First flight

Yesterday we had the first flight of the Bixler airframe (flies very nice) and the first flight in AUTO (not so nice).

First I noticed that I had the aileron serovs reversed. Quite idiotic that I never realized that earlier.
Then I noticed the same for the elevator. But I never checked if that was the radio or the autopilot. I just reversed them in the <servos> section.

My pilot approached the test area nice and stable but a little bit low. Too low as it turned out.
Soon as it was in Launch mode it started diving full throttle into the ground. The pilot had no chance to catch that.
In retrospect it's clear that we should have expected that and should have done that at high altitude.

I still have to investigate the cause. But I think the elevator channel was reversed in AUTO.

Damage report:

• Belly landing at high speed.
• Cockpit ripped into pieces.
• Motor and motor mount ripped off.
• GPS flew off and the helical antenna broke off.
• Camera mount snapped.
• Lost tail wing
• Front foam severely bent and snapped.

All in all it's fixable. She will be flying again in a few days and a few pounds of hot glue later...