A few weeks ago I started up yet another time and money consuming hobby, I guess I'm just a glutton for punishment.  This time it's RC flying.  So, me being me I decide to jump on in feet first.  I did a little searching online and decided, this doesn't look to bad, instead of doing more research, stop by the local hobby shop and get some advice, I decide to go ahead and buy a Ready to Fly (RTF) package that looked like a lot of fun to fly. 

So I buy this little 4 channel Cessna and can't wait for it to come in.  After a week and a half of waiting it finally gets here.  I open up the package and without really reading the directions I have the plane together and do a radio check.  Took about an hour to get the plane to gether and trimmed out and the radio check goes smoothly, everything seems to check out.  Now its about 9pm and the light has faded and there is no way i'll be able to test out my plane that night, but that doesn't stop me.  I figure, I'll just go out front and drive around in the street, can't hurt anything that way.  So out to the street I go, plane and controller in hand and not a lick of experience.  I turn my transmitter on, plug the battery into the plane and complete a control check.  Everything checks out so I'm ready to tear up the streets with my new Cessna.  I push the throttle up and it zips down my driveway and into the street.  Now this thing is moving pretty fast.  So off my plane goes zipping into the street straight as an arrow.  I see the gutter on the other side and start to moving the right stick to the right so it will turn away from the gutter, cause I'm used to RC cars and that is how you steer, but NOOO not on planes.  If I had any experience with RC planes I would have known that the rudder is on the left stick on a 4 channel plane, and all I was doing was moving the ailerons to the right, and anyone with any knowlege of planes knows Ailerons don't do jack on the ground.  Instead of cutting the motor, I panic, give it more throttle and right into the gutter it goes.  I run across the street explitives flying to retrieve my plane.  Luckily the only thing besides my pride that got hurt was a broken prop.  As I'm walking back up my driveway I figure, maybe i'll wait to test this plane out.

A few days go by, i've replaced the prop and re-trimmed the plane and am ready to try to actually fly.  It was a great night for flying, no wind, sun setting so no glare and not a cloud in the sky.  So I head on outside to give this thing a whirl. I remove the landing gear because the field next to my house, being not only too small to fly this plane, is also nothing but tall grass and dirt.  I try my hand and hand launching.  The first few attempts go pretty poorly, send it off, throttle up, fall out of the air.  I did that about 3 or 4 times.  Now I'm getting discouraged, but I figure I'll give it one more shot.  I pick the plane up, throttle up to half throttle and throw that sucker for all i'm worth.  It takes off.  I throttle up and start to gain altitude and then realize I'm running out of space I'm gonna hit the trees at the end of the field.  So again in my inexperience, I bank the plane to the right thinking I can turn away from the trees and gain enough altitude to clear the trees on the side of the field, but really there is not a chance in hell that is going to happen.  The plane starts it's right hand turn but isn't gaining much altitude so I give it fulll throttle, right into a tree about 40 feet up.  I run over to see the damange and see my plane hanging in the branches, main wing torn from the fuselage, but I'm not giving up.  I grab a few branches and shake that SOB for all i'm worth.  Lucking both my main wing and fuselage come falling the ground.  I asses the damage and the only thing I can see is I've lost a push rod on my main wing for one the ailerons.  I think to myself, that's not bad I'll just head on over to the local hobby shop and get a replacement.

I head on over to the local hobby shop and pick up all the parts I need to get my plane flying again.  As soon as I have the plane all fixed up, I ask my brother is he wants to go out back with me and see if we can't get this plane in the air.  He's like sure, this'll be fun.  So we head on outside.  It's another great night for flying.  I do my control check and everything checks out a ok.  I throttle up and launch the plane, it takes off.  But this time instead of heading straight forward it starts to veer to the right towards those damn trees again, guess I didn't have it trimmed properly after that last crash. So this time instead of trying the turn and gain altitude I ease of the throttle and then pull back on the elevator and give it more throttle thinking I'm gonna do a virticle climb.  Boy was I wrong.  Instead of doing a nice virticle climb it ends us doing a harrier and starts floating around the yard.  I let my breath out thinking at least I didn't pile into the trees again.  So now I have the plane stuck in a harrier pretty much floating around where ever it wants to go.  I've never done this before so I don't have a clue as to what to do.  I look over to my brother for some advice and he is just rolling on the ground laughing at me.  It was about this time the plane started to float over my neighbors fence and I'm thinking o shit what the hell do I do.  I'm thinking I don't want this plane hitting his house so I do the only thing I could think of, cut the throttle and let it fall out of the sky.  And it did just that, went nose first righ into his swimming pool.  Now that was fun, NOT.  So now I have to run over to my neighbors house and explain to him that I was flying my rc plane and kind of landed in his pool.  He was cool about it, laughed and let me get my plane.  Luckily there wasn't any damage to the fuselage or the main witng, but my battery, esc, and motor are toast. 

So over the next few weeks I'll be building and testing a GWS Slow Stick 400C.  I'll let ya know how that goes and post up some pictures and maybe even a video if I can get it to fly.

Peace for now.