So what do you think causes people to crash thier rc aircraft the most?

Lack of Altitude.

Becoming disoriented with your plane, then panicking (jerking the controls). Thats my vote.

Gravity

For beginners i think that the parkflyer type planes. THey don't have the power or manuverability to get out of trouble.
Plus the lack of training ( instructor or Flight Simulator ).

inexperience

I almost crashed today. it was simple mistake. I was coming in on a touch and go and was a little high so I get down. And land at the end of the runway. I throttle up real quick to get of the runway in time but then she got about two feet in the air when she runs sideways almost into the fence luckily my instructor is amazing so he got it in control in time. I would vote for defiantly pilot errors in miss guiding or dumb thoughts.

The Crash: A manouver performed by every R/C pilot at least once but probably more than once.

Causes vary based on skill level.

Beginner:
- Failure to seek proper instruction
- Disorientation
- Nervous pilot (typically during the landing sequence)
- Inproper aircraft set up ie. out of ballence/trim reversed controls
- Mechanical/electrical failure ie. failed servo/receiver/transmitter or aircraft structural failure
- Cocky attitude after solo (very common)
- Flying in front of the Sun

Intermediate: (By this time you know how to set up a plane and maiden your own)
- Mechanical/electrical failure ie. failed servo/receiver/transmitter or aircraft structural failure
- Cocky attitude
- Operating a plane above their skill level

Expert: A pilot I concider and "Expert" has gone down for the following
- Experts don't crash... when anyone else is watching anyways
- Mid airs
- Mechanical/electrical failure ie. failed servo/receiver/transmitter or aircraft structural failure

For what it's worth I concider myself intermediate

Inflight pilot error- 90%
Preflight pilot error -7%
Equipment failure- 1%
Radio "Hit" <1%

Inflight pilot error speaks for it's self. Panic is the major cause followed by poor judgment, which is usually closely followed by panic.

Preflight Pilot error includes uncharged batterys, loose screws, poor linkage setup, trying to fly with a motor that isn't running right, Trying to fly with servos twitching, Inproper repairs after a crash, Not repairing after a crash. bubble gum and duct tape repairs.

Equipment failure is like a servo jaming, receiver dying, dropping a valve on a four stoke engine, and other failures that could not be prevented by careful preflight inspections.

I've only seen one crash that "MAY" have been caused by radio interference. I lost a plane that was flying flat and level one second and turned into a lawn dart the next. A little later, in the pits, a guy was showing off his old computer radio and the neat feature that allowed him to switch between two frequencys. One of those frequencys was the channel I was flying. No proof that this is what happened, but a strong suspission that it was the cause.

I have crashed a number of times, and all but two were results of my panic when things werent going as I though they should. IE getting inverted on a landing approach and then pulling full up along with jaming the throttle full open. Makes a mess of things that does.

I've seen very experienced pilots freeze up and crash due to a sudden panic over somthing not being what they though it was.

I've caught guys shrugging off things that were sure to cause a crash. One guy shrugged off a loose motor and when I saw it, I had him shut down and we took a closer look to find the firewall was ripped out. Or seeing a guy going out to the pilots station with one aileron drooping. Some times we get just a bit to egear to fly.

Don

Combination of distraction and disorientation.
I have had 2 real bad crashes for the samwe reason, Took my eyes off my plane to see where another plane was and lost orientation in the process.

I know (personal experience) and think that some beginners and above crash from lack of focus, they may be flying their plane well then look/ do something else and all of a sudden a tree grabs it, or it goes behind a tree. I also know that personally I don't have great vision and have been always worried about loosing it up too hight.

Jon

awwww but duck tape and gum makes a strong hold

and to think all they needed to make that repair air worthy is a little bailing wire

Solar flare or cosmic storms are my personal favorites. Wind shear is also a good, but it's too easy to second guess that one. Around this time of year, ghosts and evil spirits are very active, too. I have a broad selection.

Not to mention the ufo’s there a problem too

Yup

The above description is quickly followed by running out of airspeed, altitude and ideas all at the same time

I just saw on the Discovery channel pilots of full size aircraft crash due to piolt error 92% of the time. Would it be any different for RC pilots? Probably not.

Well if we dont crash, dont have excuse to buy new planes

Mr 67Stang covered it pretty well but I can summarize.

Three leading causes:

75% Wrong control input - Including improper speed at take off/landing - too fast or too slow). Insufficient elevator is a leader here. Improper battery management would go here - failure to set the charger properly.

15% Testosterone - Trying something difficult to impress others)

10% Mechanical failure - Usually the fault of the pilot/mechanic in pre-flight and routine inspections. Cross threading metric clevii on SAE rods, mixing servo brand arms to shafts. Reusing previously crashed equipment (I do this LOTS). Trusting ARFs (whose fault, really, is that? YOU are the final quality inspector on that job.)

I'm sure radio hits occur. That's human error for not checking the pin board or allowing bozos at your club or field.

I lost one model to a mid-air. My fault for not flying with a spotter. The other pilot's fault too for the same reason - 50/50 tie.

No one in R/C likes to fess up. I always admit it is my fault and have no problem with that. Mae Culpa.

PS - it's not really mechanical failure if you are doing something purposely outside of the design parameters of the equipment. That is "mechanical abuse". Like putting a .91 on a model designed for a .40 and ripping off a wing or tearing out hinges from aileron flutter. That's human error or wrong control input - excessive throttle.

Hey Watch this!

or

Look, no hands

MAN that hurts! I put a little high wing with an os .10 into a soccer net once on its maiden. It was just a little breazy and I had it at a stand still, looked over to the wife and said "look at this". when we looked back at the plane it was just ducking into the soccer goal[]

[]Also going cheap on equipment.
I trashed a brand new 99" dynaflite butterfly Sunday. 4th flight ever on it. I had done a really nice covering job and had LEDs and glow wire night flying set ups. was just getting used to how it handled. first flight up Sun it ran out of power and did a mud face plant at the end of the runway. VERY embarrassing. this is (WAS) one super easy plane to fly. pilot error/ yup I erred when I bought a new 2100 mah 5 cell battery on EBay. this had only 4 flights on it and had been cycled on my digipace and tested ok before flight but was stone dead after checking it post mortem. so I said to myself "nice move exlax you really saved a lot on that #@%% battery!"

Also flying to far out(fits under previously mention disorientation) differs with each pilot and with different planes but a lot of crashes happen away from the pilot's visual comfort zone.

The number one cause for me is the ground rushing up to my plane rapidly [:@]

Bob

for me,
* it has been depth perception, i flew beautifly into a set of powerlines which i flew alongside of when they grabbed my pulse xt and showed it the ground.
* 2nd was an engine failure after take off, too little airspeed/ altitude, tribute 36 suffered a hard landing.

I'd give electro-mechanical failure a higher percentage, esp. for intermediate or better flyers. My last two crashes I was distracted/interrupted by another flyer during my normal pre-flight routine. In the first crash I didn't tighten the wing bolts, in the second I didn't connect the alieron servo. In both cases I allowed myself to get rushed into the air by others, a mistake I won't make again soon.

True, this does happen. However, this cannot be considered electro/mechanical failure. This would still qualify as pilot failure to me. The aileron servos didn't fail to connect themselves did they?[8D]