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UPDATE Hate it when the expiration date matches the mai... - 10/17/2006 1:48:10 AM   
Mr67Stang



Posts: 2339
Joined: 4/26/2006
From: Raeford, NC, USA
Status: offline 		I have spent the last 2 months bugging my buddy to come out to the feild and start flying with me. Well he finally picked up a H9 Alpha 40 RTF put it together per the manual and met me at the feild. I looked over his plane and helpped him with some ground tech and passed him to a more experienced pilot to help him with the initial trim flight. Our expert took the plane up and was having a hard time trimming the plane out... seemed to be constantly changing. Then the plane took a hard left and dove to Tera Firma. Well the 2 minute flight was followed by a 20 minute search in the bean field to find that the wing halves were seperated. The wing halves of this plane have a 3/4 in wide piece of tape (like packing tape) and 2 aluminum tubes joining them... That's all. The ailerons were constantly changing as the wing halves worked themselves apart changing the linkage geometry. (This of course is speculation). I am in no way saying there was no error on our part here because common sense would dictate that you epoxy wing halves together. I just hope my buddy is not to discuraged and gives it another go. Has anyone else seen this happen? or have experience with this plane and what did you think about the packing tape?



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< Message edited by Mr67Stang -- 11/6/2006 12:56:37 AM >

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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 1:58:53 AM   
Kmot



Posts: 7820
Joined: 6/11/2003
From: Northridge, CA, USA
Status: offline
quote:

Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden..


That's gotta be one of the best "one liners" I have heard.

Sorry about your buddies plane!

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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 2:33:06 AM   
dioncuda



Posts: 323
Joined: 7/20/2002
From: morgantown, KY, USA
Status: offline 		Yes it has.My friend had it to happen.
It had a few flights on it.You can see in the pic the wings came apart.
Dont let him give up.

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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 2:42:45 AM   
rrragmanliam


 

Posts: 1006
Joined: 10/20/2003
From: Arvada, CO, USA
Status: offline 		Hi 67,

Sounds like a poor design to me. 3/4 of an inch isn't much tape, 2" packingtape would be better. But I cant even believe the mfg signed off on taping the wings together. It's only going to be a few flights before oil starts working it's way under the tape and starts causing problems. The wing should be glued and the seam glassed. What really gets me though is how was your buddy to know it was a poor design? The MFG is at fault here and completly failed your friend.

Darren

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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 2:59:35 AM   
Mr67Stang



Posts: 2339
Joined: 4/26/2006
From: Raeford, NC, USA
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: rrragmanliam

Hi 67,

Sounds like a poor design to me. 3/4 of an inch isn't much tape, 2" packingtape would be better. But I cant even believe the mfg signed off on taping the wings together. It's only going to be a few flights before oil starts working it's way under the tape and starts causing problems. The wing should be glued and the seam glassed. What really gets me though is how was your buddy to know it was a poor design? The MFG is at fault here and completly failed your friend.

Darren


This is the route we are trying to take here. He is contacting H9 to see if they will replace it. As this is what was sudjested by my clubs senior members. If they fail to back the product I doubt my friend will by another H9 plane even though most are pretty good. I think I have him talked into getting a Tower trainer ARF to put his parts into if H9 will not replace the loss.

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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 3:06:53 AM   
aussiesteve


 

Posts: 1097
Joined: 10/12/2005
From: TEDA (Tianjin)Tianjin, CHINA
Status: online 		I seem to remember our Alpha came with a small tube of red stuff - a bit like loctite. It worked extremely well on the wing joint but it wasn't mentioned in the instructions to use it - our LHS man told us about it.

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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 3:08:49 AM   
Mr67Stang



Posts: 2339
Joined: 4/26/2006
From: Raeford, NC, USA
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: aussiesteve

I seem to remember our Alpha came with a small tube of red stuff - a bit like loctite. It worked extremely well on the wing joint but it wasn't mentioned in the instructions to use it - our LHS man told us about it.


Thanks, I will ask my buddy about that.

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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 3:16:28 AM   
Mr67Stang



Posts: 2339
Joined: 4/26/2006
From: Raeford, NC, USA
Status: offline 		Decided to look online for the insrtruction manual for this plane. Take a look at the short directions provided for joining the wing halves.

http://www.hangar-9.com/ProdInfo/Files/han2475-manual.pdf



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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 3:50:26 AM   
skiman762



Posts: 1166
Joined: 12/1/2005
From: Nashville, NC, USA
Status: offline 		I had the alpha and arrow never had any trouble with the wing taped
in fact it was so strong the the arrow had a midair the cut half of one wing off and even after hitting the ground wide open the wind joint was fine


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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 9:49:38 AM   
icegs


 

Posts: 18
Joined: 9/26/2006
From: Abbotsford, BC, CANADA
Status: offline 		I have one of these too. It's my first plane, so I just put it together how the instructions said. I used the tape, and was surprised how strong the joint was.

After two or three flights, I was giving the plane a quick check, and found problems starting. The tape at the leading edge was starting to split right at the joint. If you held each wing half, you could easily move them around a little. I epoxied and glassed the joint before I tried flying it again.

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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 1:30:00 PM   
weeber24


 

Posts: 73
Joined: 4/24/2006
From: Atlanta, GA, USA
Status: offline 		Ouch sorry about the loss. Hopefully your friend will jump right back in the saddle. I have to say I'm somewhat surprised about the wings separating in flight. I started with my Alpha 40 RTF back in April and flew for several months with the wings just taped together. Glow fuel eventually got to the tape, and I epoxied the wing halves together.

Out of curiousity, how many rubber bands did you use to connect the wings to the fuse? I usually did four (two per side) front to back and then four more (two per side) going front-left to back-right and vice versa. I wonder if this would help keep the wing halves together as well?

From the sounds of it, H9 should replace the plane since it was built per their instructions and an experienced guy was at the controls. Hopefully they'll do your friend right.

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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 1:45:16 PM   
Sir_Sparksalot


 

Posts: 15
Joined: 2/26/2003
From: Bloomington, IN, USA
Status: offline 		I had a Hobbico Trainer do the same thing mid-flight. With mine though the wing half totaly seperated and the plane came down in a half-wing spiral of death. Six inches deep I found the engine broken off and buried. Enough with the balsa for a first plane. Have you ever seen the www.spadtothebone.com web site and the links to the FREE plans. It may take a bit of searching here and the related site www.spadworld.net .
I went here and have built a number of the planes. My first SPAD plane was truely crash tested. I ran into trees, hay bales, the ground, you name it. Through all of it, most of the time all I had to do was clean of debris and change the rubber bands. I built a Debonair for the club as a club trainer. One day while flying I failed to use strong enough rubber bands. The wing came off mid flight and floated to the ground. The fuse came down at a bit of a faster rate, as you can guess. Within about two hours of readjusting and replacing the engine mount and CAing a small fuse crack, it was ready to fly again.
The best thing is that the parts came to a total of under fifty bucks. And for that amount two planes can be built. You have to have your own radio gear and engine, but I am going to guess that these can still be used from you untimely expiration date.

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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 2:20:35 PM   
CGRetired



Posts: 4270
Joined: 9/14/2004
From: Galloway, NJ, USA
Status: offline 		That's interesting that they rely on tape like that. I had the NexSTAR trainer, RTF. It had a steel spar and a plastic gizmo that the wing halves slid into and, I believe, four screws to hold the two wing halves into the plastic gizmo. The gizmo was a cup like device that each half slid into. It was very strong, well, strong enough to put up with the abuse I gave it while learning to fly. I sold the plane to an elderly gent who still fly's it. I solo'ed four years ago.

Easy for us to hind-sight for you, but to be truthful, I probably would have followed directions and used the tape, without knowing any better. Now, of course, we all can say it would have been better to epoxy the two halves together and glassed the joint.. but as I said, beginners don't know these tricks. Tough way to learn, though. I hope he gets a new model and continues to fly. It's worth the time and often the heartaches to learn to fly RC.

H9 should really consider working with you and replacing this.

DS.

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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 2:43:28 PM   
GerKonig


 

Posts: 191
Joined: 3/5/2005
From: Levittown, PA, USA
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: CGRetired

That's interesting that they rely on tape like that. I had the NexSTAR trainer, RTF. It had a steel spar and a plastic gizmo that the wing halves slid into and, I believe, four screws to hold the two wing halves into the plastic gizmo. The gizmo was a cup like device that each half slid into. It was very strong, well, strong enough to put up with the abuse I gave it while learning to fly. I sold the plane to an elderly gent who still fly's it. I solo'ed four years ago.

DS.


I Had a H9 trainer (.40 size) previous to the Alpha, where the wing was in 2 pieces w/a steel-rod joiner. On the bottom of the wing you installed 2 small screws (smaller than a servo screw) and you ruberbanded the 2 wings together using a miniscule rubberband around the screw heads. This was only to keep the wing together while moving the wing around. When you installed the wing on the plane at the filed, you attached the wing with 4 rubberbands per side, and the pressure of the rubberbands against the wing, kept it in place. We tried pulling from both wingtips, but the friction of the 8 rubberbands allowed no movement. I flew the plane for many years (instructing others) until I sold the thing earlier this year (replaced by an electric 70" Telemaster).

I hope you get the plane replaced by H9:-) IF you had 4 rubberbands per side I cannot explain the separation, after all this thing does not roll like an Extra 300...

Gerry



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RE: Hate it when the expiration date matches the maiden.. - 10/17/2006 2:53:14 PM