Lost one to th SAW Gods today.....

[Chilli]

Tested a couple SAW boats today while getting ready for trials. While running my beloved Insane FE30, she had a nasty blow over.. never to be seen again. It was like Davy Jones swallowed her up. We got in the retrieval boat and there was absolutely no sign of her. I had the sponsons filled with two part foam, pool noodle down the sides and a little addtional floation in the cowl. The water she was running in is pretty deep so I doubt she got stuck in the mud. A Neu 1521 and Hydra Ice went down with her. OUCH!!!

[G-UNIT]

That S*#!S.

[egneg]

Heavy duty bummer Mike!

[Doug Smock]

Mike, I'm sorry to hear that bud.
With all of that floatation, and none of it surfacing, I'd do a bit of dragging on the bottom. In Huntsville we used approx. 6' of 1/4" angle iron with rope tied to each end to recover my N Mono. It didn't take long to make it pop up and I salvaged everything.

[Make-a-Wake]

Lost this one at 65 mph..................underwater for a week, the motor still works fine to this day, but it made me sick, I paid a diver a hundred to find her for me.

[SAW- USA]

Just don't see how it would sink with all the floatation ??? All my boats are open hatched with gas motors and at the most they just bob up and down . Alli use is pool noodles and just 1 down each side with some on the hatch . Sorry to hear that !!! Hope you find it

[drwayne]

The 2 seconds before failsafe has driven some of my more acrobatic toys deep into bottom mud... B(
Drag the bottom !

[Fluid]

I am sorry to hear of your loss, I've been there. But realize that even deep water can hide an FE SAW boat on the bottom. In 2002 at Legg Lake the German team lost a rigger in 10+ feet of water on Friday morning. Sunday evening they knocked around on the bottom with a LONG pole and up pops the rigger - with just an ounce of water inside (good tape job!). It had been firmly stuck in the mud for 2-1/2 days. Remember that the motor is running full tilt when it submerges, and it takes a second or so after the antenna disappears underwater for any failsafe to kick in. The boat will keep on going like a crash-diving nuclear submarine until it hits bottom.

That said, it is tough to put enough flotation in any FE-30, impossible with 4S2P. One club member learned the hard way this Spring when his 4S2P boat lost the hatch and was gone forever. You need ~29 cubic inches of flotation for every pound of boat weight, and the sponsons are around 32 cubic inches each - only good enough for a bit over two pounds between them. Add another 40 cubic inches for the foam in the main hull and you are 'way short of enough flotation to support the nearly 7 pounds most FE-30s weigh. With that big 1521 instead of a Limited motor you were even worse off.




.

[srislash]

I feel your grief Chilli,I still have not recovered my Shocker yet.

[LuckyDuc]

Head out to the pond tomorrow with a drag like Doug mentioned. I bet she'll pop up.

[detox]

You need ~29 cubic inches of flotation for every pound of boat weight,
.

Thanks Fluid ! We need more people like you that are willing to share good info.