well we finally decided to paint out house.... and this involves stripping back the paint to bare wood and starting from scratch.... then came the small leak in the bathroom and we are now upgrading that too, then the wife decided to re-paint the toilet so of course I wanted the toilet replaced...... a job for a plumber? sure but I gave it a go installing it not the most pleasant job...

decided the weight is getting a little high again and with the christmas food and over eating its time to reduce the weight as im up to 100kg now.......... and 5 ft 7in so yes well over due..
At 43 years old it is a risky game to play this over indulging and it is time to stop..... we went out today and brought two new push bikes one for me and the wife and the other for the kids (they have all had bikes before but wrecked them) its really money well spent as even today they have spent quite a bit of time on the bike I even went for a ride to the petrol station to pump the tires up makes me realise how unfit I have become, I can go to work and GO HARD all day weather its digging a trench or terminating cables (over here Electricians do everything)

you wont understand the picture without the sound on loud WARNING not for young children however it is not anything bad see here it really frustrated me getting through to level 4 as it goes 3 DEE tell me how you get on?

Well recently I decided to buy a Lightining dart after looking at it for over a year I purchased one reading reviews and comments from other people

As a familly man I have just come off a new job (nice this time as I was not the supervisor) but all the same 14 hour days 7 days a week for 4 weeks.... no flying no building just head down rear up and concentrate on the job at hand I am so dam tired that its a good thing its finished and whats worse with christmas coming up the money is to go to bills not toys.....thats for next year!!! and to those who wonder... I am an Electrician working on oil feilds and such contracting

well had a little issue that needed sorting with my speedo on our toyota granvia, amazing people the japs very intricate and too big for my hands, pulled it apart and in the process one TINY wire onto the main coil broke...... more fidling trying to get further in to fix that hair like wire and then ping..... another broke so ended up with 3 hair size wires to resolder to their lugs,,,,, at 44 yo not a easy task out with the magnifying glass and iron got there in the end but never again!!! leave it to the experts next time

well a new model is on the way see here next week sometime but unfortunately wont be built for a few months

was quietly spooling it up to set up the 401 and was getting it to the point of being light on the skids and BAM one tail blade flew off, the set screw that holds it in place had snapped!!! I paid one of the kids $20 to try and find the lost CF blade which they were able to at about 25m away (no they were not there while I was testing) upon closer inspection it seems I had not over tightened it at all but its a design fault which is well documented across the internet see photos and further...Continue Reading

I have been working on a job recently and had a guy come up to me chatting about planes telling me his son has them as well.
Turned out his son died almost a year ago, came home from school went to his room and had a heart attack.
He asked me yesterday if I could finish a model plane for him that his son was building and of course I said yes to him.
Turned out the local model shop had it for about 3 months, lost a whole bunch of bits and never got round to it, in his words he was almost in tears when he retrieved it from the shop.
Today we talked about the fact his one year memorial is coming up soon and if I could fly it for him, I said yes to that too of course, but it got me thinking.
I have two controllers and with a sim may teach him to fly it just for the memorial with me on the buddy box in case he has any problems very sad but I have started it tonight

started up my Raptor Titan tonight on the front lawn, just to run the motor!!!! spooled up but kept it below 1000rpm and on the ground, A little concerned about how much the swash jumped around while spinning but it was quite windy and they are not digital as yet, have a Digital on the tail and MAN what a smooth powerfull servo I will replace the old servos once its in the air.

Two weeks ago I had a plane (Kadet senior) loose contact with my transmitter and it started doing VERY big circles of about 2-300 meters at full throttle, climbing the whole time.
My first reaction was a type of panic as we watched it to see what it would do, then settled into disbelif as we watched it go higher and higher.
It was at this point I said to the other guys I should follow it across the feilds which I did on foot until it dissapeared into the clouds and I could not hear it anymore.
It was estimated that it went out of sight at about 10,000ft so it was pack up and go home with me never seing it come down........a little disapointed as it had all the radio gear but the plane itself was quite old and just a "bash about" model.
About two weeks went by until I got a call from the Police in a little town called Waitara who told me they had it!!!

Damage to the plane was just the prop, front mount for the wing and squashed wheel brace
Over all I would estimate it traveled 12km from the feild to its landing point.
this was over the Waitara river and in a direct line over a Methanol plant which you can see in the photo on Mamaku rd
Im going to rebuild this plane as I really think she deserves a second chance dont you think?
CAUSE OF CRASH
Well last night I performed some tests on the whole setup to find out what went wrong (see following posts)

We live in a very temperate climate some minor frosts during winter and alot of rain due to the mountians.
Summer here is hot and sometimes a little muggy but not extreeme.
We are on the west coast of the North Island of New Zealand and live under the shadow of Mount Taranaki here

Ben (who has a cold here), Dannielle, Christina, Jessie

raptor 50 titan trying some maverik 620 mains in the next few weeks