Deep Reaper Final Adventures (and crash)

An exciting, action-packed compilation of the best flights from the last few months of my FPV Deep Reaper's life, featuring lots of fun proximity flying at various locations around Colorado's Front Range. At the end is the video of my plane's unfortunate demise when I accidentally flew through the signal beam of a TV tower on Mt. Morrison, causing my elevon gyros to lock up, sending the plane into a death spiral straight into the top of an outlying rock formation at Red Rocks Park (it was in a closed area, so no one was around). Skip to 4:34 for the crash.

I recovered the plane the next day and while the airframe was a total loss, I was able to salvage all the electronics except the batteries and GoPro, which was so destroyed it had even lost its memory card (the only piece I never found). Thanks to my SquareTrade accidental damage warranty, the camera will be replaced with a Contour Roam2 which I think has better colors and contrast than the GoPro 3 White Edition I had before and has a better form factor for my next plane. I am currently building a Ritewing Zephyr II to replace my Deep Reaper.

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Comments

Carl La France March 25, 2013 at 4:50pm

Sorry for your Loss Patrick Awesome video
Patrick McKay March 25, 2013 at 12:58pm

I did fly my old plane over Mount Herman on the Rampart Range last summer. Haven't gone down there lately though.
Patrick McKay March 25, 2013 at 12:51pm

Oh and Nick, yes that was another RC plane near the beginning. It does kind of look like a full size if you're not paying attention to scale though doesn't it?
Nick Scott March 25, 2013 at 12:49pm

Yeah, I apologize for the confusion. When I went back and retread the post, it was clear what you meant.

You picked some nice spots. Have you ever gone up to Rampart Range Road and flown around there? I bet you could get some great mountain scenery in addition to your awesome footage along the hogbacks.
LanMark March 25, 2013 at 12:44pm

yikes.. well the wattage that those things put out is crazy.... you might as well put your airfoil in the microwave oven... which probably isn't all that far off. Sounds like you need to work on shielding your electronics and fly that again.. if successful market your solution as anti-RF shielding.
Patrick McKay March 25, 2013 at 12:34pm

Yes I just passed through the signal of the tower. I didn't hit the tower itself. :) The HD footage right before the crash is from another flight in the same area the week before. I stayed above the tower that time so I never flew through its beam.
Nick Scott March 25, 2013 at 12:27pm

Doh, thanks LanMark, I totally brain locked on beam. Didn't even register he meant the signal. I live in Denver and know what Tower he is referring to, somehow I got it in my head he somehow dinged it, I was looking for it and never saw it.

That is a powerful tower transmitter, I can see that creating havoc with rc equipment.
LanMark March 25, 2013 at 12:13pm

Yikes.. wow.

@Nick it sounds like he didn't hit the tower but the beam from the antenna locked up servos.. wow.

That is pretty crazy.. so how did you get such awesome video if you lost the memory card? Was the HD video from another flight in the same area?

Wonder what about the beam caused the lockup.. and not just everything to go crazy.
Nick Scott March 25, 2013 at 11:55am

Beautiful footage, at the :35 second mark, that was another RC Aircraft, right? The first pass I thought what on earth is he doing, but then I went back and watched and the scale in comparison to the two seemed more like another plane.

Hitting the tower was more subtle than I thought it would be. For some reason I expected more of a violent decent.

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