Disaster

[Gixerbenten]

After advice again. Lost a model today, ST ASW28, stock set up, Orange R615 RX, DX6i. I fly next to the sea with a non electric railway line inbetween. Took off with no wind and climbed to around 500 ft. Flew around for about 5 mins no probs. I tried to turn right with no response, lost signal I thought. Not touching the sticks it rolled to the left till inverted and dived vertically into the sea. Last saw it floating away. I thought if I lost signal it would just fly off into the distance, not do that. Any ideas anyone ? All batteries good btw. Also what would you suggest as a good 2m foame ? Was happy with the ASW but dont want to get the same again. Budget £100-150. Cheers Ben

[Depron Daz]

Sounds like you hit LVC. I believe (may be wrong) that the Orange Rx's do not place the surfaces in a straight ahead position, and will remain at their last input. Or of course the ESC and BEC failed.

I have a few Orange Rx's and mine all remain in their last position, unlike most Spektrum Rx's which go into a failsafe setting, which is the last setting you had when you bound the model, so that should be motor off, and surfaces all straight and flat.

If the model is worth it, you should always fit a separately powered UBEC to keep the Rx alive so that if the flight battery is too low and the ESC hits LVC, you can still have control for a dead stick landing.

Edited By Depron Daz 393 on 07/11/2013 19:52:48

[John Privett]

Posted by savedbytheground on 07/11/2013 19:43:28:

Sorry but is this post a wind up...

That's not the way it looks to me.

1. I don't use Spektrum, but the Orange rx mentioned is Spektrum compatible, so what tx other than Spektrum (or JR) would one use it with?

2. Not sure he's specifically overflying a railway line, he mentioned that he's near the sea with a railway line between the flying site and the sea. I imagine lots of people fly near to, thouhg mostly not actually over, a road or railway.

3. Doesn't the ST ASW28 have a leccy motor on the front, so why not 500 feet in zero wind?

4. I read that as meaning it rolled left without being commanded.

5. Quite possibly, but I don't know what f/safe settings the Orange rx has.

6. Agreed!

[Andrew Russell 2]

As for a new model how about this**LINK** my friend has one i fly from time to time and they are great fun on a budget

Don't listen to the negative comments and as for the crash it could have been anything ( altough someone may be able to explain)

keep your head up, have fun and fly safe

[Gixerbenten]

Cheers Daz. Not a wind up, I was led to believe the Orange rxs were fine. I wouldnt call 500 up and 150meters away distance flying, gaining 500 ft is quite easy with the motor on honest. Maybe fair enough about railway. Let go of sticks because I shat myself so gave it a couple of seconds to try and get my ed round it. Sorry to have upset you Saved by the ground

[WolstonFlyer]

I am sure that the LVC feature only cuts power to the motor and preserves a power output to the RX and therefore the servo's - that has always been my experience on the models that I fly with various different makes of ESC.

What is interesting is that the HobbyKIng page for the R615 does not mention a fail safe at all where the new R620 specifically mentions Failsafe: All channels to bind position at signal loss.

It does sound like you could have lost signal, perhaps the roll to inverted was then just caused by the wind direction?

You could have a look at the HobbyKing Phoenix 2000 glider as a replacement, it has a strong blow moulded nylon fuselage and foam wings... and get the newer R620 RX or an original Spektrum one

Edited By WolstonFlyer on 07/11/2013 20:37:39

[Gixerbenten]

Thanks for that John and Andrew but the post didnt bother me. Still on a downer after this mornings eppisode. No plans on giving up, and ta for that link Andrew, looks good. Cheers all

[Devcon1]

Hi,

I stand by my previous comments (Electric motive power accepted) and wonder what the investigators would have made of the situation had the model entered the windscreen of a passing train,

Regards

John

Sorry Gixerbenten, it's not personal but I think a number of problems could have been eliminated prior to committing the model to the skies,

[PatMc]

Posted by Depron Daz 393 on 07/11/2013 19:49:41:

If the model is worth it, you should always fit a separately powered UBEC to keep the Rx alive so that if the flight battery is too low and the ESC hits LVC, you can still have control for a dead stick landing.

Edited By Depron Daz 393 on 07/11/2013 19:52:48

If you reach LVC the battery will still power the Rx via BEC.

[WolstonFlyer]

If you reach LVC the battery will still power the Rx via BEC.

I thought so, glad you agree PatMc

[Bearair]

Hi Gixerbenten

Because you haven't got the model anymore it is difficult to figure out what happened and really any suggestions will probably be speculation. One question I would ask is did you try throttling back if the motor was running or throttle up if the motor was stopped? It would tell you if you had any control over the model at all.

I would ignore the negative comments expecially about mixing brands it is an argument that has been going on since 27meg days some people just believe you have to have the same label on the tx and rx or it won't work properly! As for leaving the sticks alone if the model is out of control then its probably the best thing to do. Waggling the sticks mindlessly has in my opinion caused more crashes than anything.

I can recomend the ST Fox, a bit more aerobatic than the ASW but not alot worse at thermalling. They also make great slope soarers in moderate wind and will fly inverted all day long should you wish it. The only bad point on them is the motor mount which is made of cream cheese, but its a quick job to beef it up with a bit of ply. If I remember correctly they use the same bats as the asw so you wont have to buy new batteries.

Ps, what gixer you got?

Roger (triumph and bernelli)

Edited By Bearair on 07/11/2013 21:07:56

[Codename-John]

Posted by Bearair on 07/11/2013 21:03:27:

If I remember correctly they use the same bats as the asw so you wont have to buy new batteries.

He will, the asw one is out in the sea lol

[Frank Skilbeck]

Could be an ESC failure that took out the BEC circuit hence no response from the radio, could also be a battery failure (i.e. broken wire).

Also failsafe won't make the plane fly straight and level but move the throttle to the closed position (on binding with Spektrum) and if the Rx is capable move the other control surfaces to the setting at which the Rx was last bound to the Tx, so if it's a Rx that only failsafes on throttle then the non-throttle surfaces will stay at the last commanded position, if it does failsafe on all surfaces then they will move to the position they were in when the Rx was last bound to the Tx, so if you had to trim the model after binding then on loss of signal they would move to the surfaces to the out of trim position.

[PatMc]

see below

Edited By PatMc on 07/11/2013 22:20:31

[Alan Randall]

I'm guessing that savedbytheground flies in the middle of a desert or some such place so that there is no roads, railways etc. within miles.

[PatMc]

It's pointless speculating what caused the problem, since the model is lost without any chance of checking the gear even if it is recovered at a later date.

[PaulH]

I'm guessing savedbytheground spends twenty minutes de-mousing his glove box, before he even drives to somewhere to fly. And for those in the know, we remember what happened tp Mr. Swellanbach.

[David Tweddle]

Hi Ben sorry for your loss, I cant help with this apart from was your details inside just in case...

After all there may not be any thing to salvage so best in this case if it does not come back to haunt you.

All the best and chin up mate.

David

[Jon Laughton]

Sorry to hear fo your troubles - I'm not a user of Spectrum but some lads in our club have had very similar problems with the orange receivers and all have scrapped them for the proper thing...

[RB]

For what its worth; I have learned very quickly on these forums/posts that there are loads of guys who will criticise everything apart from Spektrum/DSM2/DSMX. They will blame anything and everything rather than their beloved 'system'. Spektrum is flawed and it has numerous 'issues' most of which result in this outcome; the bottom line is that even the cheapest 35mhz system does not 'depend' on users knowing its deficiencies for reliability (RX low voltage / aerial position / RX data buffer over run / faulty RF output to name but 4!) Horizon hobbies have grown an army of supporters / fanatics by their policy of unquestioned free replacement/ upgrade so don't be surprised by their vitriol; even the best Spektrum set ups randomly fall out of the sky (just check internet reports by some of the best display pilots). So do yourself a favour,buy another system before flying again (a £40 35mhz cheap set is fine for reliability/range).

I know all the why's and wherefores so to the Spekky disciples don't waste your time I have seen too many nice planes pay the price! Oh and it doesn't matter whether you use chinese clone receivers many of the Spek OEM RX's are worse!

[Paul Marsh]

I've had two crashes since I've been using 2.4. Both were on Futaba, but even that wasn't the radio fault.

First was a brand new rx switch that was intermittant and the other the battery wire had been damaged against two surfaces and model went ff after takeoff.

Electronics going into salt water is dead anyway, and as said, the evidence has been lost, so slagging off Spektrum/Orange rx's is not right, when you don't know the facts.

Seems it lost power-faulty battery/esc, so no rx will work without power.

[RB]

LOL, the standard rebuttal; and the 'un-explained crashes go on!'

[Devcon1]

Hi Gixerbenten,

On reflection and looking again what I said and how I said it It's clear to me now that I have been very unfair and plain ignorant.

Please accept my sincere apologies,

Having lost a model the last thing you wanted was comments such as mine.

If I were to reply again I would only advise using Spektrum Rxs with Spektrum transmitters for general flying based on incidents I've witnessed and keep the orange Spektrum combiniation for purely short range foamie/micro stuff as it seems a false economy to save a little but risk alot..

[Gixerbenten]

Ta for all your input, guess Ill never know what happened Roger BearAir, its a K3 1000 quite heavilly tuned. 1070 cc high compression lightweight pistons, head skimmed ported and pollished with high lift cams. 172 rwbhp. K-Tech forks Harris rear sets 06 R1 callipers on Gallfer discs, quick shifter with pc and k&n and full Akra. Think thats about it. Only prob now is since Ive started flying, any nice days days the bike is 2nd choice so its not getting the thrashing it needs

[Dylan Reynolds LaserCraft Services]

Posted by RB on 08/11/2013 10:31:48:

LOL, the standard rebuttal; and the 'un-explained crashes go on!'

So, according to you any "unexplained" crash is down to Spectrum gear and nothing we say is going to change that? Seems a bit of a blinkered view in my opinion, and to sneer at anyone who says anything otherwise is just wrong.

Yes you have your opinion on Spectrum gear, and yes thetyhave had there issues, there is one answer to that, don't buy it, but don't slate the people who do use it. I have been using their gear since I came back to this hobby and never had a single problem with it, that includes DX6's, DX7's and now DX8's!

The fact is, there has been an incident, it needs looking at, and could have been caused by any number of reasons, pilot error, radio failure, battery failure, ESC etc etc.

I suggest you keep any posts constructive and everyone will get on much better