HELP. Super cub lost signal while climbing, can't find it.

[logsta11]

I went out flying my Super Cub today. I was climbing when, all of a sudden, my plane lost signal.
As far as I am concerned the plane kept climbing up so I can't find it.

Will the plane have kept climbing on full throttle and elevator input (how I had it) until it ran out of battery or do the Super Cubs have a safety feature?

Please help, my plane is lost over some farmland but I don't know if it kept climbing and flying until its battery ran out or if it just lost power and returned to neutral elevators and glided down

Thanks

[pug205]

That's quite distressing logsta11. Did you have your name and telephone number on it somewhere? I hope someone finds it and returns safely to you if it was marked as such.

[sham]

If it lost signal, and the electronics on the plane were still functioning normally then it should have gone to idle throttle and held last stick input on the elevators. It would therefore have stalled and started to descend.

If, however, something went wrong on board and that's why it lost signal... It could be anyone's guess what it did - you would assume it would have lost power and simply glided in, but electronics do funny things when fried sometimes. Hope you find it.

[coupe1942]

Not that it will help for the problem your currently having, but maybe in some future flight. I tape in a business card on the inside of the fuselage that has all of my info on it. Business cards are so cheap to make that you can personalize them with as much info as you wish. They are light enough that they don't add much if any weight to the plane and essentially nothing to the CoG. My hadwriting is so poor that I can't even read it most of the time, so the business card works better than a handwritten not for me.

Once the plane is out of sight and lost, it really matters not what it will do, as there are likely a dozen different scenarios it could chose. No buzzer or tracking devise onboard, so the best thing is to start guessing as best you can and go from there in searching. I used to fly a small gas powered chopper that had a nasty habit of getting lost from the playground where my young kids and I always flew it from. It would head over the housetops and then disappear. We lived in a different time back then, as neighbors looked after one another. Somehow, even though it was not marked with the info as I suggest, someone would always bring that little chopper right back to my home within a day or so. They would always say that they saw the kids and I flying it or that they had heard some neighbor tell them that we were the ones who flew it. Must have lost it a dozen times and each time it was always brought back to us. I was amazed that no one stole it or kept it, but we lived in different times back then, I suppose. It had no place on it to put the info on an attached card or note.

Be nice if there were some type of beeper alarm, but it would likely just be a battery drain when installed and not loud enough to really help locate the plane with, anyway. Remember that trees are not your friend when searching for a lost plane. Don't overlook looking through each of them in a search. White planes are likely going to be more difficult to spot than colored ones, I suspect. Good luck in your search. If you at least have some idea as to where the plane was last spotted when in flight, it may help reduce the area you need to be searching in. Again, good luck with it.

[flydiver]

Dec 28, 2014 13:56:48 GMT 1 coupe1942 said:

Be nice if there were some type of beeper alarm, but it would likely just be a battery drain when installed and not loud enough to really help locate the plane with, anyway.

There are:
www.lostmodelalarm.com/
www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/__20578__Turnigy_Be_Found_Lost_Model_Beeper.html
www.valuehobby.com/gt-power-lost-model-alarm.html
www.dpcav.com/xcart/Lost-Model-Alarm.html

They are pretty loud. Won't go miles but work if you get reasonably close to them if not sealed off inside a foam coffin. My buddy had one work when it went lost it in the woods well over a 1/4 mile away and he didn't see where it went down. Luckily I've only needed them for finding in tall grass....so far. They are almost critical for sloping being at the mercy of the lift. Most newbies ought to have them, but they only figure that out too late.

The battery drain issue is irrelevant since it's going to go dead anyway if you don't find it. When not active (flying) it has no appreciable drain.
Note-I got some really cheap Chinese ones. They worked but had a unfortunate tendency to go bad > loudly, really obnoxious. Get something from a reliable company, it's insurance not a gamble. If you want to gamble.....don't use one.

[coupe1942]

The funniest item finder I ever saw was at Wally World one day when I was shopping there. I kept seeing this balloon moving just above all the packages on an isle about 3 isles over. When I walked down that isle out of sheer curiosity, I found a lost kid with a helium balloon tied on a long string to his rump. Smart Mama, I suspect. :-)

I could not get the first link to work for me, but probably my old computer. My hearing is bad enought that I really never even hear crickets chirping. Means I don't have to listen to my wife's snoring either. :-) These are certainly cheap enough. Do you have to splice them into the wiring or where do they attach? Does the end have to be replaced to work on a Deans or XT60?

[flydiver]

They fit between the RX and servo, just plug in. As long as there is servo movement they don't go off, a timer is built in. Stop the servos for a period of time or turn off the TX with the battery attached and then they go off.

Do a search on [lost model alarm] and get lots of hits.

[coupe1942]

I watched a review on YouTube of the Turnigy model one, but the piece failed to work in that review. I ordered 3 of them just to piddle with them when they arrive. I am a bit worried about where I would mount them and the size, as space if pretty limited and I don't want them to lay on any servo arm or wire or such in the plane. Have to wait and see how they work out when they arrive. Shipping is about the same cost as the three pieces ordered. I no longer live near my HobbyTown store, so shipping on HobbyZone parts usually nails me in the long run, but local taxes do the same if I purchase here in TX. Ebay prices are all higher than HobbyZone ones. Any rate, something to piddle with in the future. I always love new toys like that. :-)

[flydiver]

If I can get one in the battery/RX compartment of a Weasel you should have no problem.
The buzzer is about the size of a small grape. The wires can be coiled or taped out of the way.

[hghost]

another reason to fly LOW and Slow......