tell us your mistakes.

Well I had to re register so I thought because of the site crashing I post this topic. What serious mistakes have you made in your CL adventures. My last one was After I epoxied the wing on the fus and let dry overnight, the next day I noticed I glued it in backwards. I really didn't want to fly clockwise so I had quiet the repair job to do. Came out ok though, just a waste of time let alone felling like a, well you know. Greg Hart <><

Not me, I never make mistooks.......

Actually my last one was while flying my pride-and-joy twin engine stunter........
One of the engines quit while I was flying inverted and about 45 degrees up... no big deal really as it flew Ok up there, but I panicked and pulled the handle down so it went up... lost line tension and smacked into the ground... here in Oz we had a drought for 5 years so the ground was like concrete... saved the engines, but the rest got a "Viking" funeral.

OK Greg, as you already know I have completed a modified Cardinal that's ready for paint. Before I glued the wing into the fuse I lined everything up real proper and professional like. I marked both sides of the fuse at the trailing edge and at the leading edge. I checked the incidence and all was perfect. I started by first tacking with ca and then I checked it again. All is well. I completed the fuse to wing joint epoxyed etc............I decided to check one last time and realized that I had followed the wrong markings for alignment and the wing was not perpendicular to the fuse nor parallel to the elevator hinge line. My heart sank, people in Austrailia could hear my screams.........I went to the art store and picked up a sheet of thin cardboard. I went to the hardware store and picked up a couple of fine tooth hacksaw blades. From the cardboard I cut a couple of 4 inch wide strips and taped them to the wing on both sides of the fuse to protect the wing. I used a exacto knife no.11 to cut a slot thru the fuse at the wing joint large enough to slide the hacksaw blade thru. Taped both ends of the blade and by hand I sawed all around the wing top and bottom until the wing was free. Aligned and epoxyed again. Now it looks great. Am I stupid...you bet.

I think my worst mistake was at the age of 13. Building my first inverted engine stunter I turned over the fuselage, marked the holes got the drill and went at it. Making sure I had a tiny bit of offset to the outside of the circle, I finished up the top blocks and the rest of the plane. So proud of my first inverted engine, etc., my buddy and I headed for the flying (baseball) field. Fox 35 was running just right and I signaled release. As soon as it broke ground I knew I was in trouble. It made the prettiest wingover at about 25" high and smacked the terra firma directly across the circle from where it was launched. Couldn't even figure out what happened!!!
When I got the pieces home (heartbroken) I looked at the engine to remove it. It had inboard thrust!!!!! Upside down, the holes were backwards.
Still triple check that even to this day!
Merry Christmas!
Bill <><

Just like when you cut it twice and it's still to short.

I hate that when it happens.

Scott(I never make mestakes)Riese:+

1. Gosh, the fuel proofer is kind of thick.

2. So: Let's put some thinner in it. Hey, that's better.

3. Let's fuel proof some decals.

4. Gee, the decals are getting all smudgy like.

One Saturday night I was listening to Rider's Radio Theater, and finishing up a Twister wing.. It was summer, a sweet breeze flowed, and life was good.. My lovely wife fixed me a Tanqueray and Tonic, which I had just sipped.. Ah, just right!

At that point, I somehow managed to catch the power cord to my ghetto blaster (in the window over the work bench), and down it came! It crushed the wing into about a hundred pieces.

At first I considered just wadding the whole affair up and tossing it into the trash. Then I finished the T&T as I thought about it, gathered the pieces, and reassembled the "puzzle", with thin CA. An hour later it was back together, and no one was the wiser.

[photo not recovered: 3e69bb3870f12ad5.jpg]

"Never let a computer know you're in a hurry."

I think I have made all of these mistakes, and quite a few more. The longer you fly and build ...

I have ...
...built planes with the long wing on the outboard side.
...used 5-minute epoxy for a 10-minute job.
...picked up the handle upside-down.
...put a streamer on my plane the same color as my opponent.
...tried to pit a racing plane with the battery turned off.
...gone to a contest without the plane.
...had a piece of lumber fall from the workshop rafters and wreck three wings (a Nobler and two combat wings).
...used the wrong thinnner and ruined a whole airplane's finish.

I could go on.
--jt

>I think I have made all of these mistakes, and quite a few
>more. The longer you fly and build ...
>
>I have ...
> ...built planes with the long wing on the outboard side.

Did that once as well. I used to build a 2" offset in all my wings 25 years ago. Looked at it, realized what I had done, and felt very, very stupid. Then I remembered there were 2" between rib bays. So, I lopped off 2" from the outboard and just thought that I would fly even panels. To my surprise, it flew better than what the conventional wisdom of the time said it would.

Sometimes you can get dumb and lucky - at the same time.

Merry Christmas.

Well, besides gluing doublers on the wrong sides of fuselage sides I once carved a prop (rubber folding) with a left hand and a right hand blade. I assembled all on my first Nobler without the pushrod installed. I've run the leadouts out the wrong wingtip. There's more but the old brain won't go get 'em, I guess that means there's even more to come.

I painted an airplane once with polyurethane varnish. "WOW" it looks nice. After a few flights the varnish got all sticky like bubble gum on the hot asphalt parking lot in July. It took 3 cans of carburator cleaner to get the varnish off. It was never a good flying airplane so one day I started it and let it go. It flew almost a mile before it crashed.

I glued a wing on wrong once didn't notice the problem until the airplane was completely finished. "NOW WHAT???" I cut the wing tip off, spliced in another rib, glued the wing tip back on. It flew great.

I just finished re-registering, too, so I hope every one had a very happy and safe Christmas.

I remember mixing some epoxy to sheet my foam wings. Put the part A into the cup, then got a phone call. Finished mixing the epoxy after the call, spread it on the wings, put the sheeting on the foam, loaded a bazillion pounds of SCUBA weights, and left it to set overnight.

I woke up in the middle of the night and realized I had mixed two batches of part A and NONE of Part B! I doubt if I could ever live long enough to see that stuff set up. To this day, I always grab the Black label bottle first.

Ron King

Like a few others, I have put in the wing upside down, or is it inside out. Yeah, that's what I meant. Drilled the offset engine holes offset the wrong way, but thankfully discovered this before finishing the plane. Thank you for round toothpicks and epoxy!!. Covered a wing only to remember that I had not yet pulled the leadouts out and through the line slider. And I'll never forget the time when a very young Bob Hunt took the time to explain to me how to paint a Nobler in candy apple red colors like his. I got home that night and started things going. Next morning, after lots of doping and of course all "dopey", I tried to speed up the process and mixed the silver and the red. Ha, instant metallic purple, which is what I did paint one Nobler. It was a cursed plane, the fuel tank in it was from a wrecked Nobler and was never checked for leaks. That tank leaked about 20 ounces of fuel before I realized the entire wing and fuselage were totally fuel soaked. That was in 1967 and it only gets worse as I get older.

This has got to be the greatest boneheaded engine test ever. Got my first 35, was a K&B Stallion. Instructions said to mount it in a test stand. Whats a test stand? Alas, there is my Dads vise on the work bench! I put the 35 in the vise. Not to tight as I didn't want to hurt the crank case. On about the 10th or 11th flip it started! Pure joy. Standing right in front of it of course. It came out of that vise at about 15 mph. I took that 10 inch prop right in the gut. Turned out to be the tightest T shirt I have ever worn in my life. Miracle of it was I didn't get a single cut. Knew what a test stand was after that.

Bill

Lets see.
completed wing sheeting (fully sheeted wing), realised Id left top spar out.
Cut off leadouts along with masking tape on fully finished plane.

Squirted ear full of cya while squeezing bottle and listening for
escaping air to signify tube was clear. (It was).

Set down at supper table with a giant size tube of comet glue in
back pocket, ( causing burning feeling in sensitive areas)

UUhh the other stuff id be too ashamed to tell in public.

Charlie Pate

Ah, c'mon, you can tell us. We won't laugh at you, Oh, heck, yes we will and with you too.

LAST EDITED ON Dec-26-03 AT 00:53 AM (CDT)
 
That reminds me of a friend of mine on board the USS Cromwell DE 1014. Ralph Norris EN1, and I were in the machine shop, all 8 by 14 of it, and he was holding a McCoy Diesel in his hands and flipping the prop. Surprise, the darn thing started. I don't think his eyes ever got back to normal. He had this surpirsed look on his face for weeks after that!!! Sure would like to find old Ralph. He had a very nice Ares I bought from him. We took it out to fly it and he got hooked and I had to sell it back to him. Heck of a way to get a flying partner.

LAST EDITED ON Dec-25-03 AT 11:15 PM (CDT)
 
The big question is: Which One?

Randy, always tell the most embarassing one. The others will seem trivial by comparison. Come on now, the worst thing ever. Heh, don't laugh to much guys. Some of these are too close to home and my stomach is hurting from laughing. Lots of been there, done that's.

OH I GOT ONE. HEY "HOWARD RUSH" DIDN'T you glue your NOSE to the work bench with CA?

Scott(I'm sure that Paul told me that one)Riese:o

Ty,

Shoot Ty, with so many to choose from, I doubt I could decide. Maybe the Rube Goldburg plane destruction story. Or the CL plane becomes free flighter story. That was fun. How about the: Oh, that's why nose doublers are a good idea story. There are many, many to choose from, though my favorite was probably the shot down by enemy fire story. What I get for flying near a place they shoot off rockets. Luckily, there are less such stories in the past several years. I don't know if I've gotten any brighter, or just have less energy with which to do stupid things.

O.K., to get back on line :- Not stunt flying, but Team Racing.
Out practicing one day, sorting engine, decided to give my pilot a real good competition stop. Model comes in, I grab it, fill it, give it one whack, engine starts, I let go. Top class. Then I look up and see my pilot standing beside me. He has come out for a chat. The model survived quite well, but it led to a new inclusion in the routine, - Always look at the pilot before letting go.

I was carving a balsa prop blade for a Wakefield (a Schwartzbach, for you older Gumbanditos). I made one chip too many. Surrounded by hundreds of chips, I sorted through all of them, until I found THAT chip, glued it back on with CA and finished the prop blade just fine. Steve

My mistake, that I discovered lately, was that I didn't notch out the leading edge on my foam wing on the short nosed "Copperhead V-10". Therefore I don't have enough room for a larger tank that is now needed.

I have a custom tank being made by Dan McEntee, but it would be nice if I had used a little headwork up front so I could use a commercial plastic tank.

I built the model with the idea a 40VF or K&B 6.5 would be OK, but after the 46VF went in, and out, and the PA 61 went in, the fuel capacity was just plain short.

I am learning, but very slowly.