Started early today and was up on first flight when I had what I thought was a hit on my radio signal. As I turned on base leg for practice landing approach, the plane nosed over and then almost immediately recovered and then almost immeduately it did it again and recovered. I was able to land and promptly walked the flight line to see if anyone else was on channel 48. Only other 72MH plane at the field was on channel 34. Walked back to my plane and noticed that the antenna was not extended. It's a good thing that I had a fully charged transmitter battery. Afte extending the antenna the problem magically went away, imagine that.

I felt really badly but the crew at the field assured me that they all had done it before when they used 72mh, and noted that if I would invest in a 2.4 system that I would not have the problem again.

I guess I will just have to get a check list because the 2.4 system is definately not in the budget this year.

Sometimes it's better to be lucky than good.

Gary

been there and done it , more than once and also with 1/5 and 1/4 scale rc cars - try 27 lbs of out of control car at 50 plus MPH and afterwarde check yer drawers for skid marks - Dont ask how I know - hoping nothing gets hit in parking lot

Thats one thing I check before each flight. I watched a club member lose one of his planes because he forgot to raise his antenna. I guess I was lucky also. I learned from his mistake. Glad you got yours down safely.

Count me in as someone who lost a plane to that mistake.

Now I have the opposite problem... I'll be cruising along with my 2.4 and get a sudden anxiety attack because I realize that my antenna is not sticking out in front of me

Hummm!!! seems like many of us has done that before. One thing, it tells you how far your range check is.

Sure does, Irish. In my case, I was flying 2.4 GHz all day long and when the receiver battery started to get a tad low, I switched planes. The one I switched to was on channel 48 72 MHz. I fueled up, checked everything, and put it in the air. Just after I made the first turn after take off, it started to behave strangely, then it went up, down, inverted, then crunch.

I wondered what the heck was going on when I remembered that I was on 72 MHz and the antenna was down.... oops. I got so used to seeing a short stubby antenna that it never hit me to raise my antenna on the transmitter. []

Yup.. we've all done it at one time or another.

CGr.

Awhile back I walked out on the field and very carefully told a ( new ) pilot to just keep flying and I slowly raised his antenna. About a week later I did almost the same thing until I relized the pilot had a 2.4. Oh well I needed the exersize. ENJOY !!! RED

I took off with the antennae down about 3 weeks ago. Luckily I realized it about 5 seconds after takeoff, but it still scared the crap out of me!!! It's all about the little things in this hobby.

Ha.. I did the same thing once, but realized that my antenna was down and raised it myself while watching my plane. OOPS!!! But, I was able to bring my plane home in the same condition I brought it to the field.

CGr.

Minn, can't count how many times I've tried to yank out my 2.4 antenna!

Throw me on that list, had the antenna only about 1/4 out and when the plane got far enough out in front of me it started doing a whole bunch of crazy stuff. Lucky it was high enough and apparently just close enough that I was able to save it. Afterwards I couldnt figure it out until I was going to start putting it away and went to grab the frequency pin off my antenna,

It scares the crap out of you don't it I will be flying along and then all of a sudden...my heart will stop, my eyes locked wide open...and then I realise - 2.4 man, 2.4