I lost my plane!!

[scotty22]

I was out flying my old 2m glider today, it was an own design from about 6 years ago, i was pretty fond of it, just nice to fly...

I was flying from the sand dunes at Cruden Bay in Scotland, now, Scotland isnt known for thermals in february, but I found one and tried staying with it. I was concentrating so hard next thing I knew I could hardly see it...uh oh.
I tried dives, loops, nothing helping, it was still climbing and being all white, I lost sight of it.

I have to say, thats a bad feeling to have. stood there holding the tranny with yourself to blame...scary thing is though, I didnt realise it was so high until it was too late!!

Anybody have the same ting happen to them??

scott

[Guz]

I know that feeling in your gut. Sickening isn't it?

I've flown my EasyGlider past visual range in thermals several times, blink and it's gone. You just stand there and say "S&*%, I lost it!", put the sticks in a corner and pray you see a glint somewhere." Fortunately I've found it and was able to bring it back, except for one time. I ripped the wings off when I lost orientation and pulled to hard. The plane went down in an apartment complex, search and searched for an hour, never found it. Asked the grounds keepers to keep an eye out for it. Three days later they called and said they found it.

So I feel your pain, sucks don't it?

[DACeller]

I have been lucky and not yet lost a plane. IMO, the excitement about a good thermal tends to MAKE you hang with it, but I'm learning that such TD activity is really outside the realm of good R/C piloting. The trick is more to find such thermals, not stay with them, so I let it gain needed altitude and then leave looking for another. If too high, spiral it down until you can at least see it and then go looking for more.
OR it you wish to sustain for contest practice, just spiral it down some and let it go back up. I think the better pilots will know which is which and when is when. Practicing will help of course. It is possible that a whopper thermal will take it up even if spiraling so you need to recognize its power and get outa there. Thermals are easier to so recognize if in more visible range.

I'm still learning and hope never to lose any planes in this way. I fix and fly my old birds a lot to provide the comfort that if I make a mistake, its loss won't be too costly; still, I would hate the thought of any loss.

[Batmanwpg]

Oh ya done that. I lost my 2M almost directly overhead. It was that high! Trying to concentrate, one blink and she was gone. Put the sticks into the corner to see if we could spot it spiraling down but no luck. I had written it off with that sick feeling. Shortly after a friend on his way home decided to check down a road to the local golf course and he found it in a soft (mud) ditch in about 5 pieces. She has since been repaired and is back in the winners circle! I now put my name and phone # and reward offered for return on all my planes. I've gotten Free Flights back this way so it wouldn't hurt for RC either.

[romanl]

I had an EZ Glider fly away on me last summer. My wife's comment was "oh well, at least it wasn't one of those $1000 planes." The lesson I learned is that you do not want to be down wind with the EZ because it's penetration is not very good.

[onethermal]

I lost a plane about three years after I had learned to fly, I was enjoying our local slope (site for soar utah) and I was going out on the front part of our slope to get enough alitiude to go to the back part of our slope and then work it up 1,500 feet to the ridge. things were going great I was doing everything I wanted to do and more. then I got to far back on the ridge and next thing I knew my plane was gone.
I searched the mountain tops for many of days and found not a trace of my plane...so I learned a lesson, if you really like your plane you need to keep it away from the trolls that live beyond your eyesite ??? but when did that ever stop us from pushing the distance. :)

Clarence

[alstrahm]

Scotty, sorry for the lost, it always pains me to see a plane go down, and when it's mine it hurts even worse. I have flown R/C for 45 years and sailplanes for the last 25. Lost one new Falcon 880 in a contest cuz there were three of us flying for the same thermal in an overcast day and looked away for a second and was flying someone else's plane until the timer said who's plane is going straight in, not mine i said to my self, wiggling my sticks, alas,to no resonse, Never did find those servos after pulling the nose out of 6" of dirt. Lost a Sagitta 600, one of my favorite planes, at the local schoolyard after letting someone else get it to high. i have also saved a plane from getting lost because I happened to be watching his progress, as it was geting very high, and he lost sight and I grabbed the tX and brought it back. There is no easy answer, Know what your plane can do, know your eyesight limitations (mine seen to get shorter as time passes me by), but there is that factor about being in the dream themal you always wanted to be in. Sorry about the loss, but your not the first and you will not be the last.
Allen

[Crashaholic]

I dont really fly thermal too much (so what am I doing here!) but I fly slope a lot. I have lost a plane and have seen others lose them too. It is always a terrible feeling. We fly combat a lot and all of the combat wings look the same. The worst is when you are flying along, put in some stick movement and "your" plane doesnt respond. This is usually followed by a sinking feeling in your stomach along with with the realization that your eyes had drifted to someone else's plane and you were flying that. You look around, wiggle your sticks, and look for the plane doing the funky dance up in the sky. I had the happen once and there was no plane doing the funky dance in the sky. I didnt even know where to start looking. I turned around to find the plane had "landed" about 20 yards from me. I couldnt believe it.

Anyway, I decided to start making beepers (lost model alarms) and selling them at my cost to the local flyers. When I sell a beeper, I always tell people to put their name on the plane though.

[BMatthews]

It sneaks up on you when you least expect it.

I lost a fairly new SAM old timer 1/2A Tecaco model that way. Had it up to spec height and got a bit of dust in my eye. By the time I blinked it clear the model was gone. I tried putting it into a spiral dive and called out to all the other folks on the line to look for it but it was gone.

Shortly after we gave up on it I realized that the wind at ground level was almost completley the opposite way to the cloud movement. So we also had an odd reversal at altitude so that meant we were looking the wrong way.

I got my Miss Tiny back about 3 months later. The wing was fine but the inside of the fuselage was all grey like an old fence from the sun and filling with water when it rained. There were also two small sets of teeth marks in the stabilizer where a rat or other small rodent had tasted the model or tried to do battle with it.

Oddly enough I almost did the same thing some years later when thermalling nicely and answering questions from a bystander. I suddenly realized that I could not see the stabilizer any more and that the wing wasn't any too big either. Shut the guy up and concentrated on getting it down to a more comfy altitude.

[lincoln]

Yup, I've lost one up and far out in a thermal. About a month after I started to fly. But my name was in it and I got it back. I could actually just barely see the glider when it got out of radio range. (Not to worry, was an old Kraft which had had a hard life.)

Lost a Sagitta 600 a couple or 5 years ago when I couldn't make it back over a treeline. It wasn't all that far, but we couldn't find it. Was trying out hard contacts and lost another Sagitta when I couldn't get back upwind far enough. Pieces were found. And lost one in the bushes at a Long Island contest. Not many pieces back two years later from that one! Whole airframe was rotted but the battery still seemed to hold a charge!

Not sure I've lost any others, though I've had some come down downwind.

[Curare]

I've never lost an aircraft into cloud never to be seen again.

Oh no sir, not me.. :(

[scotty22]

So im not the only one then!! :o

I was thinking about it last night and I still cant get over how easily it happened!!, I mean, Ive been flying for years now and never even came close to losing a model that way. ( plenty of crashes though!!) :D

I suppose that one goes down to experience, be a bit more wary of getting to high!

scott

[ChuckA]

I never fly a thermal soaring sailplane without working spoilers or flaps. Even so, I have on occasion been forced to move a long way to get out of a giant thermal even with full crow. Flying without some means of lift control is like flying a power model without a throtttle. It can be done but why?

[jfrickmann]

I lost my 2m electric last April. Same thing - too high and far. Pulled the stick back and tried to find it for 10-15min until I gave up and turned off the transmitter. Spent five days walking the forest hoping to find it but didn't.

Then in September a guy calls me - he found it! And amazingly, the $500+ worth of radio gear, brushless power system and an EagleTree MicroLogger w/ sensors still works! So now it is flying again - just not as high and far :o

So don't forget that little sticker on your plane.

[frugalme]

Casual flying with HLGs, intermittently as my only RC activity for several years, it's pretty easy to get 'em too high to see the little boogers. And it don't take a strong thermal either. So far I've been able to spin down when intentionally pushing the limits of my eyesight.

Lost a Sweet Stik w/ST 46 back in '74/'75. It was doing small loops (on its own) as it drifted downwind and disappeared over the nearby woods. It was near dusk so the next morning I offered a finder's fee/reward to my fellow A&P school classmates and after about twenty minutes of 20 guys searching, it was found in pretty good shape. The guy who found it was my room mate and knowing my financial situation, wouldn't accept the $20 reward. Whata guy.

[2motheus]

Last year, not on purpose, I had a new stretched Sagitta 900 (120"+ ws) at over 3,100 feet, measured with a ZLog. I knew I was in the danger zone and was trying to spiral down, but it seemed to only get higher. The spirals may have been working, but at altitude it's hard to tell if it's really coming down. After 7 minutes of alternating between spiraling and moving laterally to find some down air, I finally went inverted.

Circling inverted seemed to do the trick.

I suppose it would be possible to figure out ahead of time what stick movements are required to get a particular plane upside down. This would enable you to do the maneuver even if the plane got out of sight and right-side-up spins weren't working.

In any case, the spoilers go in before the next flight. :D

[dougmc]

After 7 minutes of alternating between spiraling and moving laterally to find some down air, I finally went inverted. I thought the general advice for a plane with plenty of dihedral was simply to move the stick to one corner and leave it there and put the plane into a spin ...

(Though inverted does sound like more fun ...)

[rdeis]

The spin is the best failsafe when you're at the limits of vision. The rotation gives you a better chance of catching a flash of reflection off of some flight surface.

But flying inverted will get the flat bottomed airplanes, especially, down very quickly if you can see them well enough to do it.


Closest I've come to losing one was when my 100" Pantera vanished on me at altitude. I had lots of pilots searching the skys for me, but no one could see it until we herd an odd whistle and buzz coming from my airplane, now at low altitude and in a steep dive.

I pulled out and limped back to the field-- the buzz had been the H-stab fluttering, half of had came off and been lost somewhere during the dive.

Got down safely and built a new stab just in time for the contest the next day.

[T Z]

Scott,

I'm embarrassed to say it, but in my 4 years of flying, I've lost 4 planes. I mean totally LOST, I haven't found one of them. I almost envy others when they say they've lost one due to a battery failure or receiver glitch which caused a lawn dart death. I've never had the pleasure of losing a plane in any of those ways. My radio gear and batteries never had the time to "grow old" with any of my planes.

The first 2 were mostly due to inexperience and strong convective storm clouds that snuck up on me while at speck height. I can remember as a beginner loving to push it to the limit for max time. At that time, I just didn't believe you could make a plane permanently go away. Boy, did I learn my lesson. I lost the 3rd plane while specked in a normal, nature-made thermal which had drifted over a large housing development. The housing development then spawned an entirely new thermal (due to house heat I suppose), which then aggressively took my already specked plane, right out of sight and out of my control.

The fourth plane, despite being very cautious, vanished straight over my head on a bluer than blue day in the spring when there was lift everywhere. I did all the tricks, stick in corner, dive it down, waited a long time and looked everywhere, it was totally gone.

I think B Mathews mentioned how it can sneak up on you and he's right. One thing I've learned is that it's easy to feel safe just because you "see" the plane (or spot or speck), but that's not enough. If you aren't able to clearly determine it's direction, then, the next move you make on your sticks will either bring the plane closer to you, or blink it out of site when it's at speck height. If your plane is rising very SLOWLY then that moment comes without warning. I know it only too well and that sense of loss also, staring at the sky with a blinking transmitter, not believing you're going home without your plane. It's especially tough if you've been flying the plane for a while and really have it dialed in, not to mention the loss of time spent building it, the money, and the memories of good flights on it. After losing the 4th, I went through a tough period mentally, afraid to stretch out and really fly again. But soon I realized that it's part of the hobby and a natural result of trying to find where the line is without fear. Something I do now as I near speck height is to ask myself out loud if I can tell which way the plane is oriented. As soon as the orientation gets fuzzy, down she comes. Anyway, my condolences, but as you can see by the responses, it happens to many. Good luck and good air.

Tom

[BMatthews]

TZ, my current rule is that if I can't make out the stabilizer as a separate piece along with the wing then I'm too far out. Lose the stab and the rest is just a misplaced blink away.

[regis]

My theory - as mentioned at http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?p=7533219#post7533219 is that this happens when the plane passes through a boundary layer. Like looking at fish in water - the fish are not where they appear to be. FWIW regis

[Brendan Miller]

I'm used to flying high up and far out with my old RESolution XL I could see that plane at 1400+ft and a good distance out and get it back. Now with my soprano I had it up to 1450ft (about) and far out and lost sight 4 times, had to do some diving and turning to see it and get it back, which I did, and landed at my feet, I know now not to fly that far out.

Brendan

[lincoln]

If you've got a clean glider and you like to fly high, you need spoilers or flaps. I almost lost a .40 size trainer for someone, straight up. I suppose that says that even spoilers may not be enough, because a .40 size trainer is it's own spoiler.

[T Z]

TZ, my current rule is that if I can't make out the stabilizer as a separate piece along with the wing then I'm too far out. Lose the stab and the rest is just a misplaced blink away.

BMathews; I agree 200%. That's good, clear-cut advice to follow when caught up in the moment (and the lift!). Many times I've seen only the wing and deluded myself into thinking I could "see" the plane. That's not much use at "blink out" distance though, because unless you know how it's oriented, you won't make the correct move in that next critical moment.

[T Z]

I once read in a post by a top flyer, that he thought the best way to get out of REALLY strong lift is to dive straight down, gain speed, then shoot sideways out of the thermal. He said he had seen instances of planes both spiraling and with spoilers deployed--actually going UP in strong lift! From what I've seen, I can believe it. When the lift acts like wind under the plane, it makes sense to show the cleanest plane profile to that wind. I also like the simplicity of that move because at blink-out height, I'd be hesitant to invert or do anything complicated. Just a thought about what I read.

Tom

[bobby legue]

In the south west classic this last weekend I flew a 9 minute round with a fairly heavy plane [ Marauder ] and I put the spoilers up at 5 minutes, never put them down, and landed a couple seconds short of 9 minutes. I thought I was going to lose it as it was going up so fast.
Bob

[VasMan]

I found this thread while looking for something else, however I did lose an airplane once. It went into a river (Sacramento River) behind some trees in a distance and I never found it. My wife likes to tell people that her paycheck is now swimming to Hawaii, since the river flows to the Pacific Ocean about 80 miles away.

Vas

[rdwoebke]

Tom,

Don't feel too bad. You are not alone in the club of people that have lost 4 airplanes. I'm a charter member myself! :-)

Ryan

[IwantaJet]

http://www.loc8tor.com/

Never lose a plane again. A small investment compared to the cost of a high end or even mid level model. Costs about the same as a couple of digital servos. It would be nicer if the range was longer of course.

I haven't used one but when I win that Pike in the raffle I'm going to get one.

Roy

[StevenatorLTFO]

If there is any doubt about how strong lift can be, once while working on my pilots license, I found myself on downwind in a Cessna 152, with full flaps, power all the way off, nose about 20 degrees down, and was climbing at almost 500 feet a minute. What worried me most at the time, was what would happen when I found the down air that was associated with that monster thermal. (turned out to be not too big of an issue) I'm sure an RC sailplane in that same thermal would have gotten very small very fast.

[T Z]

Wow, Ryan you too? I take no pleasure in your losses but it does make me feel a little better to know this. I thought that #3 would absolutely be the last for me but no.

I don't think it's my piloting skills per se--my longest flight so far is one hour 5 minutes, with numerous 45 and 50+ minute flights, and I haven't had any piloting mishaps in a long time despite flying in all kinds of weather.

I just like specking her out, and maybe I'm too much of a cowboy when I'm up there. I've been checking the weather soundings (SkewT diagrams) before flying lately (have just started reading them) - and I actually get a little apprehensive when I see a steep lapse rate developing. When I first started flying I had no such fear. Now, unfortunately, I don't feel as free as I used to.

[rdwoebke]

Wow, Ryan you too? I take no pleasure in your losses but it does make me feel a little better to know this. I thought that #3 would absolutely be the last for me but no.

After #1 I thought that would be the last. Then after #2 I thought that would be the last. Then after #3... and #4... And then this summer, I almost did what you have done 4 times. I was flying a rudder/elevator only 30 inch span model. That is a small plane.... I lost sight of it for at least 20 seconds when it was high in a thermal, but had a spotter helping me (I knew it was getting small so had a spotter help earlier in the flight) and luckily got it back.

My lost planes were all equipment problems. #1 was a dead battery. This was before I had a good charger. #2 was a hand launch with a 50 mah NICD pack. I knew those were good for 20 minutes of flying, but pushed it with "one more flight", I was thermalling down wind when I thought I'd come home and about that time it spiraled into a woods, and my searches never found it. #3 was stupid on my part, a rudder servo was dead on launch and I could have dove the plane into the ground, but it seemed to be coming back around only to go into a woods (I since have acquired a hiking GPS for this scenerio). #4 was Johny Rotten and I'll post its story in the morning.

Ryan

[Test005]

Do you guys mark your sailplanes with name and phone number? I have marked all of mine and I hope some nice soul will give me a call if they find one of my lost birds.

Thankfully I have not lost one yet, I'm a beginner and go 120m-90m-70m-50m-30m-15-10-5....launch again.
But one day I will find lift and I will too loose a plane...Yes that I will do!

:)

[lincoln]

Putting the name and phone number is a good idea. Has returned one of my lost models.

If I hadn't been flying it at the time today, I might have lost my dlg. Strong dust devil blew through right where I was standing. I think it would have picked the glider up, though I'm not sure how far it would have taken it!

[kwmtrubrit]

Two weeks ago I was at our flying site with my Riser 100. I was about to try out my new RAM3 and was hoping for some altitude. Blue sky, 60f and wind between 10-15mph. First hi-start launch up and down. Second launch, here we go! I'm really not sure if it was a thermal or just wind surfing, but a couple of guys were saying "look at keith go." I'm thinking, this will be a good christening for the RAM3, and getting egged on by their comments. Then, one of the guys whom I have a lot of respect for says "hey Keith, you've got bigger balls than I."
I said "I'm bailing and pulled the spoilers", and the plane was gone from my sight. "I don't see it" I said, to which I hear "you are in a dive, I can hear it, pull out!" I did, very gently and got it on the ground. I checked to plane over and found the vertical stab would move from side to side about 3/4in at the tip. Lesson learned: I won't do that again----until next time!! The sick part: After my "high altitude attempt," I wasn't able to download the info from the RAM3. User error I'm sure.

Keith

[rdwoebke]

As promised, the ballad of Johny Rotten:

“The king is gone but he’s not forgotten
This is the story of Johnny Rotten
It’s better to burn out than it is to rust
The king is gone but he’s not forgotten.”

On the final round of the day in Cincinnati in 2005, I had a battery failure of some sort on the Bubble Dancer. Final round was a 15 minute task. I had noticed before launching on the final round that my spoiler servo was buzzing. It normally does not buzz. When I moved the spoiler stick a bit, it stopped buzzing, so I thought I should be fine.

Launch was a bit low in the down wind conditions at the time of that launch. One pilot managed to find lift in that round and got pretty high. Not sure how the other guys did, as I pretty much fought my own fight that round. After about a minute and loosing most of my launch altitude, I found some decent lift but got pretty far down wind. After about 6 or so minutes into the task, I started back up wind. I worked my way up wind for about 2 minutes, until I found a small patch of lift over a lone tree. At this point I was probably at about 100 feet of altitude.

I worked this bubble for the next several minutes. Re-cored a number of times. About 12 or 13 minutes into the task, I noticed that the plane did not want to change diameter of the circles. I gave hard right stick, nothing. I tried to see if I could stall it, nothing. Gave full spoiler nothing. At this point, I realized I did not have the plane.

So I of course go running after the plane. That seems to be the first instinct when something like this happens. I ran after the plane as it started to thermal higher (and move down wind). On my run, John Dinitz from JR pulled up behind me in his vehicle and offered to drive and chase the BD. I hop in his SUV, and we drive down the roads at Voice of America Park. We get to a closed road and ask the security guy if we can go through as we were chasing a plane. He said we could not, so I thanked John for the lift and took off on foot. I chased the plane about another half mile, and finally stopped to at least get a line on it as it seemed to be descending. Then, of course right as soon as it descended it would climb again. I stopped and watched it for what seemed like forever. It eventually disappeared from sight in the sky. Probably at 500 to 1000 feet of altitude. It seemed odd to just turn back when I could still see it, but I knew that it was so far away and thermalling so nicely that it was unlikely I would be able to run it down on foot.

On the walk back to the field, John came around in his car again. He drove me back to the flight line. He said he took another route around that closed road after he dropped me off. He had driven about 2 or 3 miles after the plane. He eventually got to a point where it was low (and over a park). But then of course it re-cored the lift and went up and out of sight.

Even though I was not able to recover the plane, I really appreciated John’s help. He could have missed his flight assignment but he chose to help me chase after the plane anyway. John is a heck of a good guy, and JR has been supporting the OVSS series very well. I have been a JR customer since 1996 when I purchased my 783. I have bought gear from other manufacturers since (as well as a ton of JR servos and receivers. I’m particularly fond of the 610 for use in small HLGs and other small planes). JR has found another lifetime customer in that small act of camaraderie on Saturday.

My last image of that Bubble Dancer was it working the lift masterfully. As much as it hurts too loose a plane that took me 7 months to build (not to mention the gear including the good JR servos), I like to think it is still up there somewhere, still working thermals. My name, AMA number, and phone number were inside the canopy, so if anybody finds a red, white, and blue Bubble Dancer in Ohio, Indiana, or Kentucky some day, please give me a call. :)

Ryan

[Ed Franz]

I remember that flight well. It would come down to give you some hope, then core and go right back up. It was a shame to lose such a nice plane. It think your right, it is still up there somewhere thermalling along.

Ed

[arukum17]

Happened to me with my first real RC plane - Spirit 2m but in my case too height was not the issue - it was too far downwind... sickening feeling is the same though.. apartment complex... recovered after 2 months with crash damage to fuse.

Since then I never fly too far downwind; in windy conditions; and add a REWARD/name tag in the plane

[sawman]

Lost my 2 meter Fling for about 15 seconds the other day. Big booming thermal. Got that bad feeling :( . Put the sticks in the corners, waited for the flash then brought her back down to a more reasonable altitude.

[T Z]

Ryan,

That is an incredible story of Johnny rotten ! What a noble yet frustrating way to loose a plane - as it taunts you with it's own outstanding thermaling abilities saying, "I don't need YOU to sky out pal, but you can watch" ! :-) That is truly a knee slapper! It would frustrate the @$% out of me but wow, what a story ! Too bad it was a long build model. It couldn't have been an EZ star or something, right? Good story.

Tom

[williamson]

I have lost planes on several occasions. The first time, I was flying my Spirit in a gaggle of gliders circling in the same thermal. As you might guess, I began flying the wrong plane. It went down about a half mile away and I was able to find the plane with its nose inserted in several inches of mud in the front lawn of a house. There was little damage.

The second lost plane was my Dove which disappeared on a bright clear day. My name address and phone number were on the plane. I got a call about three months later from someone who was out walking his dog. With minor repairs, the Dove flew again.

The third lost plane was my Electra. It was a balmy clear summer evening and the plane was thermaling nicely with the motor off. The plane was becoming a small speck, but still larger than my usual panic point. Suddenly, the plane disappeared. It was then that I realized that the sun had gone below the horizon. I put the plane into a spiral, then loops and saw nothing. Despite having my contact information on the plane, I never saw it again.

The fourth plane was my Electra. The plane was high in a thermal when a strong wind came up. There was no way to get it back up wind. With a good compass bearing on where the plane went down, I combed the woods (after the leaves had fallen) out for about a mile and saw nothing. The following spring, I got a phone call from a fellow who lives about 1.25 miles from our field. The plane sat in the top of an oak tree in front of his house over the winter and finally blew down in the spring. My contact information was on the plane. Unfortunately, the plane was a total loss.

The fifth lost plane was my Majestic. Here again, I found myself flying the wrong plane high in a thermal. I got a brief glimpse of my plane just before it went down. A search in that direction revealed nothing. About months later, I got a phone call. Someone hiking through the woods found my plane. However, six months of wet weather in a swampy area had destroyed the plane.

I felt a little better when I observed another incident. Mark Drela was flying his original Bubble Dancer. It launched beautifully and began to circle nicely in a thermal when Mark suddenly shouted that he didn't have it. The receiver was off. We watched the plane circle nicely and drift downwind about a mile before the plane went down. Mark was able to find the plane.

Our club has invested in a Walston receiver and now many club members have purchased Walston transmitters for their planes. I have such a transmitter. Since using it in my planes, I haven't lost one. It may be like bringing along an umbrella to ward off the rain.