The lowest takeoff roll EVER.

With the indoor season finally over and the weather getting good for some giant-scale flying, I've been putting the gallons through my 102" Quique Yak. I took it down to Joe Nall, flew a few times, and had a blast. While there Andrew and Frank put a dangerous thought into my head... to come out to Muncie for the last-minute XFC qualifier. We talked about it a bit, and I spent the ride home listening to music, planning my freestyle.

So, in the past few weeks since then, I've been getting used to my still fairly new Yak, pushing the envelope and seeing what it's capable of. I flew it in a demo at our club's open house last weekend, and in the past week started practicing my XFC routine. That's when the trouble started...

The day of the demo, I took the plane up in the morning to get used to the field and practice a bit. 2 minutes in, I did a snap, and the plane came out with some down elevator trim. I landed, only to find a couple of hinges in my right elevator had come loose, apparently from some smoke oil contamination. We pulled it off, and with the help of Chris (CSpaced), mixed up some epoxy and put her back together. An hour later the epoxy was set, and the shakedown flight went without a hitch, as did the demo. Later that day one of my side-force generators broke in the air... a sign of things to come.

That night I cut a set of SFG's from plywood to continue flying. A day or two later, I went to the field to fly. The grass was a little higher than usual, but I didn't think much of it. Put the Yak together, taxied out, and took off. Apparently I managed to find the roughest spot on the runway to take-off through, because immediately off the ground I could see that one of my wheel-pants was falling apart. Not too suprising, as they already sufferred some damage from the rough field before. I set up to land, and despite setting the good wheel down first and immediately applying full 3D-rate up elevator, the pant caught and flipped. Oh, great. Luckily, all the damage was a broken prop. That night I drove out to Chris's house and borrowed a new prop.
Yesterday, he came out to out field and we put a few flights on. A couple of minor issues later, we got a problemless flight. I decided I need some more torque on my ailerons for my freestyle, so last night I installed new servos.

Now we come to the fateful day, today. I took the Yak out to CCRC to test fly it. Cranked it up, everything sounded great. As I taxied out, Chris told me not to do my characteristic low roll-to-inverted on takeoff. I said of course I wouldn't... I planned to treat it just like a first flight to see how the servos performed.

Throttle up, little left rudder for the x-wind, pull it off the ground. The next 3 seconds are a blur. The plane started rolling. I corrected, but the plane didn't react. It rolled to KE with the wing tip just inches off the ground, then inverted, then as it tried to make the 3rd quarter of the roll, the wingtip caught. Cartwheel, another broken prop, but more this time. The left wing has some broken sheeting, and the nose of the airplane has to be recontructed. The motor came out with the cowl... the firewall still attached. The rudder got some damage too.

Still in shock, we walked out and carried the plane back. We checked out the equipment, and except for a now-stripped aileron servo, everything worked just fine. I was disgusted, but within a few minutes Chris and Jeff (Unbalanced) were already discussing fixing the plane. Jeff offerred his services in fixing the plane, and Chris volunteered to help too. Jeff let me fly his Cap and Ultimate to prove to myself I can still fly. We spent the rest of the day flying and tearing up a gas car... good times.

Now it's sunk in... looking over the plane again, it's not going to be THAT hard to fix. I'm taking the plane over to Jeff's later tonight so we can start attacking it. Goal is to get it flying within the next several days, so I can get SOME practice in before we leave.

I have to thank Chris and Jeff for helping me out. With only 12 days before the contest, these guys have stepped in to get me back in the air. I'd be grounded otherwise.

So, I'll be busy the next few days. I still have to figure out what exactly caused the uncommanded roll... that won't be an easy task.

Oh... and if anyone in the Greensboro, NC area has a spare new-style 3W twin ignition module they wouldn't mind lending me, let me know... mine got pretty well demolished in the crash.