How far did he have to go to find a tree? I don't see any in the picture!

There's some trees on final... they're not close... but they're not far... they're around 500' from the threshold. It was getting dark... and Chris had left his sun glasses on from flying earlier in the day... so to him it was really dark. He thought he had passed the trees so he started dropping the plane in... then a frog hair too late he realized he was actually behind the trees.

I guess that was one expensive flight for him!!

I will wear a black armband tomorrow...........

( should have sold it to me )

You guys are confusing....

It was an expensive day. Startted building new H9 Cap last night. Should be back in the air this week end. Luckly no damage to on board gear. Thanks for the uology Joe. If I had know you would anounce to the world the crash I would have come up with a more elegant story. Simple fact is it dosn't take but a few secounds of being stupid to cost you alot of money in this hobby. We must all be nuts......

LOL !! Glad I'm not the only one to screw up like that.... a couple of weeks ago I found that it was getting a bit too dark to see the Bobcat clearly when it was low and to the north of the field, so I called it a day.

It was only after I'd taken the aircraft apart and put the three tons of support equipment away that I took my sunglasses off.... and realized that there was still TONS of daylight flying time left ! A few choice Scottish words were uttered at that point.

Sorry to hear about the Cap. Hey Joe - until his next Cap is ready, maybe you should sell Chris that excellent work of art "thing" that you dragged out to the field on Sunday... ? ;-)

Gordon

Sorry about the Cap...I was flying at an unfamiliar site last week...just a TT Profile mind you, the whole setup costs less than your engine...
Anyway, there I was making my base turn over the trees...spotter at my side. Watching the for the shadow. Watching, watching, watching...must've missed it ? I made the turn to final and my spotter gives the clear signal ("I think you're clear...")
CRACK! The profile smacks the top of an alder tree, creating the biggest pollen explosion I'd ever seen...There were no leaves on the tree, just new springtime buds and plenty of yellow/green pollen. The profile busted through the skinny limbs and came out the other side still flying...I continued my approach and landed the plane...no damage, just covered in pollen, I wish I had had a camera with me. Classic. (and very lucky....I would have needed a chainsaw to get it down.)
TM

Undeniably... and with these great plane deals I've been making lately... I'm well on my way to the cuckoo's nest. Gary (the guy who bought and sold his Edge and my CAP over a couple of weeks time losing around $3000 in the process) is definitely on his way, as well.

Between buying lovely "planes"
(cough***Edge 540***cough cough!), crashing a cool cap
, and your throttle stick,
I bet you are not so happy with the last couple of weeks!

The expression "fit to be tied" comes to mind.

Don't worry, be happy!
I remember when I my firs "serious" crash. I was trying to land too hard, and was goofing up. I was about to stall, so I nailes to full and pulled back. It was alright as I had a 60 pulling it along, so I knew it wouldn't stall. My trainer though, took over, and by now, it looped over, and crashed at full. The fiberglass fuse split, and was not a pretty site. After that, I have to admitt to crying, (I was 12 :cry: ) I thought I would never get it fixed and was really sad. I went on to fix it, crash it, fix it, fly it, and pull it out of service. Its a real site now, with epoxy all over the place. I might post pictures someday.
And today, my beautifull YS engine wouldn't b***** start, and I was really pissed!
But, its not as bad as it seems, I hope!

It seems crashing good "ol' friends" is the new hobby at our field now...... While my friend wasn't very expensive like the big CAP, loosing is driving me just as nuts.

Well... you see... the plane Wayne has fond memories of was built by me for Ted... who had me fly it for him for three flights and then put it in his garage for three months. Then I bought it from Ted, and Gary bought it from me, and Chris bought it from Gary, and I stole it from Chris. Does that clear things up?

ROFLMAO, Joe, the deck came up and hit you right, you must have some good excuse.
Reading about you guys really makes me want to come up and fly with you one weekend. Is it worth a 7 hour drive each way to fly with you guys? Or maybe I can do it in 4-5 hours from Pasadena, what'll you say.
DKjens

Okay guys... here's where the fun starts.. hopefully this link works. It'll show how far those "nasty" trees are. They look a little more dense from the ground though!

Michael
Cut and paste the following link into a text editor and then try the url.. delete the line breaks. I can't get it to embed in this message without a line break at each line.

"http://www.mapquest.com/maps/map.adp?mapdata=xU4YXdELrnC80z6PVgqChMoHgO68jo3aFN dPu2CVwVS2QRzTsj%2bTJ9ssZ6%2bkpgM3Gtqt2nxjDHdt7j3h YUz1CTG3PyO2uoDvJIV81X0y8JdSu5HrDa8eaoSTGAQKCykakp oPmsXSdz5HP1PnzyBEJisPQYC3vGqpJpWWfsDTHG5BOO%2bn3T ouiV4Jw0bR0vEwQ18DKZJQYY9Lb0%2bDSMkG48LAQySnPUTl4e sr%2f1DYmhDcODiBfPDKajRWStl5cw92dgLU1Y6MRz3tqoRIng VtQAig1TCvHcT47VcTd5ahPl8WBoewNmvicAFCrCOzaUkluwoJ 9KQZCveoKvq99pyNH6w6kVbI3NSxNMp6A8pc7yKeFvekubQ6s3 wUqm5f6l3m"

Okay, here's the darn image. I've got the link, so proper credit was given (hopefully).

After all that cuttin and pastin it still didn't work.....

What size edge was it??

I finally inserted the photo. I tried cutting and pasting and found that the first line still had a space in it between the "maps/map.adp? mapdata=xU4YX". Should have read
"maps/map.adp?mapdata=xU4YX"


Now, you tell me how far those trees are away. The runway is ~520' long.

Michael

LOL...wow...you guys go on a long final huh.....

i should come out and see you guys fly, i got to san jose almost every week or did to play ice hockey. i did happen to see 2 r/c flying fields. one was more by tracy and the other one was off the freeway to the left and was nice looking