Today I took the Vanguard out for a short test flight. It shows I haven't flown a hover in over a year.
It unloaded itself from the trailer
It was obviously keen to fly after being stood up for the past three years or so. Anyway it unloaded and done a waltz with me before I parked it up while I moved the trailer and put my life jacket on.
I went to fly down the slipway and it wasn't responding to rudder input, so Becky dragged it a couple of feet then it went off down the slipway, but I had no directional control
, not impressed so far, then I realised that I had lost my thrust
WTF. On closer inspection it was obvious why. The stainless hinge pin had come out of the belt tensioner. I put the pin back in, & noticed that there was supposed to be a split pin in the end. I hunted in the car and found a couple of keyrings, so I threaded one in one side, but the other side there was no pin sticking out of the frame as it was level with the frame, so no obvious way of stopping the pin from coming out again
, So I thought about it for a minute and threaded a cable tie through the key ring on the end of the pin and secured it to the thrust frame
That was a good enough bodge for now, but needs to be sorted properly before I take it out for a longer test run.
Anyway video shows how it performed. It gets over hump easily and I didn't get any water spray on me.
I need to finish off a couple of small jobs and make a better hinge pin for the thrust belt adjuster. The biggest job I need to do is make and fit a foot brake, as the hand operated one is too awkward as ideally you need three hands
I've been told by Becky that I'm not allowed to sell it as she wants me to keep it and use it. We'll see on that one
, but it did seem to fly nicely for it's first time out.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKLeJXmE7DA&t=7s