Never mind the weather - who has been flying, then?

[Stephen Jones]

I went to My Flying site for a Swift One.

 

 

 

Steve

Edited August 17, 2024 by Stephen Jones
typo

[Peter Jenkins]

Finally made it out to the patch to test the Flight Coach board a fellow aerobatic pilot had built for me.  As ever, our Chairman had left the patch looking like a bowling green!  About 5 pilots had been there in the morning but when I got there at 4.30 I had the patch to myself.  As you can see from the photo below, the approach heading west requires a fairly close conversation with a large tree.  There used to be trees this size all along the edge till the farmer was persuaded to let us cut them down and he used them for firewood!

 

The aircraft I'm flying is an Oxai Citrin.

 

 

It is, IMHO, the prettiest F3A biplane I've ever seen and it flies really well.  Far better than I can fly it!

 

This was borne out by the flight paths I reviewed for the 3 flights I flew.  More practice needed or rather fix the errors that Flight Coach has shown.  That might take some doing but at least there is an independent review of what I actually flew.

Edited August 17, 2024 by Peter Jenkins

[Adrian Smith 1]

Nice patch, Peter, even nicer aircraft! ✈️ 

[Nick Cripps]

Just a quick trip out to the local field today to check out my newly-repaired Carbon Cub. Although it was pretty windy, it needed

doing so it's ready for the Don Valley MFC open weekend over the bank holiday.

 

[Jake Bullit]

Cracking day at the beach on Friday, had a few flights each on the FMS Rafale and Flyfans L39, the Skipper/Dragenfly got to do some"skipping" off the pools too .

Club mate Chris was down with a couple of good size IC planes, though he was experiencing engine problems and had to do a couple of dead sticks.

Images are just screen grabs from video.

[leccyflyer]

Just the one flight for me this weekend - very blustery and turbulent conditions saw most folks just having a blether, with very little flying going on. Still - got us out in the (very) fresh air for an hour or so.

[Ron Gray]

Some good flying today at one of my club’s scale competition day. I didn’t fly the Hurri in the comp but had some nice flights either side of it. In this last flight I didn’t bother to fly it at scale speed but allowed the Laser 200 in-line twin to rev!

 

 

[GrumpyGnome]

No flying today but ran in the little petrol engine in my P51. Hopefully, the wind will disappear sometime, so I can actually fly it!

[Daren Cogdon]

No flying here, either, but I did start cutting foam on something that is NOT a Spitfire....!

[Paul De Tourtoulon]

The only wind here is from club members eating Merguez sausages, on our Friday night fly in and BBQ,  I wont bore you with my flights of the week,

Bell 222, PC 9, Hurricane, Drone racers, Kwik fly etc,,,,,,,

Edited August 19, 2024 by Paul De Tourtoulon

[payneib]

I got batteries charged on Saturday night ready for a good forecast on Sunday. Apparently the METO hadn't actually bothered doing a forecast and just made it up, so I spent the day discharging batteries.

 

The good news is, I've finally convinced the 11yo to put his tablet down for five minutes and get his CL build finished ready for Buckminster next week. He could end up flying in the Nats next Friday. 😂😂

[Adrian Smith 1]

Having a good run of flying at the moment. Early bird catches the worm or something like that, as first thing there was not a breathe of wind and it was due to pick up later in the morning. So out came my landing "floater", the Pilot Slick 67".  I always introduce a couple of clicks of down elevator as I prepare to land otherwise she just floats on for ever it seems. I am not too fussed about whether that's due to thrust lines or battery position ( they are as far forward as they can be), mainly because she doesn't get an outing very often. All I know is when in the air doing aeros she is just great fun to play around with.

 

I even managed to get the strip cut afterwards, just had to work around the full size boys who use the strip with their RV8.

 

[GBG]

A good day at the field. Managed to maiden the Xfly Glastar and Eclipson Horten. Also had a couple of flights each with the Xfly A-10 and T-7A.

[GrumpyGnome]

I promised to post some videos of Kev's big beautiful YAK54, 170cc DLE Twin...

 

 

 

 

Edited August 20, 2024 by GrumpyGnome

[GrumpyGnome]

Couple more....

 

[GrumpyGnome]

And the links:

 

https://youtu.be/B6tpn8Yy6TA

https://youtu.be/B-mGcloZhCc

https://youtu.be/g0Pzagd2_7I

https://youtu.be/kl8B4TerQus

 

 

 

[Adrian Smith 1]

Nicely flown by Kev 👍

The way she held up in the wind on finals made it look like it was windy! Nice clips.

[payneib]

1 hour ago, GrumpyGnome said:

And the links:

 

https://youtu.be/B6tpn8Yy6TA

https://youtu.be/B-mGcloZhCc

https://youtu.be/g0Pzagd2_7I

https://youtu.be/kl8B4TerQus

 

 

 

Is Kev feeling ok? I've not seen him do that much right-way-up flying in all the times I've seen him fly, combined. 

 

Maybe he's just turned his build board 180°.

[GrumpyGnome]

That'll be why it was so cheap - it's upside down!

Edited August 20, 2024 by GrumpyGnome

[Ron Gray]

We had the next round of the Wacky Warbirds competition at the field last night, combined it with monthly club meeting and BBQ, it was somewhat windy. As per usual there was a bit of carnage followed by rapid fixing in time for the next round.

 

Typical scene, 2 working, 3 onlookers

 

 

Which turned into 2 working and 5 onlookers (well 6 if you include me!)

 

 

 

[Daren Cogdon]

Ooh, Thunderbobs!  Or are they Banzais?  

 

Which reminds me, I still haven't built mine yet! 

[Ron Gray]

In the photo, 1 Thunderbob, 3  FW

[GrumpyGnome]

2 workers, 6 onlookers, 13 opinions...

[Martin Harris - Moderator]

There was a time when the only two members of our club who regularly flew in testing conditions were myself and another regular contributor to this forum. Some said we were brave - although most shook their heads at our apparent stupidity. 
 

However, things are changing with the ready availability of light but capable foam models and I was delighted to see all the attendees at our regular Thursday afternoon gatherings taking to the air yesterday in winds forecast to be gusting over 40 mph, with no damage or uncomfortable incidents other than the odd non-damaging tumble when gusts hit around touchdown. The low energy retention and groundspeed helped a great deal in this respect. 
 

The most popular models for these conditions are little belly landing Arrows Hawks, which handle all conditions admirably.  However, we flew a variety of propeller and EDF models although prudence led to some deliberate wheels up landings with retractable undercarriages. 
 

The moral?  Maybe start to explore the envelope in slightly higher wind conditions than you’re used to with suitable models and I think some of those complaining that they never have an opportunity to fly these days may find a lot more fun and flyable days appear!

[Ron Gray]

I love flying in strong wind conditions and fly my XFly Tasman and my balsa WOT4 (4s - 6s). Vertical landings are the aim of the game together with flying backwards or trying to mimic a kite, great fun.