Hi Steve, Bummer, I know that feeling quite well. Now it is truly maiden'ed so it will live out the rest of if flying career without incidents. Glad to hear that the damage was not too bad.


Best Regards,

Wylie Shaw

GDBot: I don't know where you are in the build process, but here's a couple of docs I have for adding carbon to the spars:

Dang Steve, I hate to hear about your puckering experience. Them low altitude pop-offs and breaks are tough to control. Once I popped at about 20' up in a 25mph wind and it blew my plane down the field like a tumble weed.

At least it's not so bad and I'm glad to hear about the durability of this monster...very impressive. Do you have a pic of the break area on the fuse?

Sorry to hear that Steve. Like Don, I would like to see a pic of the break and damage.
It does sound like a strong bird to survive the disaster. I certainly hope so with the way I fly!
Glad to hear that you can repair it cleanly and not have to use a big gob of fiberglass to hold it all together!
Gerald

Every sport has its ups and downs, highs and lows, but in our case its literal!
Who knows, it might even fly better after these minor repairs..
The Oly thanks you for your words and concern .

Ahhh, Steve, I have never had a sailplane yet that didn't fly better after a few repairs. Oh yeah, and the brewskis help a lot with the healing process.

Rassen frassen mutha puss bucket! Really, not so bad Steve, you'll get her all fixed up and she'll be good as new. Shoot, I've had worse than that on my lip and I can still whistle .

LMAO . Steve, I just realized that the last pic is a burning tree...your Oly tree...that is too funny

I have used the syringe/water/iron trick for dents in balsa and it works great.

No wukkas, carton er #iss will fix er mate.

Yep, you blokes are right, she's scrubbing up like new it might be ready for the air again by Sunday If I can manage it.

As far as rc aeromodelling carnage goes, this one weren't even a 0.001 on the Richter scale compared to something like this poor fellow from our club field earlier in the year;

Crazy German Pilot 2 (1 min 14 sec)

Originally Posted by dwells

I have used the syringe/water/iron trick for dents in balsa and it works great.

I've read about that treatment, but have never tried it. I suppose a fine grade of syringe is needed, it could be a problem item to get from the local pharmacy or chemist shop, but i will ask. Thanks for that tip Don.

Yeah they're tough to get hold of here n the States for sure. You have to have an insulin card to buy them. I ask to buy some, no card of course, and the pharmacist treated me like a junky. I don't know why, I told him I was main-lining my sailplane . I have friends in the medical biz and they got me a few .

LOL! Main-lining a sailplane with.... performance enhancing drugs...? Asks the pharmacist? PSML. No, it gets high enough as it is thankyou Mr chemist, just h2o will do thanks, I need the ballast
Yes its hard enough to get the syringe over a counter here too, let alone a needle to match. But If you ask nice and are genuine and don't look messed up they usually give you one, though its been awhile since I asked.

Edit; I have the repairs mostly finished, and luckily while I had the film and iron out this afternoon the new digital flap servos and other bits and pieces arrived in the mail. I'm making the most of my holidays, and not sleeping much either. The poor jet that crashed in that pic and vid, was replaced pronto as an expendable item.

The needles tend to be rather coarse, but you can get a variety of syringe and needle sizes at places like Tractor Supply Company. They're for veterinary purposes, but work OK for us. You can also get similar ones from some of the composite materials suppliers, for repairing bubbles and delams in fiberglass parts.

No worries Steve. I'll DHL you a couple syringes. I'll throw in a little baggy of microballoons also .

The poor jet that crashed in that pic and vid, was replaced pronto as an expendable item.

Do you mean that Mr. Megabucks already has another?