Okay...so hopefully I can fly better than build. Can you top any of the following bouts of stupidity??

While building an ARF no less ...my Funtana has suffered the following:

BURNED a big hole in the Elevator while trying to iron out the wrinkles (ahh... iron shouldnt be on highest setting)

Used a SHARPIE to outline the fuse on the horizontal and vertical stabs....the black lines CAN NOT be removed with alcohol

Run a screwdriver COMPLETELY through BOTH top AND bottom of aileron while screwing down control horn

Got CA somehow in the blind nut and screw for the wheel pants requiring removal with a Dremel

Put too much canopy glue on .....and didnt notice that it had run down INSIDE THE CANOPY while it was drying inverted....canopy looks like a candle was lit and dripping inside it

My cat chewed the middle of the sleeve for the carbon fiber throttle rod....ruining it

My wife knocked over my golf bag ....right on to the stab...damaging both horizontal and vertical.


If this thing gets off the ground before I destroy it ....it will be a miracle

Step 1 - Get rid of the cat

Step 2 - Have it take the wife with it

Step 3 - Acetone will remove the sharpie ink without damaging the covering

Step 4 - Put Golf Clubs away, you can't play this time of year anyway

1) Don't let the dog step on the wing tip.

2) Those plastic triangles you use to see if the fuse is square, don't glue them to the fuse.

Carl

You WIN!!!!! You are the dumbest SOB I know. JUST KIDDING! I have had those days myself. I have learned that when I do one really stupid thing I leave the shop and wait for another day. Same thing at the flying field. Some days your 10' tall and bullit proof, other days you cant land without breaking the prop.



David

If you ever make it to the more complicated airplanes (warbirds, turbine jets) the limits of your stupidity you will never find I assure you.


I apparently have no limits. I recently sheeted a wing, cut my flaps and ailerons out, added my balsa cap strip, blended, fiberglassed, primered and got ready to hinge when I realized I didn't cut the 3/8" out of the wing and control surfaces that I had put in with the cap strip. If this doesn't make sense to you now, someday it will and I hope you never do anything that stupid cause if my list of stupidities were limited to some overrun canopy glue and some sharpie outlines, I would be the happiest most successful RC model guys I KNOW!!

What can I say, we have all had projects from hell that wouldn't work out because of murphy's law.

Sometimes your the windshield and sometimes your the bug. Looks like you were the bug with this plane.

I have used hair spray to remove sharpie ink very successfully.

I don't know what your problem is, I go through same thing, or something similar on just about everything I build. I hear it builds character....

Don't feel tooo bad. I think if we all got the grey matter to remember we have all done this at some stage. Just a part of life.

Cheers.

The biggest tip I can give, is to take you time. It is tempting to want to just GIT-R-DONE! However, hopefully you'll have tbe airplane as long as you want it....which will be much longer than it took to build it (especially an ARF). So a little due diligence and attention to detail now, will be worth it in the end.

If you have any doubt about how to do something....stop...and do some research first. Go through it is your mind, and then do it for real.

Good luck.

All those things happening to that plane just gives it character. I have boogered up so much stuff I could write a novel on it so don't sweat it man.[8D]

I love the monocoat that comes off in flight...you ask...DID you remove the backing???
Reply....There's a backing???

Most of my planes crash several times before I ever get them built. I had a fuse I was mounting the motor mount on when I set it in a cradle as I reached over to get the next screw. Some how I knocked the fuse off the bench and of cousre it landed mount first on nice soft concrete. I broke the mount and tore a cunck out of the side of the fuse. I have had planes fall from a painting rack, while they were still wet. Put screw driver through seveal surfaces, Dropped an Exacto knife through the wing I just finished covering. If it can be done, you will do it at some time or another. Some planes just won't do a maiden flight without some scars.


Dru.

I've done my share of stuff on 3 planes so far, but I ain't telling nobody!! (vbg)

A distant memory (all efforts at erasing it totally have failed) of having once built an airplane with two left wings still haunts me. I need to go to confession.

John

I just finished the second wing of my edge, all covered and really looking nice. I now have 2 port wings, 9 nights of 2hrs a night in my shed building it and not once did I notice that it was IDENTICAL to the wing I had already built. Oh well, soon be pay day.

LOA....!!!!

I was reading through this thread gettin a bit of a laugh at the same time thinking of my most stupid moments. I arrived at your offering at the same time I remembered having a spare starboard wing for a 1/4 scale Piper Cub in the closet (same cause). You want to trade a port for a starboard? I know the wing profiles aren't exactly compatible but who knows, it might just work....

Thanks for the offer dk, but I think I will pass up on it LOL.

While using fingers to hold piece of sheeting in place, CA wicked over and glued fingers to fuse.

While firmly holding a straightedge on a piece of balsa to shave off a small amount, managed to also shave a finger that was overhanging the straightedge (to make sure it didn't slip!).

While using kicker to 'encourage' some CA to cure, didn't realize that the CA bottle was also in the path of some overspray. Did you ever glue shut the glue bottle?

While scratch-building a model, I once cut the landing gear notches into the tops of the ribs. Didn't find this out until I'd glued all the ribs to the LE, TE, and both spars!

I once had the knife with the #11 blade fall off the shelf and 'spear' my thigh. That was sore for a week! Also put a small hole in my pants.

OK..OK...I'll give......I have read amusing recounts of encounters with CA and its ability to glue anything to anything. I haven't had much of a problem but, there was a time that I was using CA to strengthen holes drilled for my servos. I use an applicator with a long point so I can get right in on the area where I want to get the glue to go. I took off the cap to the bottle of CA put in the applicator and withdrew CA into it. Well duh, stuipd me, I forgot to put the top back on the bottle. In leaning forward, (yep) I hit the 3/4 full bottle of CA and it spilled all over the top of my workbench. Unfortunately I had a set of small screwdrivers in a plastic case sitting right next to the bottle. It glued some of the drivers into the plastic case, and also glued the case to the benchtop. I don't know how fast I moved, but I was lucky to have some acetone handy. Anyway, I now have an area on the benchtop with only the wood showing and some of the wood on the bottom of the screwdriver case. Luckily I was able to clean up the screwdrivers with the acetone. Fumes and heat were very prevalent for a few minutes there. I still need to sand and repaint the workbench top and I make sure that before I do any gluing I close the d**n bottle.

Your right is builds character just ask anyone who knows me I am a real character

Terry

me too.

I think of all those posts above as a sort of "checklist"... pretty much the only thing I haven't done (yet) is glue my forehead to the workbench(ie: "Home Improvement" )

LOL!

Kept going through this thread until I found the two right/left wing syndrome. Been there, done that. Once picked up the wrong two bottles of epoxy. Mixed up a batch and then tried to asssemble an LT40 wing with 6 minute stuff. Before that I'd built one ARC and this was my first, and only ARF. Once that wing splice is in place with epoxy it stays put.

And I thought this were some Standard Tricks of the trade for building planes, Ever spend time in setting up a wing for gluing, just to notice you forgot to lay down the wax paper. LOL

Ever sheet the entire leading edge of a wing and then see a pin sticking through the main spar as you put the last shear web in place? Yup, had the wing very firmly pinned to the building board and no way to get to the pins.

when things go wrong like this,say this "Hoppkins,Popkins,Pelican Pee,We Thought so
Now,and We Think so Then" This works for me.