carl24bpool

Just reporting back on my frst self teaching outing.

I took my new Ripmax 40 Trainer to some nearby sands where it is safe to fly. It is about 5 miles across the sand and I used a fail safe to cut throttle just incase of any problems.

I have never flown before but am a very competent computer game player, especially good at flight simulators, and games requiring steadt controls, so stupidly assumed I would be a natural.

It was a cloudy day with say a 5mph breeze. I carried out all my checks and fired her up. Pointed her into the wind and throttled up. It only needed about 40 feet until is was gagging to leave the ground, and also trying to pull to one side. A bit of rudder and up elevator and she was away. The pulling to the side seemed to stop after it left the ground (not sure why). I climbed steadily and began to make clockwise laps, whilst trying to feed in some slight correctional trim. Even with exponential set up it seemed very eratic for the first few laps.

All this time I was mentally preparing for the dreaded first landing. I read all I could on this forum about landing and how you should test the stall speed high up first. I never went slow enough to stall, but slowed the plane enough for me to be confident at landing at that speed.

Well I lined the plane up into the wind, about 250 yards down wind of me and slowly eased off the throttle allowing the plane to decend slowly, but not slow enough to stall (or what I thought wasn't slow enough to stall). When the plane was about 10 feet up I really eased off the throttle and slowly applied up elevator to prepare to flare. Had to level the wings a couple of times, but seemed to be coming in okay until I pulled up to flair at about 6 feet, which I now know was too high as the plane did start coming down for landing and then nose dived at the last minute and flipped. I bust my propellor and got wet sand all over the engine and fuse. Only other damage was slight bend to front wheel strut.

Not bad I thought for my first flight. I would of flown again but had no spare prop. I will be trying my luck again this weekend. If I can get a mate to come I'll do a littel video of my erattic flying.

Still chuffed, and releived to still have some plane left.

DragonHeart

Surly thier must be a flying club near u ??? the whole aspect of this hobby to me is about the club feel..... you can get unlimited helpfull advice from clubs and much much more........ and all for free you just have to ask......... I think if u want to stay in this hobby JOIN a club and grab the benefits, like INSURANCE !!!!! and someone who will teach you how to fly....... i think youve just been lucky to get away with it this time, next time who knows...........

This is a great hobby and wish you the best in it....... but think twice and go somewhere safe and learn to fly properly and not just cross your fingers and wish for the best.........

http://www.flyingsites.co.uk/ lists most of the clubs in the uk, hope thats of some help........

raideron

My Feedback: (1)

Yeah it has and will be done.. Self teaching... Be Safe, these things
can cause a bit of damage/ hurt someone...
Yeah, you have to flare just before touch down to bleed off the
remaining speed of to plane... It may have been good you did not
have a another prop..... unless you completely insured "all" sand was
not in the engine and cleaned off/out really good... Them little things
sure can cause a lot of damage...

Montague

Not a bad first flight, unassisted, actually. Congrats.

And, now you know what a stall is. That unexpected nose-down on landing was a stall.

Be very careful to get all the sand out of the engine. Obviously sand in the engine will chew it up badly.

I *thought* that the UK actually had some pretty strigent rules about flying qualifications and tests and stuff. You should probibly at least check in to a local club to make sure you aren't doing something that could get you in trouble.

bubbagates

My Feedback: (32)

sounds like you thought the process through fairly well. Be careful about the wet sand in and around the engine. Sand and metal moving parts are not a good mix.

What it sounds like happened is you were a little to high for the flair. The flair should happen within the last 6 inches and you only need a tiny bit of up elevator. I would pratice the approaches up high going through all the motions then do the landing again. Also while you are up high, cut the throttle completely and just keep giving it up elevator until it stalls, that way you will know how slow you can go before the stall comes and you will also learn how it stalls (drops the nose or wingtip) If it just drops the nose then a little power will save it, if it drops a wingtip then power and opposite aileron is required

Otherwise good job..have your knees stopped shaking yet??

britbrat

Sounds like a remarkably good first/solo flight. Amazing! You want to hold your descent rate steady all the way down to about 1 foot above ground, then GENTLY flare and try to just hold it off the ground by feeding in back pressure on the stick as needed -- eventually it will settle onto the ground.

carl24bpool

Hi all,

I appreciate the "join a club" advice, but unfortunately I just don't have the time to give a club. I also play a lot of sports like golf and snooker. Flying is just gonna be a once every month or two thing for me. Maybe a bit more frequent in the Summer.

The thing is me and my friends (me being the only one into planes at the moment) use my local sands for things other then model planes in the same day. Two of my friends have nitro cars, and we also take off road motorbikes and power kites with us. By the list you can probably tell that we like a variety of activities. Us youths of today seem to get bored of doing the same thing for too long.
I'm sure most flying clubs will not allow nitro cars, motoX, of kites, so kinda rules them out.

There used to be a club just down the road, but I think it has closed. I may go and see if I can at least get some lessons.

As for the legal side, I 'm not sure. I do know that my brothers friends step dad (you get that lol) had an IC plane fly onto the back of his head whilst he was in his back garden. The result was about 50 stitches and a sore head, but he never go any compensation. For you in the USA i know that you could probably of sued just for him coming into your airspace over the back garden, but here in the UK its not that bad YET. However I would still of expected some kind of punishment for the pilot. Maybe this pilot was just a lucky man.

I do not therefore think its okay to fly into peoples heads, and I fly my plane in at least as safe an environment as at a club. On the sands there is no property of people within about a 2 mile radius, which is about 1.5 miles better than my nearest flying club. Obviously insurance is a factor, but thats a risk I'll have to take for the time being.

FLYBOY

My Feedback: (11)

Wanted to stress this fact too! Make real sure you have the sand out of it!!!!!! A few grains of sand in the carb and the engine will be toast fairly quickly. Clean it good! Sounds like you did pretty well other than the landing. Keep the rubber side down! [8D]

carl24bpool

Thanks for reminder about sand, but I have already thoroughly rinsed all engine parts, including the carb and muffler with some old fuel I had lying about.

FLYBOY

My Feedback: (11)

alcohol works well too, just make sure and lube it up good again with oil. I use marvel mystery oil, tool oil works great too.

RCVFR

My Feedback: (7)

It appears you learned a great deal in that first flight. Congratulations and good luck on the next flight(s).

flyerdarren

a nice trick with your landings, is to use the throttle to control your decent, and the pitch to control your speed. Once your down to about a foot or less off the ground, pull back a little, wait, pull back some more , wait etc. The point is to time it so that your wings are at or just above stall speed when the mains hit the ground. Good luck and keep practicing.

samolot

My Feedback: (14)

I havent yet read all the posts, but when i read about the club-feel, i must say that guy was right. Going to an airfield to fly amongst buddies wiith planes of their own is soooo cool. Talking to people who know what your talking about makes coming to the field a pleasurable experience. Too bad you dont live in the states. here there is poop load of clubs around every state.

twistr

My Feedback: (4)

ROFLOL! Do you have a copywrite on that! I have to use it!! [sm=bananahead.gif]

Spanky1

Great job! You are now on your way. You have done what most never could. Keep breaking props until you feel it in your wallet. Like I did, then, you will force yourself to land easier. As with everything else, doing it on your own forces you to learn YOUR style. Not someone elses.

Great job and congrats. Keep flying.

Tip: Don't EVER forget that you did it once (flew on your own) you can do it again.
Spanky

jcflysrc

My Feedback: (50)

Uh huh...and just remember...if you crashed once, you can do it again.

I wish you luck...but what you really need is a good instructor. You WERE lucky. If you continue to pursue it on your own, you WILL undoubtably lose one or more planes. Considering the expense AND the trauma inflicted to your confidence level after such an event, you might actually stay in the hobby with the help of a good instructor. Just my opinion.

Good luck at any rate...and YES, some video of your erratic flying would be interesting.

Jim C

rcuser004

My Feedback: (287)

It is possible to learn to fly on your own but there is a long standing joke about doing so: "the average first flight of a novice (alone) is about six seconds!" Trying to do this without an instructor will make you a proficient builder (misc repairs) but won't do much for flying. If you are persistent enough on your own, you will be able to take off, fly and land consistently. However, there is much more to learning proper flying skills than just bringing your plane back to the ground without crashing.

Regards,