Man, so sorry to hear about these loses. I feel for you guys whole heartedly.
Woody, have you decided to stay with 2.4? I think that all of us are so excited about the ability to no longer have to worry about frequency control that we have all kind of ignored these incidents hoping they won't happen to us. Even though I personally have never had any of these issues, will I be the next one who makes a post like this?
I heard that the European 2.4 systems are different than ours? Is this true? More still needs to be known about how JR handles power loads on 2.4. It seems that the systems are extremely sensistive to power and how clean the supply is.
This is frustrating to hear.. again...
Andy
ORIGINAL: MaJ. Woody
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: Arial">Hi Xantos.
I am very sorry for your loss. As you know I lost two new jets back to back on the same day. If you have not been in that awful, sickening, helpless position of no control and then feel the pain of having lost your prized possession I think its really hard to relate top how you are feeling. I know how you feel my friend. I was very hesitant to go the 2.4 route but then did. I felt like it was the best decision I ever made. Crisp control, no worries about some careless person switching on their radio and taking me out. I logged about 300 flights without incident. Over 200 of then in 4 different turbine jets. Then the unthinkable happened. That fateful day that will ever change how I feel when flying. I will never know what happened but I know it was not structural or mechanical. It was something with the radio equipment. I cant really describe how hard it was to get back on that horse (with new equipment) and have fun flying again. I have logged 20 turbine flights since the crashes (the weather has prohibited any more than that) and it was only on the last two that I felt like I was having fun again. It has changed my flying style a bit.One of myfavorite maneuvers has always been the low high speed pass down the runway. I just cant do that with any confidence anymore. I have seen what can happen and that will always be in the back of my mind somewhere. Bottom line is that I had 100% faith in the equipment and felt it was unfaultable. Now I know better. I love this hobby more than words can describe so I have chosen to stick with it. Hopefully I wont ever experience anything like this again for a long time. In 28 years of flying I have crashed my share of planes. But I can honestly say that I have only experienced any type of radio failure, be it glitches or full lockout less than a half a dozen times. Pretty good reliability given the thousands of flights that represents. I am not qualified to make any statements about how reliable 2.4 is or whether it is the right time for the hobby but I think it is in theory the best thing we ever had. I know that nothing is bullet proof and that every time we fly we are taking a chance but I will continue to enjoy this hobby that has given me such joy, education, skills and cherished friendships.</span></p>