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

[Colin Carpenter]

Got 3 flights on my Sebart Miss Wind at 9am. Very little wind but overcast.  Patch is already waterlogged in places but can still drive in ! Got a feeling it’s gonna be same as last year now - wet !

[leccyflyer]

Gorgeous day today - deep blue skies, bright and sunny, frosty at first but then warmed up later. Almost flat calm at first , with no more than 3mph wind later on. Very pleasant out in the sun and got eight flights in with seen different models, including my 400th flight of the year. Whist pootling around with my wee profile depron Spitty dogfighter I was attacked several times by a Peregrine falcon - I thought it was unusual for a Red Kite to take that much attendant, but was concentrating too much on my model to get a really good look at the bird, Clubmate Mike said it was a Peregrine, which makes more sense - probably thought the Spittie was a pigeon. Tried to get some video of my SE5a, but the video glasses continue to defeat my best efforts at switching them on.

[GrumpyGnome]

Wind abated, rain stopped. 

 

Had a couple of flights with the Wot4, and the baby F4U - these little foam warbirds truly are remarkable.

 

John made some nice noisy smoke with his big T-Rex and Laser (the old FunFly). 

 

Peter got some tuition on the club Apprentice. Which is so much easier to fly than his Ranger-style model - until that's trimmed at least!.  There can't be a better model to learn on than an Apprentice....

 

Spent the evening playing with my new FrSky gps module........

 

[Learner]

Woke up to rain, forecast for rain all day (was actually ok for 3/4 hours) then rained again. So no flying again today. 

20+ mph winds tomorrow, 30+ mph Friday.

Spent more time mowing the strip than flying from it this year!

At least house isnt flooded like many and indoor flying starts soon.

 

Edited September 25, 2024 by Learner

[payneib]

That was a rather brilliant day. 

 

The Pup had its first flights after it's service - just over a year since it last flew. Some minor issues with the fuel filling set up to resolve (it needs a longer, smaller bore fill line), but she flys wonderfully with her new servos and Rx. She always looks gorgeous in the air. I desperately need to go 1/4 scale - it's such a different flying experience, when you open the throttle and instead of more speed, you just get more drag. 😂

 

One of my bestest toy aeroplane friends finally made an appearance after a summer of excessive overtime, and we got to do some good old fashioned "Wotty Bashing". Just a shame it wasn't our trio, which is even more fun. So much fun in fact, my ugly Acrowot XL got a little bit more ugly, when the pilot finally lost his head in one of my full lock, full throttle, length of the strip, aileron rolls. 😂

[Peter Jenkins]

Got out fhis afternoon and zlthough there was a strkngish wind blowjng in mansged to fly 4 practices for tomorrow's competition.  On the patch we tend to be shielded from the full force of the wind - see photo of the wind sock.

 

 

However, as you can see from the model's position, the approach gets very close to that big tree and thar does cause a few problems!

[GrumpyGnome]

As well as @payneibs Pup and Acrowot, we had:

 

visiting member John (who has now returned to the dark satanic mills of West Yorks) chucking his ic T-Rex 700 and old Laser fun fly around

 

Peter getting some tuition on the club Apprentice before the master tx said "instructor has control" when he didn't  - nobody did. I'll need to return today to retrieve the undercarriage from the Hawthorn... also he finally took his own little unbranded bixler-type model home in one piece after flying it a few times

 

After a couple of false starts with his radio (no bind, then reversed throttle), Duncan finally got some stick time with his large Wotty

 

Michael had some nice flights with his BigFoot and Skysurfer(?). Then I checked out his Lightning warmliner before he got to grips with it

 

I had time between tuition, chatting, drinking coffee and watching for a few flights on my Wotty, but couldn't fly my Double Trouble because the clunk had come adrift 😞

 

Good day at WHMFC.

 

 

Look at that beautiful sky - perfect for glow fuel smoke trails!

 

Looks nice out again. Hoorah.

[leccyflyer]

Cracking Saturday's flying at Kerloch, with a reasonable turnout and wide variety of models flown. In preparation for the eventual maiden of my Flair Beaufighter I gave an extremely rare outing to my Balsacraft Blenheim. I mentioned that I hadn't flown the Blenheim since before Covid - but when I checked I found it was 2009, not 2019 when I last flew the twin. Had forgotten how nice and relaxing the model is to fly - twin sp600s provide ample power turning 8x4" from a single 3s1p 3200mah pack. I always wanted to fit the Eric Leadley transparencies to the nose, but never managed to get them. The Blenheim has a fixed undercarriage, so you have to pretend that she's on a permanent landing approach. Derek got some great shots, but other than that had a bad day, with his much loved Super Chipmunk crashing very badly - probably a write off- with apparent radio failure.  😞

 

 

 

Some passing hikers took an interest in the models and asked if there were any Spitfires - after asking if Jim's 109 was a Spitfire. Luckily I had one that I had prepared earlier and so ended up flying my Flightline Spitfire IX - everyone loves a Spitfire. Managed a rare hand launch myself with my wee Martlet, which was flying alongside Jim's Brewster Buffalo. Flew my WR FW190 off the dolly and she was as good as always, before a strange noise from the motor and freewheeling prop with sudden loss of power - called the deadstick and the FW190 is so well behaved in the air that I was able to make a stable turn and safe, though quick, downwind landing. Took that as an omen and didn't fly her again. Broke out a pair of Spitfires for Derek and Jim to take on my venerable Volantex Me109E, but they didn't lay a glove on the Emil - great fun and a nice finish to the day.

 

 

 

 

[Daren Cogdon]

That Blenheim is really smart.  I would love to see the full-sized one at Duxford (haven't seen it since before its accident in the early 2000s).

[leccyflyer]

Thanks Daren. I'm planning to take the fixed undercarriage off and use the Blenheim as a test bed for launching a twin from the dolly, which might result in some changes, or even a slightly larger dolly than the one pictured.

 

Saw the full size at Sleap many years ago and she's magnificent. The full power rolling take off by the Harrier tore up a huge patch of the tarmac runway, but that didn;t bother the Blenheim at all, she set down beautifully on the grass, good as gold. It was a great show, with Corsair, Sea Fury, Blenheim and a Hurricane IIRC, all operating really close up and accessible, moreso than at the larger shows.

 

 

[leccyflyer]

Another good morning flying today - high cloud, but a bright sky and though there was a very gentle crosswind conditions were good. Half a dozen of us turned up and there was a bit more blething than flying, but still some good flying and nice models on show. I was persuaded to fly my Flightline Spitfire IX and enjoyed that - a typical Spitfire flight for me, culminating in a decent enough landing but tipping up at the end before falling back down on her tailwheel. Flew some other models, but batteries were still suffering a bit from the cold, despite my hot water bottle in the lipo sack - I'm taking a minute off my timers for the rest of the season.

 

Most impressive model of the day for me was the EFlite Viper EDF flown by Mike and his son Chris - very rapid with superb vertical performance as well as brilliant ground handling. Really nice display from this wee jet.

 

[Peter Jenkins]

Only 10 made it to the start line at the second last UKF3A Aerobatic competition today at the Leicester MAC.  The wind at ground level turned out to be very misleading as it was very gentle.  Once you got airborne though, the full strength of a quite strong wind at 90 deg ish to the flight path had a few ending up in the next county!  However, despite some interesting turbulence on approach there were no landing accidents.  

 

Today was my first competition flying my new Anthem, it's in the foreground of the photo.  The aircraft is still part way through it's trimming journey so I'm hoping that finalising that issue and getting more practice with the aircraft - I'd only managed to notch up 13 flights before today - will help me to improve from my consistent position in the 5 competitions I've managed to fly in this year - last!

 

[Geoff S]

45 minutes ago, Peter Jenkins said:

Only 10 made it to the start line at the second last UKF3A Aerobatic competition today at the Leicester MAC.  The wind at ground level turned out to be very misleading as it was very gentle.  Once you got airborne though, the full strength of a quite strong wind at 90 deg ish to the flight path had a few ending up in the next county!  However, despite some interesting turbulence on approach there were no landing accidents.  

 

Today was my first competition flying my new Anthem, it's in the foreground of the photo.  The aircraft is still part way through it's trimming journey so I'm hoping that finalising that issue and getting more practice with the aircraft - I'd only managed to notch up 13 flights before today - will help me to improve from my consistent position in the 5 competitions I've managed to fly in this year - last!

 

 

Ken Moss is a member at Ashbourne and a keen F3a flyer. Was he there? 

[Philip Lewis 3]

40 minutes ago, Geoff S said:

 

Ken Moss is a member at Ashbourne and a keen F3a flyer. Was he there? 

 

No Ken wasn't at this competition, I don't know why but he didn't withdraw he never entered, maybe a prior engagement? 

[Daren Cogdon]

Tried to fly one of my FT Spitfires this afternoon, but the wind was too much, and I landed after about 90 seconds!  

[leccyflyer]

Colin's FliteTest Spitfire was flying beautifully this morning. Mind you, he was flying a real one just a few weeks ago!

 

[Daren Cogdon]

Nice!  Where did he do that?

[leccyflyer]

He went down to Duxford a few weeks ago Daren - a couple of weeks before one of the two seaters came up here to Scone. I think if I did such a flight I'd want to do it from Biggin Hill.

[GrumpyGnome]

The Ents were very active today - 2 pilots, 2 tree incidents :-( and the trees are not massive!

[Daren Cogdon]

5 minutes ago, leccyflyer said:

He went down to Duxford a few weeks ago Daren - a couple of weeks before one of the two seaters came up here to Scone. I think if I did such a flight I'd want to do it from Biggin Hill.

 

I would probably do Biggin as well.  I nearly went up to Scone when the Spitfire was up, but I ended up getting sidetracked!  😶

[David Davis]

Very calm weather in Central France yesterday. I flew the Big Guff and the Calmato. Chalk and cheese I know! With the Big Guff I just concentrated on flying tight circuits up and down the runway. With the Calmato I concentrated on perfecting every aerobatic manouevre I am capable of! I also took my engine test stand and ran-in my recently acquired Laser 50. I have fitted new piston rings to it courtesy of Gavin Carter. Five of us turned up and for once the number of i/c powered models exceeded tose powered by electric motors.

 

No pictures were taken because my camera is "hors service," but here are some pictures of both models from the archives.

 

 

[leccyflyer]

100% high overcast today, so no piccies, the NE wind strengthened through the morning from about 6mph early on to double that by lunch time. The wee fellas' stabilisation was working overtime to help deliver beautiful formation flying with two Spitfires at first and two Me109Es later. These have all been repainted, so we aren't flying the exact same aeroplanes - the station keeping was excellent though, especially from the Spitfires. Flew my Martlet and wee Spitty dogfighter as well, for a good couple of hours flying - getting chillier though and that NE wind coming over the trees was pretty turbulent. Nice to have the hut to shelter in and warm your hands on a cup of hot coffee.

[GrumpyGnome]

Steadily raining non stop here. But never mind - first indoor flying session of the season!

 

Low turnout , with just 5 of us so we lost a little on the cost of the hall...

 

Surprisingly, my Crack Yak Superlight flew OK. Despite spraying it with bleach to get rid of the detritus of the clematis growing in the pigeon coop! Blade 130, and K110 helis had an outing too. Some of my batteries are definitely on their way out... I'm not alone.

 

Ian brought his Night Vapor to play Russian Roullette with the bigger planes and helis. It survived! His Crack Yak refused to bind so stayed on the ground.

 

Another Ian brought his bigger Blade, 2 charged batteries, an armful of batteries to charge, and a charger. But no lead to attach the batteries to the charger! Somehow, he managed to make his 2 batteries last over an hour by judicious use of short flights and long chats.

 

Paul brought three models but all three seemed to suffer from dodgy batteries.

 

Finally, Tony has at last finished his new Click. And bought a heli! He soon broke his old Click, and managed to scare us all with his heli. Then came his new Click....

 

 

Yes, it's going backwards. Unsurprisingly, it's now broken......

 

Edited October 1, 2024 by GrumpyGnome

[Daren Cogdon]

Probably the shortest flight I've ever had with this Spit - lasted exactly 60 seconds, or three circuits, before the wind forced me down.....

 

....and I nearly took out a sheep!

[Richard Harris]

Managed to escape out last Sunday to a bit of a get together at HOEMFC, Coventry way.

Most of the flying was done in the morning as the wind got up in the afternoon and was very turbulent lower down. 

Considering the weather forecast we had 40 odd autogyros turn up and a couple of new faces who tried their hand on the buddy box.

 

A few snaps.