measuring the temp of the battery and ESC I knew flying was over for the morning. I have my fingers crossed that it clears up this afternoon, but if not I will just have to put that second battery back on storage charge till the weather gets nice again. I will post up the boring old man flying video later, I still have to get it ready to send to YouTube.
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