There’s always a first for everything isn’t it? Today I had a very interesting flight, something to be added into the existing pre-flight checklist and I hope it will never happen again.
I broke my first propeller, something that every paramotor pilot will go through. However, instead of breaking it during take-off or landing which is the most common cause, I broke it during my flight.
During take-off I noticed that I was veering to the right that requires me to counter it with the left brake. I realized that the harness’s counter-torque buckle was set a bit too high by the previous pilot causing me to sit tilting to the right. So I had to do a left weight-shift while working on loosening down the seat buckle.
As I was adjusting the buckle, I heard a sharp smack and I figured that something must’ve touched the propeller. I turned and saw the right brake handle was stuck at the cage’s nylon net. I placed it back on the magnetic holder, then resumed fixing the seat buckle while I was flying in a big circle maintaining altitude.
When I was done and started flying in a straight path, I grabbed both brakes and put the throttle to more power to gain further altitude… that’s when I heard the engine suddenly pops, rattles and starts wobbling like mad.
At first, I thought it was something wrong with the engine because lately among my flying buddies there has been several engine failures due to tuning and broken parts. It was wobbling so badly that if I continued flying, I’d probably looked like a flying epileptic. So I stopped the engine and glide back to basecamp. I didn’t have enough altitude to make the full turn for the runway landing against the wind, so it was almost a cross-wind landing. No problem with the landing, just a bit hard because I landed almost right after making the turn. Nobody wants to land in a tail-wind.
Once landed, I saw the propeller was broken. I’m not quite sure why other than because of the brake handle but it looks just fine, though there is a mark of it being grazed by the propeller.
My question is, how did the brake handle managed to get stuck at the cage’s nylon net because that means the brake line was not in enough tension causing it to be sucked by the propeller and stuck at the net. Could it be that the brake lines were too long? but as I recalled, the brakes weren’t dangling any more than other wings that I’ve flown before. If it does, then it would have definitely hit the propeller immediately during take off when I let go the brakes to pull the seat in.
Why does it only happen almost 10 minutes later? This is something that I’ll investigate for an answer.
Anyway, I consider myself lucky today and a few lessons learned. The brake line could have got in further from the nylon net and gets entangled with the propeller which means it’ll be a nose dive spiraling down straight to the ground from 500ft.
Sky’s CIMA K2 is among the world’s most recognized brand, it’s everywhere in YouTube and dozens of good reviews from independent pilots. Could it be manufacturing defect or could it be something else? I’m definitely not happy about this and going to ask Sky Paragliders if they could give any insight regarding the matter.
But, this won’t stop me from flying! :-)
p/s : here’s a video of me taking-off, courtesy of a friend who was there to try out paramotor but decided to cancel it after seeing what happened.