So we have had a few days decent flying weather over the past few weeks, a very pleasant change I even managed to get some gliding in on a couple of occasions with reasonable lift.
It was also nice to bump into our French branch club member Phil Leach who was over visiting. It was interesting that Phil said at his flying club in France lunch is taken at noon on the dot with a BBQ and large amounts of wine drunk before flying recommences for the afternoon session.
Perhaps that might improve some peoples flying, or perhaps not
Flying Field
The field has had several grass cuts now and is improving each time it is cut although I think the bump in the middle of strip has got worse due to the wet weather we had over the winter. In previous years this bump has reduced in the summer months as the field dries out.
Please be aware that after cutting there tends to be clumps of grass clippings on the strip this is due to the mower probably not set to summer settings yet.
These clumps of grass will catch your prop and indeed act as arrestor lines when you land so try and pick your landing spot away from them.
The grass in the car park has been cut /strimmed.
Overall the things are looking good and tidy
Flying Field Activities
So since the last newsletter there have been a couple organized events at the field.
Firstly was the ‘Nitro Mayhem’ day which as the title suggests was a day of glow engined aircraft.
Oh the joy of watching people flicking glow engines and wiping the fuel residue of the models.
The turn out was reasonably good with a varied selection of models many with mini tuned pipes on them and once on ‘song’ these models were quick and a credit to the strength of the glue holding the wings together.
I think I have mentioned this before but the Weston purple glow engines appear to be a very good engine and once tuned very reliable.
A few photos of the event
The big bi-plane in the photo used to belong Alan Wormwell he sadly passed away a good few years ago. Mark Conlin ended up with the model and did it justice on the day. It is powered by a very impressive YS super tuned four stroke glow engine, the tick over over on the engine is fantastic and once warm the engine will start by simply turning the spinner with you thumb and finger.
Now before you all bring me to task yes in one of the photos there is a foam EDF jet. Later in the day due to small number of flyers everyone was invited to fly what ever they wanted.
Sunday last gone was the first of our Fly-ins which are open to all flyers from any club.
The weather gods were not up for this at all and the format of the day turned out to be as follows
Take your model out to the pitts, get ready to fly, rain starts, take model back to shelter, rain stops and repeat.
In my case I got as far as a couple of circuits before the rain started
I have to say that the rain gods were out for Mark as the heaviest rain always appeared to fall when mark was about to fly, to compound this he spent a good portion of time trying to get his trusty DLE engine going.
I did offer him a 6s lipo pack but his reply was very un gentlemanly to say the least, he did get it going though.
One brave soul from the Runcorn club did turn up with his family and several models in his van, he did have a couple of flights with one of them
To offset the naff weather Jason and co did put on a splendid BBQ with burgers and sausages a plenty. A good BBQ tends to lift the spirits when the weather is poor.
I have mentioned before that as a club we do need to support these events.
A bit later in the afternoon the weather improved and I managed to show Steve Warburton how to create a control surface mix for his Valiant. This mix was to apply some down elevator when he he deploys flaps. The model now does a good landing approach as before it wanted to stick its nose up on approach.
Steve just needs to sort out the Saito engine now, its getting better but not quite there.
Now in the afternoon a very strange object was spotted being hand launched with mutterings of ‘That will never fly’
Well it did and very nice as well
I will leave you to make up your own joke about it
Training Night
Don’t forget training night is on Wednesday evenings weather permitting.
I would suggest looking at the Messenger ‘Flying Now’ group to check if flying is going to take place and you can ask the question with regard to club trainers availability.
Field Gate
Just a reminder if you are the last person to leave the field to close the gate and lock it, there have a couple instances recently where people have arrived and the gate is open.
Regards Chris V