Bad day flying....

I say that, but I was flying so it can't be all that bad. Windy afternoon in Harrah OK, I decided to put up the Ringmaster anyway even though the more experienced were waiting things out. The Ring is pretty hefty at 34oz so I don't get really concerned about the wind. I took the opportunity to practice some level and inverted flight as well as some inside and outside loops as I figured it was too risky to do anything else. All was going well until I decided to do some consecutive outside loops.

I learned something new about wind. You should bias the wind so when you are doing outsides you dive into the wind to slow the plane down. I didn't do this and my second loop went full bore inverted pancake into the grass as the wind took hold of it like a slingshot.  I have never seen a rudder explode into so many pieces!  Also ripped the tail off. That plane was grounded for the remainder of the day. The wind calmed about an hour later so I decided to put up the Clown. I found that my inside loops were near impossible to pull out of. With full up and a hard yank I could get it to pull out just barely. I ended up just flying the tank out as I didn't need another wrecked plane.

Once landed I went over to look at the plane as I knew something was wrong as it was acting way nose heavy. This wasn't possible as I have a Fox .25 on the nose and it weighs 1oz less than the .35 I took off.

A quick look at the elevator and I found that the center pin hinge had broke free and along with pushrod flex it was allowing the elevator to lay almost flat when in full up deflection.

I plan on doing some sewn hinges to fix it and using a safety pin as a pushrod guide. So I pretty much played pit boy the rest of the afternoon while everyone else had fun.