Multirotors and Trees Oh My.

Having already smashed my Blade QX350 you’d a thought I’d be a little more careful.  But no.  On Matthew’s 6th birthday I thought I’d take the Hex out for a spin and document the White Death that had come down upon us the previous day.   If it’s going to be cold, might as well have snow.

So I strapped the legacy Contour HD camera to the Hex and took it out for a spin.

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Changes since the most recent flight included, the landing gear, and the weight of the camera.   Should have probably re-tuned it but I didn’t.

The plan was simple.   Start it up in the driveway, and execute an Auto-Flight that would circle the property filming the spectacular views.   Best laid plans.

Continue reading “Multirotors and Trees Oh My.”

Avon Storms

At the last tire change I put on a pair of Avon Storms.

I decided to try the Storms because many folks claim the are “the @#$@$”. Outstanding handling and performance as well as reasonable life.

I had to replace the first rear right at 6k, which considering I got a good 7k out of the previous Metzlers wasn’t what I had in mind. The front still looked ‘great’ although the handling was starting to deteriorate. I mounted a new rear and marched on.

We’ll 5000 miles later I was very sorry. The front went to hell at about 8000 miles total, but we were on our way to the Void Rally and didn’t have time. The tread still looked good but it had started to wear really lopsided.

After the rally I ordered up a new set of Pilot Road 2’s. Now weather and other factors meant it would be about 3 months before I’d get those mounted.

The following are photos of the Storms:

2nd Rear after 5k miles. Well into the wear bars but probably has another 2k left in it. Somewhat flat spotted in the middle but I’d venture out of those 5k miles, only 1200 are slab, so I’m not impressed.

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The front:

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I didn’t like the Storms and won’t buy them again.

  1. They took a crap load of weight to balance.
  2. I didn’t like them on tar snakes and painted lines. Very, very slippery.
  3. I felt their wet weather performance was only mediocre, not outstanding.
  4. Life is poor in my opinion. To me there were a step backwards from the Metz Z6’s

Chipotle Chips

Chipotle Chips when properly prepared at $.70 a bag, is a bargain. A hands down exceptional value.

Much better than say a small bag of fries from McDonald’s.

But getting a good bag of chips these days seems to be the exception rather than the rule. I realize Chipotle is growing like crazy and for that I’m thankful. But really, how hard is it to cook them ‘just right’, not over done, not under-done and with the right amount of lime and salt?

Lately it seems like that later step is skipped altogether. Without that lime goodness the chips are not worth a nickel, let alone $.70.

I really hope the trend changes, cause consistently getting bum bags of chips is starting to wear on me.