Originally Posted by Jb Stearman

HELI-MECH

It's great to see your cub on her feet again!
Well, I had MY turn in the" O S---" ! barrel. My cub refused to come out of that proverbial spin and ended up in the pond on the other side of the field with the wingtip about three from the bank. Somehow it was upright and almost flat with the nose about half submerged. The prop was a four inch stub, the cowl was destroyed, the door post was broken and there was a slight bend in the wing tube. No damage to the wings or rest of the fuselage, tail or landing gear. There wasn't even any torn covering and my windshield was still in perfectly good shape !!
In my shop, I pulled the engine, removed the carb, plug and muffler, cleaned them and saturated the engine with WD-40 until it ran out clear Used the heat gun to help dry out the nose. Ordered another cowl and wing tube. Recut and painted the cowl. Everything went back together fine. I also changed out the RX and ignition switches. Ran the engine to make sure it was OK.
Now for the good part. Why did it not recover ? I have done the maneuver with this plane before and the recovery was prompt. Maybe this time all the flight attitudes and speed were
just right to induce a no recovery scenario. The only other thing possible was that the left elevator servo went "south" on me for some unknown reason. The servo for that side was locked in the elevator up position. I use only Hitec HS 645 servos for all my flight controls. However when I built the cub I did notice that the left elevator would droop after sitting for a while. So I went back to the beginning of this forum and started reading. Seems others have had problems with spin recovery. The subject of washout entered the picture. Several methods were discussed and all made sense. For me, the simplest solution was posted by LIFER in post # 577. And that was to reflex the ailerons up 3/32" from natural. I reset my ailerons to these specs and went flying. With two mistakes high I came back on power and eased back on elevator. It stalled straight with no tendency to fall off on either wing. Spins are a no pucker factor event and with a little power, she just mushed along with no signs of a stall or spin. My cub now is even more of a joy to fly.
I guess my bottom line is that there will always be a learning factor. Thanks again for a great forum.