First Quad ... first crash

I woke up this morning from dreams of flying.  I've been thinking a lot about quads and FPV and last night I dreamed about it.  Fortunately, I have the most understanding wife in the world and she said "Sounds like you should go get one."  Well, if you're going to twist my arm behind my back, fine then!

So I called around to Teknikmagasinet and CoolStuff and the finally Hobbex before I found what I was looking for, which was a Hubsan X4 with camera (later to be identified as the H107C).  I've chosen this as the entry-level for me as it is, frankly, the lowest price with an on-board camera.  Turns out that the H107C is out of stock pretty much everywhere in the local area except for Hobbex at Burlöv Centrum (Malmö).  As luck would have it, they happened to have the most attractive model (red with silver stripes) in stock, and that's what I bought, along with an extra battery (which I sheepishly confess plugging into the USB phone charger in the car on the way home).  Eager?  Me?  Let's just say that I had the whole thing unpacked and the manaul read while waiting in the car at the grocery store while the wife ran in to get a few things.

Speaking of unpacking, I found the advertised red quad, controller, extra propeller blades tool, charger and battery all where they should be.  The manual I found under the plastic tray.  Where's the propeller guard?  I guess I'll have to go back to Hobbex or Teknikmagasinet and get one.

So after painfully waiting through dinner, evening rituals and getting the kids in bed, I got to take the little red X4 (dubbed Little Red, as opposed to Secretariat, aka Big Red) out for its maiden flight.  Being the natural born genious, I took it out behind the building to the nice, small, enclosed, half-asphalted yard.   Two words: Bad Idea.  Asphalt and plastic flying models coupled with newbie pilot makes for disaster.  I kept things under control for the first battery.  Everything went well.  The X4 is stable, but I found it to be quite sensitive, even in "normal" mode.  I was quite heavy-handed on the controls and poor Little Red did its best to keep up.

So, in with the second battery!

Now I'm an experienced pilot.  Time to see what this little guy can do!

... would be a good candidate for "famous last words" for a novice RC pilot.

I took Little Red up to the second-floor level of the building where I thought I'd do a little peek-in on our kitchen window.  Things got turned around pretty quick, and left became right, back became front, and up became up became up became up.  So Little Red sailed out over the back gate, hovered bravely over the street and drifted steadily away until the voice of Panic took hold of me and cut the throttle.  Lesson #1: Dropping a Hubsan X4 from 15 meters onto asphalt WILL break an arm and a motor.
At the very least.  Good feelin' gone.