Just in case anyone needed a reminder: Dogs and helis don't mix.

Cross-posted from Helifreak:

It's such a nice afternoon and I had been such a good boy by doing the washing, vacuuming and lawn mowing I thought I deserved a bit of heli time. I took my Logo 500 to the local high school, which has an extremely large area of grassed fields (they share it with the local intermediate school). There was a guy up one end practicing hitting golf balls but other than that the place was empty, so I figured it was safe enough to start flying as long as I stayed away from the guy with the club.
Boy was I wrong. I took off and had just started flying a couple of circuits when a border collie came out of nowhere and started running in circles barking at my heli. I immediately started to hover at a safe altitude and did my best to look around for the dog's owner. I should point out at this point that I am a dog lover, and would be absolutely devastated if I hurt a dog with my toy.
I hovered for about 5 minutes, long after my timer had gone off and I was over-discharging my packs. Eventually the dog's owner strolled into view and seemed to think it was so funny that her dog was being cute and barking at the flying death machine. I quickly told her that the blades were spinning at over 2300 rpm and that if she didn't get her dog under control it would be sliced and diced because I was out of batteries and had to land.
What then happened was almost funny. As the severity of the situation started to sink in and she started chasing the dog around yelling at it. It was apparent to me that she had no control over the animal whatsoever. With my great dane I know that in the unlikely situation that she ignored my commands all I would have to do is do something more interesting than the target situation (usually just lie down on the ground is enough to get her to bound over to me).
Anyway, after another minute or so I could hear my headspeed starting to sag so I climbed as high as I could and shot a high and fast auto trying to put as much distance between the heli and the dog as possible, and held it in the air much more than I normally would, so that by the time the dog caught up with it there was much less energy in the blades. Luckily the dog seemed to realise at the last second that it might not be such a good idea to grab it and came up a few inches short. I landed hard, but on the skids, my first sliding auto, but had a tip over at the end. Doesn't look like anything's broken, but I can see what I'll be doing tonight.

Scratchd Podcast, Episode 1: Introduction and basic tools talk

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Welcome to episode one of Scratchd, the podcast for RC aircraft builders and fliers. In this Episode James and Sam introduce themselves and talk briefly about what basic tools are needed for various methods of construction.

What's the point? Carbon frame for Logo 500 & 600.

I spotted this over at RC Heli Resource - HeliDirect are apparently coming out with an aftermarket carbon frame for the Logo 500 and 600. I have to admit, I'm not really sure why you would bother, except perhaps for the "bling bling" factor. Mikado's CRP frames are some of the strongest and most rigid frames I've ever seen, and certainly, as the wreckage of my recent Logo 600 oopsie can attest, can handle the punishment. The only part of the stock frames I have had any trouble with is the bolts in the boom clamp pulling through the frames.