Maiden flight of the Beaver, Spacewalker Crashes

March 6th was one of the nicest days of the spring or so we thought until we got to the field. The weather was warm and winds were thought to be low but once we got to the village park we noticed winds speeds were about 10mph with some minor gusts.

Kip worked to get an electric ready for the day so he stopped by and we rigged a brushless in-runner into his electric supersportster. The first flight was crazy, the thing was so tail heavy the plane wanted to climb to the moon. Somehow Kip managed to bring it back in without wrecking it. After adding an ounce of weight to the nose he tried again. Better but somehow he ended up stuck in a tree next to the parking lot. Some kids with sticks came by and helped us poke it down. One more flight. It looked pretty good but I think we over propped it because the plane dorked in next to the baseball diamond and we noticed a nasty burnt electrical smell coming from the fuselage. It turns out the motor and the speed controller were cooked.

I was intent on taking the E-flight Dehavilland Beaver up for her maiden flight. I almost chickened out because of the wind but finally decided to give it a shot.
Takeoff was nearly flawless except for a hook to the right which I under-compensated for. Still, the Beaver lifted off predictably with no surprises. After a few laps I brought her in over the top of the village hall. Thanks to the stiff headwind, no flaps were required and the Beaver gently landed. Next I took the F-4 Phantom up for a few laps. Wind is not a problem for this plane because it flies at like 80mph anyway. Two flights with the jet and my hands started to get cold, despite my fashionable thumbless flying gloves.

Glenn entertained us once again with the Spacewalker. Full throttle takeoffs, hammerheads and flat spins had us swallowing hard. My grandsons Josh and Alex (the Holy Crap kid from our video) were dazzled. Then tragedy struck. During a full throttle takeoff the plane banked to the right and nailed a tree. The spacewalker's fuselage was smashed! It was devastaing for Glenn, this is the 4th spacewalker. At first Glenn felt pretty discouraged. Kip and I took him to the the pub to ease his pain. After a couple of cocktails Glenn

left. We found out later he stopped to by a replacement fuselage from Dawn (Northern Hobbies). By Wednesday the fuselage had shown up and Glenn is on his way to rebuilding the spacewalker. Other than the Spacewalker incident, not a bad day.