Oh cheer, Spring's here, how much flying are you getting in?

[Alan Cantwell]

lovely day today, just as well, we had some warbird test flying to do, well, mixed luck, flew my zero, with a zenoah 38--superb, mate of mine fired his 88"hurricane up, oleos had compressed, causing the wheels to bind, over it went on the take off run, 20quids worth of prop turned to matchwood, oops, Mike flew his sebart suckhoi, great, came in for a landing, thought he would do a last prop hang, 40 foot up, engine cut, 40foot down, it met a tarmac covered bit of a planet, gawd, those things dont alf come apart well, cause? he had left the tank bungs in, and the poor old dle30 had sucked its last, still, back again next week

[Erfolg]

In this part of the country, where the sun always shines. We can fly most of the time!

Well I do exaggerate some of the time, yet not with respect to Sunday, the sun was shinning. I did have a problem, in that I was going to Royal Lytham, to spectate at an amateur Golf tournament. I was lucky in that my wife lamented and allowed me to go flying, as long as we were out of the house by 12:00.

This meant an early bird start for me if I was not to start speaking with a squeaky voice and go deaf from an ear bashing. Yet again, as all previous sunny mornings, I just manage to squeeze into the last parking spot, without going onto the grass.

I had taken my Delta, Nobler and my Basic. The Delta and Nobler all needed a bit of acclimatisation and understanding.

In the case of the Delta, I had flown it sucessfully on Friday. Yet now when I looked at it, the trimmed in Reflex was just not there. This made me a little apprehensive.

It is for me quite big for a under arm launch, being 1m span. I ran the motors up to full throttle, and threw it best I could, slightly nose high. Unfortunately it sagged to the ground before I could get to the sticks. A club member graciously offered to launch the model. In this attempt, the model just streaked away.

It seems I need a solution for single handed launching, other than pumping in a lot of up trim ffor the launch, any Ideas? The transmitter is a Futaba 8fg.

I had decided to investigate booth looping and rolls. I found with loops bags of speed are necessary, a speed decays rapidly with up elevator. The plane is perhaps undergrunted, when under load, as there is only 240W draw, not enough anyway to over come drag increases when looping. It does loop well, as long as the speed is maintained. The rolls are proving to be good, although slow speed rolls are very barrelly.

It was now when it caught me out, I started to investigate approaches for landing. I had slowed it down. I started to turn, probably a little tightly, when I thing, I tip stalled it. It immediately headed down, which was turned into a pancake type landing. This I think was done by the model. Non the less, I checked the model, it was launched again. More landing approaches were checked out. Which went without incident, then I finally landed it.

I have come to the conclusion that Deltas are far more draggy in turns and loops than Flying wings.

It was then the turn of the nobler. This had been refusing to loop. My first attempt was a large loop, done at speed, no problem. I then worked down to yanked in full up elevator, at speed, again no issues. In the end all my problems are related to trying to loop at to slow a speed, for this model. I again did some fast runs and rolls, quite axial. The story is a little different at slow speed, with my level of skills. The rolls very barrel like, tending to fall out of the inverted. Next time out it will inverted, bunts and chandles which will be tried.

Finally a flight with my Basic.

It was time then to say good bye to all my club mates, taking in the Sun, chatting and flying. So off home, showered, changed and then to Royal Lytham. Now when us modellers worry about safety, we worry about nothing, that is comparison to golf balls driven so hard, that these tiny missiles, whistle and scream through the air. On television, you cannot even begin to appreciate the speed. I asked my wife and daughter, what happens if you are hit with one? Well, if you stand where you are, you will be killed, if the ball is sliced. It did yet again make me think, safety is important, yet here is a sport with self evident safety issues, which are managed, without the recourse to a heavy handed approach. Yet with modelling some some unable to evaluate the risks and dangers with different types of models and sites, seeking a uniform set of procedures for a 20kg, petrol model through to the 500 gram park flyer.

Edited By Erfolg on 07/05/2012 12:57:21

Edited By Erfolg on 07/05/2012 12:57:51

Edited By Erfolg on 07/05/2012 12:58:10

[Daithi O Buitigh]

I think it all comes down to 'who you know', Erfolg. Most councillors and council officials either play golf or know someone who does, so the chances of them clamping down on golf courses in parks is as near zero as makes no difference .

However, very few of them know the first thing about model aircraft, so we get the short end of the stick

[Alan Cantwell]

gawd erf you going on about the CAA rules on failsafes again? give it a rest

[Erfolg]

Alan

I have no concerns about fail safes at all, very sensible, if available.

Daiths point is a very good one, we need to cultivate the public as much as possible, in addition we should encourage youngsters to enjoy flying toy planes like we do. I started with so called toys planes, and I bet many others have too. I guess the child protection laws are an issue for many clubs.

Edited By Erfolg on 07/05/2012 14:26:14

[Alan Cantwell]

[Chris Bott - Moderator]

Erfolg I just realised the looping problem model is a nobler. That's a control line model, you sure that one wing isn't bigger than the other? or the rudder isn't offset?

[Erfolg]

The weather was to poor here to fly on Wednesday, starting to rain as I was about to depart. Not stopping until it was getting late.

Today (Friday) did not seem promising, as it was obviously windy. Still the cat needed pouches and it is on the way to the field. So I went without much hope, knowing the cat had to be fed, or all hell would break out if only biscuits were available. The cat nags more than the wife on peak form.

As would be expected at the field there was one person and that person was me. As I opened the gate into the field, a Lapwing rose out of the grass, not 2m in front and sort of drifted over my head, before rising almost vertically.

I had taken my Sagitta, to cope with the wind, although not as strong as feared or anticipated, was there. I made a flight, which essentially comprised in of pointing into the wind. Looking round, I could see two Buzzards, they had risen from the ground it would seem, more importantly although at low level, were in a thermal, gaining height quite fast, still low down, going down wind quickly.

I tried a little harder and did manage to spin the flight out better than my initial efforts. The problem being, when I though I was in lift, the height gain was wiped out in coming back up wind. Pretty much a loosing battle. Lift was about, how far dare you go back to make use of it? Still the electric motor helped out here.

Back on the ground I was looking around, when I spotted that some Bullocks ( I only knew from searching for some one s model a few weeks back) a few fields away, were stampeding across the field. In the distance I could see something akin to a grey fog. From an experience in the Groges Du Tarn I guessed it was a mass of high wind and torrential rain. I guessed it was travelling towards me, at which point I picked up everything and ran as fast as my legs would go. A blast of wind hit me as i reached the car. I opened the boot threw everything in. By now rain had started, which tuned into a total grey out, with the car rocking, rain pounding on the windscreen and car in general.

When it abated I decided to go home, thankful that the model was not in the air at the time and I had safely got to the car.

[MikeS]

No flying now for four weeks or so. Part due to the weather and part me being hit down with a lung infection. Still had planned to go tomorrow but I charged the flight packs but forgot to charge my glow and starter pack. So will give it a miss and carry on building the P47 wing and go friday.

[Turbycat]

Feels like I've not had any flying for ages too!! A combination of lousy weather on my days off and overtime limiting said days off has really put a downer on it. Fingers crossed for the weekend!!

[Daithi O Buitigh]

I know the feeling - we had a lovely sunny day, so first I had to mow the lawn (to keep SWMBO quiet so I could head out) - halfway through, down came the rain

[MikeS]

Went down to Kempton this morning, the sky was clear but winds up to 13 knots. first off the my piper pawnee was having a sick day today. The 46fx was just not running right and I could not get a clean idle or pick up to full throttle. A bit of head scratching and a few adjustments to the enigne brought me to a dead end.

WIth the pawnee on the sideline my dads 20 year odd old Cessne 182 was pulled off the bench. This runs my 46ax that has always been touchy. However running sidewinder it runs great but this was also causing me problems starting. However after trying the normal tricks the ax jumped in to life and ran great.

So had some good flights but landing was a challenge as the wind was crosswind across the runway when ment I had to fly over the magic jumping out in front of you tree. A few bumpy landings due to the wind.

Back to the pawnee. Second attept on the engine got it running well so took the pawnee up for a good flight. At 8lb she handles the wind fine. Second flight the engine starting running rough again and sounded bad during the flight. Made an approach and landed.

A good days flying but very gusty. The pawnee's 46fx well I think I have a worn bearing so will look at that later.