Ouch!

[Tim Wescott]

Flew my new Nobler for the first time today -- had good line tension, the engine was too rich, but that's correctable.   :-)

Crashed my new Nobler for the first time today -- I thought "up" and it went "down".  I'm not sure if it was because it's so much slower than the 1/2 A plane I've been practicing on that I got out of sync (I was going up-down-up-down, and you really have to fly ahead of that 1/2 A beastie), or because I had a plain ol' brain fart.  But it broke the engine off.  :-(

Nothing is really broken except it apparently pulled the threads out of the T nuts.  So it just needs new ones and away I go.  :-)

But I have to cut holes in the fuselage to replace those T nuts.  :-(

But it's covered with film, because I haven't flown for years.  :-)

Oh well -- back to the building board, and pay attention next time!!!

[George]

...Crashed my new Nobler for the first time today -- I thought "up" and it went "down"... 

Gee Tim, you're the only guy who's ever done that.     

Good luck with the repairs.

George

[Russell Shaffer]

I have had advice to use Dubro t nuts.  They are apparently much stronger than some of the others. 

[Bill Heher]

I would also suggest that you pull the tank and check the mount beams and structure behind the firewall. If you hit hard enough to pull the bolts out of the blind nuts, there may be additional damage to that you can fix now instead of after you finish the repairs on the front end.

[Tim Wescott]

I would also suggest that you pull the tank and check the mount beams and structure behind the firewall. If you hit hard enough to pull the bolts out of the blind nuts, there may be additional damage to that you can fix now instead of after you finish the repairs on the front end.

Thanks Bill.  I usually remember to do an after-crash teardown and inspect -- but only usually, and you've just raised the probability that I'll remember!

[Tim Wescott]

I have had advice to use Dubro t nuts.  They are apparently much stronger than some of the others. 

I've got an order in to Micro Fasteners for some T nuts, if they come in soon enough I'll test some to destruction and see.  Or I'll just make some on my lathe, which is an extreme solution but would certainly work!

The really odd thing is that I recovered some of the hold-down screws that had pulled out of the nuts, and I saw no metal filings (or just plain threads) on the screws.  I would have expected _something_ like that if it'd done the nuts in.

So there's a chance that I did something Really Stupid putting the thing together (brain farts don't always happen when the plane is in the air), and I'll find some perfectly good T nuts when I finish cutting balsa.