Steve Houghton 1

I use laminating film directly onto the foam, then iron on shrink film over the top for colouring. The lam film provides incredible stiffness & strength and helps to prevent those little dings & dents you get when you knock the wing on the car door etc.

It's good to hear of a youngster wanting to learn to fly model planes. We definitely need more of them to keep this hobby alive.

Check out my latest video, slope soaring in a very light breeze from my favourite hill here in S Wales.

I would set landing brakes as per the manufacturers recommended settings but try it out at height, NOT on a landing. That will give you a good indication of any refinements to the settings that may be required. And if it all goes horribly wrong at height, then you have time to put the brakes away and land without them. Make sure that at 17mm aileron movement that you will still have extra movement to control roll.

I hope that those kids who are currently taking an interest in drones, multirotors, whatever you want to call them, will go on to fly proper planes or helis ?

I was invited to the Eglywsilan MFC summer BBQ and aerotow day near Caerphilly/Pontypridd where a great day was had by all, including the kids. We definitely need to encourage more kids into our fab hobby.

Being a glider guider, and mostly flying from slopes, I often find myself flying alone, which I always find amazing as my local slopes are some of the best to be found anywhere in the UK. I think at the moment people are just trying to catch up with the living they lost over the last 16 months.

The visitors loved it! Said it was the best sloping they'd ever experienced.

Sloping on the awesome Crest. What a fab session that was, apart from the little bit of rotor I experienced on landing which put a small crack in the fus.

A couple of days after having interviewed and flew with John Woodfield at Perranporth for my YiuTube channel, I was again flying just a little further along the coast at St Agnes. What a great bunch of guys there, making me feel welcome and chatting all day.

I have seen models covered totally in clear lam film, doculam, whatever you want to call it. I built one of these but decided to cover the wings & tail in a traditional transparent film.

Definitely a must fly slope, then head around the corner to fly at St Agnes around by the coastguard hut. Watch next Monday's video to see that ?

Graham - if you go to the YHA building, walk through the courtyard there then turn left and walk up the dirt path to the top of the cliff, that practically brings you onto the north facing slope overlooking the beach. Carry on to the right and just past the pile of stones and you're on the westerly facing slope where John & I flew.

That's brilliant Stephen ?

Hey guys. I recently went to Cornwall on holiday, took a few models with me, and made a video interview with John Woodfield and went flying with him on the cliffs at Perranport. Here is that video.

A few of us slope soarers have made PSS models made from correx, built from free plans designed by a bunch of guys in South Africa. Here is some video taken in 2015 of a Impala and Mig 3 I think.

Nice video Steve ? I love the sound the rotor blades make.

Funnily enough I asked this question on a Facebook group page last night as I have a large motor glider. The recommended prop for the motor was either 16 x 8 or 15 x 10. I'm not wanting speed but a better climb. The response I got was a larger prop and smaller pitch will give more thrust, the other gives less thrust but higher speed, and he too used the car gears analogy. So I've fitted the 16 x 8 which I will try tomorrow.

For me I use the GoPro 7 mounted on my cap for when I'm filming myself flying, so it's using the internal mics, and the sound quality isn't bad, for a GoPro, and certainly good enough for the sounds of motors etc. If I'm filming in windy conditions, (which I usually am as I fly slope mostly), I add a small Rode Wireless Go 2 mic, clipped to my T shirt but underneath my jacket so that it doesn't pick up too much wind noise, (which can be very annoying on playback). This is a new purchase for me which I've only used so far in testing but is looking very promising as it has 2 x transmitter to 1 x receiver, so I can have a mic & clip one to my buddy and the chat is recorded between the two of us. If I'm filming others flying then I mount the GoPro on a short selfie stick and use this when I'm chatting to the camera as I make vlog style videos. I always film in 4K 24FPS, unless I want some slo-mo action when I up this to 60FPS or 1080p 120FPS. The advantage of filming in 4K is that in post editing you can zoom in by a good 50% without losing sharpness and the model doesn't look like a dot in the distance. The disadvantage is the file sizes are 4 x that of 1080p. Some of my YouTube subscribers don't like too much wind noise, some do, others don't like music & others do, so I compromise by having both, but at balanced sound levels, so you can hear the wind and other sounds in the background.

Check out my latest video featuring the vintage Cleveland Viking belonging to flying buddy Nick. What a lovely model this is!

Over the last few weeks I've been watching the activity by the RAF's Rivet Joint & USAF equivalents over the Black Sea and USAF Global Hawks flying at 53000ft over Ukraine very close to the Russian border.

I have a X Models Whisper, all moulded 2m which has mostly flown from the slope. However it does have a tow hook and I have launched it on a hi-start a good few times but mostly only in light conditions. The model is light but does have provision for adding ballast into the wings.

I video almost every week for my YouTube channel. I currently use a GoPro 7 with a GoPro hat clip. This slides onto the front of a peaked cap and so makes it very easy to reach up and turn the camera on/off. The stabilisation of the GoPro 7, 8 & 9 means that there is no awful bouncing if you are walking with the camera on. I have also just purchased a Ulanzi cage so that I can add a Rode Go 2 wireless mic so I can mic up myself and a flying buddy so that we can both chat on the video without getting too much wind noise as most of my videos are on windy slopes. I can also take the camera out of this cage and fit it into another cage, with the wireless mics and onto a selfie stick for looking into the camera and chatting. One tip for you is to film in 4K, (if your computer & editing suite supports this) as your model will look very far away. Filming in 4K means you can zoom in by 50% in post editing without losing any sharpness or quality and your model isn't a dot on the horizon. Check out my videos to see. HERE

Check out the final Micro Bird of Time only video. Next week we are back on the slope for our weekly flying action.

And the 4th part of this series where I fly from the slope, although it was too windy and the wind was quite a bit off the slope face, it performed remarkably well.