The joy of slope

[Jump Jet]

thanks for that guys

[Big Bandit]

Hi All,

 

Just tried the Slope-hunter link that Tim posted absolutely brilliant, pumped Cold Ashby into the sat nav and off out now for a recce, to find Honey Hill. Can always de-motor the Easy Pigeon or the Zaggi, while I get something more suitable built.

 

Cheers,

 

Chris.

[Terence Lynock]

Take out motor, tank and piping and weigh same, stick it lump of church roof to same weight, job done, climb on house roof, chuck it off and see what happens.......

[Terence Lynock]

Hi Tim,

wot Holiday Inn's/Travel lodgy type places etc are there in youe area?, wife type person wants to gu up t'Orme which looks like a good idea to me........

[John Privett]

Jump Jet and James E - as already suggested, have a look at the slopehunter website. You're on the edge of the area that Gary covers with the site, but Ivinghoe Beacon is a major slope that is covered and is probably your closest decent slope.

 

There's a 'google map' associated with slopehunter that shows all the slopes on slopehunter, plus a few slopes that don't quite warrant a mention in the main site itself. There are three of those a little north-east of Ivinghoe which might (or might not!) be more local for one or both of you. The map is here.

[Tim Mackey]

terence...I am in Colwyn Heights, about 10 minutes from the Orme.

There is a travel lodge in Colwyn bay ( brand new one ) and I think there are Premier Inns in Llanddno, and Llandudno Junction.

Lllandudno has zillions of hotels and B+Bs of course .

[Terence Lynock]

May pop up for the weekend as soon as the weather looks something like promising, was looking at hiring a caravan up around Rhyl/Llandidno but as there is only the wife and myself it works out expensive up to early September then I may be back at the hospital for treatment, not sure how things will go.

What with two courses of chemo, two house moves to south Wales then back again and feeling like death warmed up for most of the last two years means my present models are either unfinished or unflown so if you want to play test pilot I will bring a few with me.....

I have joined the almost-local Long Mynde Soaring Assoc. but with the changable weather I have yet to put in any flying time there, next week doesnt look too promising either so I may be finishing off the work in the house.

[Big Bandit]

Posted by Terence Lynock on 05/06/2011 17:59:29:

Take out motor, tank and piping and weigh same, stick it lump of church roof to same weight, job done, climb on house roof, chuck it off and see what happens.......

 

 

I Only like heights when I'm sitting down, strapped in, and have a joy stick between my knees or have firm ground under my feet.

 

Chris.

Edited By Big Bandit on 05/06/2011 21:13:26

[Paul Hartley]

Just had a look at the slopehunter site, is there one for the NW of england as some of the places around Preton I thought might be used are not on it,.

[Steve Houghton 1]

Paul, try this

[Steve Houghton 1]

Home by 6 this evening after work, the sun was out, and a nice breeze was coming in South Westerly ish from the Bristol Channel. I couldn't resist it so went to one of my closest slopes, Mynynd Meio, near Caerphilly and about a 20 mile drive along motorway and dual carriageway mostly so 20 minutes ish and I was there.

 

At the top of the mountain the wind was blowing about 15 - 20mph and I launched the Wildthing. She flew ok but I couldn't get any real speed up to do any aeros so I brought her in and tried the Hawk. Now the Hawk isn't a great one for doing aeros but she definately prefered the conditions to the Wildthing.

 

All in all I had a good hour and a half before the light began to fade and the lift began to die away.

 

One thing though, we're in June and I was wearing 4 layers, woolly hat and fingerless gloves cause it was sooooo cold brrrrrrrr.

[Paul Hartley]

Steve, Thanks for the info. Looks to have more of the sites I would have expected for this area. Just need to get out there now

[Steve Houghton 1]

Paul, you won't regret it, go for it. I'll be out there again tomorrow evening after work.

[Steve Houghton 1]

Great day up the Meio, (S Wales). I got there at about 10am with light, (10mph) westerleys. Couldn't fly Mickeys at The Bwlch due to an F3F competition.

 

The WT was doing ok but the wind kept shifting off the face and a lot of lumpy air along the ridge.

 

I was joined by a couple of the regulars later on when the wind had picked up to over 30mph. The lift further out was phenomenal with their 2 metre plus mouldies going great guns, going up like a lift then diving down into screaming runs along the face.

 

Looking forward to next weekends flying then on the Monday I'm going down to Cornwall and flying from Rame Head and Whitsand Bay, can't wait for that.

[Tim Mackey]

Me thinks he is hooked

( sorry Mrs Houghton )

[Peewhit]

You have to be hooked to dare to go out flying on Father's Day

 

I went out and flew the Wizard Compact - only 15mph on the edge at best but till awesome performance.

 

Time for your fist mouldie yet Steve?

[Steve Houghton 1]

Ha ha. You know what? I'm single and so I can go flying whenever I like without having to ask permission , and my son lives in Cornwall, which is why I'm down there next week, so I had no restrictions on flying at all yesterday, woohooooo.

 

My first mouldie? Mmm, funny you should mention that Peewhit. I've been looking at THIS

[RGPuk]

Posted by Steve Houghton 1 on 20/06/2011 10:30:50:

 

My first mouldie? Mmm, funny you should mention that Peewhit. I've been looking at THIS

 

I can't profess to know anything about the Bladeer 1.5M as I haven't flown one but have flown very similar configuration machines.

 

My reintroduction to the slope after 20+ years away from the hobby, was with a Wildthing and then straight to a 2M Luna II mouldie. I would heartily recommend considering a machine with flaps as your next. The control, precision and ease of landing with CROW to use, far outweighs the extra cost and a couple more servos, giving you a much more flexible toy for the investment. Thanks to Luna, I quickly learnt and acquired the confidence to play with pocket rockets with fewer flappy bits and a slightly less forgiving nature when approaching terra firma. Having said that, when buying a Flying fish 60" recently, I still got one with flaps.

 

Luna has been, and remains, a fine flyer for me 12 months down the line, although if I had the choice again, I'd probably choose a Typhoon from Sloperacer purely on looks. Peewhit's 'yer man to refer to for those. His excellently documented assembly and flying experiences, with invaluable programming information (if you are on Spekkie gear) is available on this forum.

 

Addictive isn't it?

 

Ro.

 

[Steve Houghton 1]

Ooooh yes, it is very addictive and yes, I am hooked.

 

There is the DS version of the Bladeer, the only difference from the standard Bladeer seemingly being that it is fitted with flaps, so yes, that is the version I would go for. I've seen the affect CROW has on landing, it's like slamming the brakes on just for a moment. Landing without it would just be tooooo scary

 

A guy I fly with has a Flying Fish, and that would be an option, but he told me there is a weak point where the wing meets the fus and so I would need to carbon up that area otherwise it'll just keep cracking.

 

He's just got a Strega and cracked the fus in front of the wing on landing on its maiden flight, and it wasn't a particularly hard landing. It seems it was built purely with lightness in mind with no compromise to take into consideration that we do have the odd harder landing. So a new model which cost hundreds of £'s is having to be repaired and modified already. I realise this is an F3F competion plane but even so ..........

[RGPuk]

Weak points seem to go with the territory - we want them fast and light, but also to take inelegant arrivals and maniacal yanks on the stick. Luna has suffered from a fuz seam split near the fin - more stress related than impact derived. Easy fix though.

 

Don't be put off by needing to beef things up when you suspect a weakness - the processes are pretty straight forward. Keeping a very small kit of good 30 minute epoxy, glass cloth, carbon tow and cloth is all that's usually required.

 

I have indeed put some more strength into Fish's wing seat from the outset. It's needed primarily because of the rather large access hole provided by the manufacturers. It was a hours job to sort.

 

One thing I should say about the Fish is why I bought it. Although it can be made to go like stink, I saw one being flown during an aborted F3F competition, when everyone else simply couldn't fly as the wind was virtually zero. The only other machine able to join the Fish was an Alula!

 

Ro.

[Steve Houghton 1]

The Fish has been in my mind also, and it's within budget too. This is one decision I'm not going to rush into, (unusual for me), and I'm also keeping an eye on the 2nd hand market in case a bargain comes along.

[Peewhit]

Steve,

 

Definitely go for flaps which will give crow breaking.

On a half decent Tx they can be mixed to move with the ailerons therefore you lose nothing and gain a lot.

 

This is not the first Strega that I have heard of to break its fus on what seemed to be a reasonable landing.

 

All models have weak points and it is a question of identifying and reinforcing them, although general fus reinforcement at the boom end is not easy and will add weight where you do not want it.

 

My Typhoon was one of the first to come out and in comparison with a new one which I saw last week seems to have both a much stronger fus and wings.

 

It does seem that RCRCM have "lightened" their more recent models - nothing to do with production costs of course!

[Steve Houghton 1]

Theres a Mini Dragon for sale on the BMFA web site for £150. I've dropped the seller an email. Fingers crossed.

 

Off to near Torpoint in Cornwall on Monday for a few days and was hoping to get some flying in off Rame Head, especially as the winds lately have been SW or W. So what do I see on XC Weather? NNW I guess that means a 100 mile round trip to St. Agnes Head then . Ah well, some things just have to be done!

[Steve Houghton 1]

So I've been away on holiday in Cornwall for a week and what do I find? Not one post on The Joy of Slope thread So come on guys, what have you been up to?

 

Well as I've said, I've been staying near Torpoint in Cornwall and only a 2 mile drive away from Rame Head and Whitsands Bay, but with the winds forecast to have north in them, any sloping seemed nearly impossible down there unless I did the 100 mile + round trip to St. Agnes Head .

 

Anyway, I took the Wildthing down to Rame and launched her into a N Westerley not ideal but flyable. I was only up for a few moments when I was joined in the sky by 2 Peregrin Falcons which kept trying to attack my plane, and if i put it into a dive, they would fold their wings and dive after it. Spectacular doesn't describe it .

 

The following day the wind was westerly and blowing square onto my slope and the lift was amazing, and sure enough, the 2 falcons would appear every time I launched into the sky. I just wish I could have videoed it whilst flying. I may have to invest in one of those head cams.

 

And now I'm home and went up to the Bwlch today, flying with my two new slope buddies, Chris and Mark. We had to share Mickeys Slope with a load of paragliders but they were struggling for lift as much as we were. Still, we did manage some fun when the thermals came through.

 

Whilst we were there, there was another guy, Kieth, and I think he was from Bristol, testing a new prototype for a 2m + aerobatic soarer which he was telling us he hoped would be available for sale towards the end of this year after already spending two years development on the project. The plane is called the Kinetic, and boy did that thing go, and could he fly. Enormous great loops, square loops, hesitation rolls both horizontal and vertical. He would let a thermal take it up high then bring it down vertically then along the face of the cliff and a huge rate of knots. Amazing stuff!

[Former Member]

[This posting has been removed]