Lake Flyer

My Feedback: (13)

Boy I thought I was the only cheapskate in this crowd. I am glad I have company. I strip everything off at home then take the wreck back to the field for a "Viking" funeral, preferably with a brewski in hand. And I lunge at abandoned shopping carts that still have the quarter in them

flyinham

I salvage some parts depending on what they are and other things considered too. I have even some in the trash barrel that just happened to have the right color of covering I needed for a patch. A lot of people today think this recycling thing is something fairly new, not, it has been around for a long long time.

invertmast

My Feedback: (23)

Depends on the energy level of the crash.

If it was a high energy crash, then the only thing i keep is the stuff of value. $5 bag of clevis' or hardware isnt worth the cost of a new model, even if its $200 worth of hardware.

If its a low energy crash, i'll keep all of the valuables and metal hardware, anything plastic or nylon gets thrown in the trash no matter what.

marmalade1

I used to save clevis parts and wires, but every kit/arf comes with new ones. So I just make sure I have some spare and discard the rest. Servos must be faultless. My rxs are cheap, so if damaged or possibly culpable... trash. Batteries gently cycled after post crash voltage test. Dented Life cells get trashed as they are only $5 new and I don't want to risk a crash for $5.
I tend to strip the plane at the field. It's easier to get in the car that way!

PD

Scott Douglas

Ha ha.. doesn't make you a bad person! Where from?

I tend to save anything metal that has no obvious damage.. plastics etc I get rid of. It also depends on what happened to the model.. if it was "dumb thumbs" then I'll check the electronics as best as I can and usually put them in an old model first but if I can't explain what happened I ditch the lot.

Fish07

LOL,Me to ,best comment in YEAR'S ,LOL!!!

skoda450

I agree that the most important part recovered from crash is the reason the crash occurred. Careful crime scene investigation and forensics usually will reveal the cause. Nothing found? Hum.... Dumb thumbs again. Oh well, use THEM again for sure but educate them.

tazzzz

I have a 2005,2006,2007,2008,2009,2010,2011,2012,2013,2015 (in 2014,,had the flu) The darn thing runs fantastic!!!!!! TAZZZZ

cloudancer03

My Feedback: (22)

Kind of a redundant question but yeah I can Nabil are whatever it was I crashed and save lots of parteventually i whitle it down either giving to another person such as wheels horns etc.if it's spare wings a owls and canopies and I don't intend to assemble another one if a good friend has the plane I give the spare parts to him or I sell it on rc groups for a nominal charge or I reuse it as I do build.airplane parts sadly don't come cheap.if it says for r the price immediately makes the parts expensive.so I buy screws paints whatever at local hardware stores.after 36 years I seem to have quite an inventory

[email protected]

My Feedback: (1)

it must be nice to throw away a wrecked plane i save all i can never had any trouble>> and i do like to repair >but now iam 83 this month so i have to watch my money

PatrickCurry

My Feedback: (20)

HaHA! Maybe it's the Scotsman in me! I too pick up pennies on the ground. My parents were born in the 20's and came up through the Depression. It's hard to bring myself to throw away anything that I can see a use for down the road. I'm a firm believer in that that old WWII adage of "Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without". Of course, if something's damaged or "suspect" I'll toss it.

JollyPopper

My Feedback: (6)

I save and reuse. With most of the stuff, it is readily apparent whether or not it has been damaged. Receivers and batteries present more of a problem, but I will use them in foamies or cheapies until they prove themselves one way or the other, then put them away for use later if proved good. Servos are usually pretty straight forward. About 95% of the time, the thing that goes bad in a crashed servo is the gears, and that can be determined quickly. The nearest hobby shop to me is about 75 miles each way and having spare parts from crashes readily available saves much time and money. I see no shame in using parts out of crashed planes.

R. C. Day

My Feedback: (7)

If it is still serviceable, it gets recycled into another flying machine.
I pick up pennies too, frugal to the bone.

R.C.

rccrazedman

My Feedback: (10)

Well it seems like more often then not you will likely find airplanes at your field that has used hardware and it doesn't cause problems. Not saying anything bad about $2500 into a plane, but that is not my taste. Sorry I just would never sink that much money into one plane. I know that its easy to very quickly sink a ton of money into a jet, but I have not the slightest interest of flying one. But if I ever had that kind of money in one plane you better bet your butt that I would not have nylon hardware on the sucker in the first place. I would use the metal clevis's with clip locks and sturdier horns like dubro bolts that mount through you control surfaces, high torque servos, improved servo arms, and control linkages with metal clevis's on both ends. And if I wrecked I would probably still keep all metal parts that did not get damaged. I have plenty of planes with reused blind nuts engine mount bolts and never had issues in that respect. control rods i tend to barely reuse anyway.

rccrazedman

My Feedback: (10)

r.c day frugal yes. I'll even try to find a good deal on used engines at an upcoming swap meet if I can wait long enough for the next one. fly them in crap planes till i know if they are good before buying a new one.

Gray Beard

My Feedback: (-1)

I save everything. Clean it all and inspect it. A lot depends on the why of the crash too and what the plane did before the crash. I set up and test all the electronics after inspection. I don't crash a plane often because of dumb thumbs but I have had engine flame outs during stunts and stalled, forgot to pull out the antenna. Usually something simple and not a failure but a hard crash can do a lot of damage to electronics so I do a lot of inspecting and testing and don't use these items in a new high dollar plane. I use them for smaller planes I'm not in love with.

Gray Beard

My Feedback: (-1)

Speaking of saving things and reusing them I have control rods saved with some sort of screw on clevis on one end and a solder clevis on the other. I just used one that had a ball swivel and removed the solder clevis, cut the rod to size and soldered the old clevis back on. Perfect fit.

Jennifer Curtis

I never do this. There is a lot to be learned from
the wreckage. I spend a lot of time looking at
what broke and what didn't, getting ideas about
what parts should be improved on my next build.
Some parts may be overbuilt and unnecessarily
heavy. Some may need reinforcement. Sometimes
a part I reinforced caused a worse break somewhere
else.

Several times after a really bad crash, what looked
like total destruction at the site, looked more
repairable at home after a good long inspection.

The planes that I have totalled, I just put them
on a shelf and salvage parts when I need them.
So far the only parts I have not been able to
successfully salvage are hinges. They just
get destroyed trying to extract them.

Has anyone else salvaged covering? I
have used monokote pieces cut from wing
bays as patches. I started doing this when
I found the new formula monokote doesn't
stick as well when used for patches,

Jenny

Gray Beard

My Feedback: (-1)

Jenny, you have a lot more room then I do. I get the plane home then pull everything I can use then it goes into the can. I have never saved any covering and don't recall ever saving a hinge. Even when I had a big shop I never saved the rubble. If it's a favorite I may save the stab and tack it to the shop wall. I have only taken apart one crashed plane at the field, all others come home to be stripped.

rccrazedman

My Feedback: (10)

Jenny

I never really salvaged any monokote or have I ever tried to retrieve a hinge. The way I see it when it comes to hinges is that they are usually ca type hinges so when you have already installed ca and if by chance you get it out I think it would not reglue. Probably even the same thing holds true for the nylon type with the pin in the middle.

Gray Beard

As far as the rubble goes I initially collect it for 1, to keep our field clean as we don't have a trash bin at our field. and 2, i can take it home remove all hardware trash the trash hardware and after evaluating the plane I then decide if I want to try rebuilding and if I don't I will trash all the rubble with the rest of the trashed hardware. and if so I use it to lay out the parts on the bench the best i can to aid in the rebuild.

Jennifer Curtis

I do have a good space, but it isn't filled with crashed planes.
I am a slow builder, so it takes a really bad crash to make
a repair that takes longer than a new build.

Jenny

red head

Jenny : The next time you want to use a patch of monocote that you salvaged, try spraying the glue side with cheap hair spray (Aquanet ) ( spellings wrong but you get the picture . If I'm recovering something I spray it first , gives a better hold factor . ENJOY !!! RED

Gray Beard

My Feedback: (-1)

As for picking up all the pieces of wood that's a given. I have had a big trash bag in my van for years in case of need. Last weekend the fellow I was flying with planted his plane really hard and was out picking up the rubble. I went to get him a bag and they were gone. Gave them to other pilots. This thread reminded me of that so I will go out now and stuff a couple in the back seat slots.
Jenny, I moved from a 1000 sq. ft. shop to an 11X11 shop so there isn't any room to spare. I hate repairing so much I would rather build a new plane then fix one. I enjoy building and when I'm into a build I'm fast. I just haven't been that into it in a while. I have a summer build in the works but now I have a part time job and it kills my days.

PatrickCurry

My Feedback: (20)

I think that's a super idea! You always need a small piece for a hole somewhere and I hate having to buy a whole roll just to get a patch. Do you put something over the back to preserve the glue like the stuff you peel off, do you just throw it in a drawer or what?

Jennifer Curtis

I keep the wreckage intact. No peeling until I need it.
It still fits in a smaller box than a working plane would.

Jenny