On the EDF front Phil Wiltshire’s Alpha Jet also successfully flew on Sunday. It is a 3 cell model with no landing gear so hand launch/belly land, produced by Art Tech. It flew very well and Phil and I managed a bit of ‘formation’ flying with the 2 EDFs, great fun. I forgot to take any pics of Phil’s model but I have attached one of it from the SMC site.

Hope to fly again tomorrow, the winds should be lower… 

Cheers
Andy

In January the weather limited flying a bit, but the mid-weekers have managed to make the most of the decent days. Bob ended his run of crashes by working out that they all involved the same rx. A large hammer has now ended that particular problem, and Bob has regained his confidence to the extent that he took and passed his ‘A’ cert.  This obviously got right up Jim & Ron’s noses spurred on Jim & Ron and they also took and passed their tests. Well done to all three.  Several others are ready to take their ‘A’, you know who you are…

Our much beloved El Presidento managed to bury his long suffering fun fly a few weeks ago, that’s the first crash he’s had since he flew into Steve’s plane a few months back. This time it was rather more final and requires a minimum of a new fuselage. A post mortem revealed the cause, a duff rx battery. In my usual sympathetic way (once we had all stopped laughing) I commented that the battery had been fine for the last twenty years or so, but it turns out that it was actually fairly new. A timely reminder for everyone to check the condition of their batteries regularly. The good thing about the crash was that Don uttered a loud “Wooaa” to attract our attention as he lost control and then managed to bury the plane near enough to the patch for us all to enjoy. None of the usual novice error of crashing three fields away so nobody sees it!

Keith was obviously impressed by our Chairman’s vacuum forming demo at a recent club night, and he duly    moulded a cowl for his new Eflight Advance, saying he thought the ARTF’s exposed electric motor needed finishing off. It worked a treat, the lack of cooling air finished the motor off first time out! Nice try Keith, it’s just something else we can blame Mick for! 

We haven’t seen Nick sneaking off work to fly midweek so much recently. Rumour has it that his wife has finally realised that each time he volunteers to get the shopping at Tesco he arrives home 3 hours later smelling of glow fuel. Another reason for going electric! 

Finally:
A military pilot called for a priority landing because his single engined jet fighter was running ‘a bit peaked’.  Air Traffic Control told the fighter pilot he was number two, behind a B-52 that had one engine shut down. ‘Ah’ the fighter pilot remarked ‘The dreaded seven engine approach…’

Colin Cowplain

I would also like to thank Steve Montague for all the work on the website update.

No big raffle prizes this year, so there was the prize giving for 2011.

Andy Palmer was presented with the club man of the year.
Jim Hobday won the most improved flyer and was presented with the Green Column.
Ron Vears was presented with The Nail Man for winning the Chuck Glider for the second year running.

Don then presented Andy Palmer with the Presidents Trophy.

Mick also presented A Certificates to:-

Bob Hill
Jim Hobday
Ron Vears

Well done chaps.

The 3 New A Certs.    photo by Andy Palmer

NickS

Rod’s career with the RAF spanned a total of 50 years. He first enlisted in January 1956 and retired twice. When he rejoined he became a flying instructor including four years as a “Trapper”, that is an instructor of in-flight refueling. 

Rod gave a history of in-flight refueling backed up with a selection of photographs and videos. The first recorded use of in-flight refueling was in 1924 in the USA. A “Wing Walker” transferred five gallons of fuel in a can from one aircraft to another whilst they were both in flight. Later experiments used a weighted line dangling from one aircraft so that an airman on another aircraft could grab it and then haul across a hose. This was fraught with danger because the weight used was around 70lb. 

In 1928 the Americans did manage to keep an aircraft in the air for 27 days with the aid of in-flight refueling. 

The RAF began their first trials in 1929 using Vickers Virginias. 

Rod continued his presentation until nearly 10 o’clock and was thanked with a warm round of applause. He offered to return to give a talk on spinning aero planes.

At the start he flew a Hi-Fly glider then moved on to a Hi-Boy trainer. Since then he has flown more gliders, Helicopters and then moved on to electric powered flight. Now his main interest is gas turbine powered aircraft. He began with a Kangaroo Delta Jet and then in 2002/3 he bought a BVM Super Bandit. The models first flight was in August 2005 and has now amassed 243 flights. The total costs of the model was approximately £7500 which was not surprising when the motor costs £2500, the undercarriage was £1000 and the 11 servos were £75 each. This model has been flown in Florida on a couple of occasions securing 3 trophies. Best Sports Jet & Critics Choice were won on.

The first trip and Outstanding Graphics on the second visit. Steve continued for an hour and a half before being thanked by the members for an eye opening, very enjoyable evening.

I hope you have found the club nights interesting , we have had guest speakers as well as club members giving demo’s , talks  and quizes ETC. The problem we have is, the more we do the harder it is to come up with new ideas, so if you know anyone who can give a talk on any subject or if you have any ideas of your own please let me know.

Throughout the year a few of my fellow contributors have been a little harsh on some of you, especially the chairman, who on the whole has taken it  in good heart, so I would like to thank him for being a good sport, but also take the opportunity to warn him, and the rest of you, Dan Dover and his buddies will be watching, very closely.

Last year we had the launch of the new web site. It is far easier to upload articals so it would be great to see other members thoughts in writing.

Traditionally at this time of year we make resolutions, so I have had a few ideas, Mick ‘s is to still be  flying the Yak in March, Andy’s is to get a proper aeroplane and stop messing with the extreme hair drier, Ron’s is to get back to IC where he belongs, Ian and George have the same, it’s to use the throttle throughout the flight not just to take off and land !! and finally, mine is to stop booking Nick Clement to give talks and demo’s, because if I don’t I will be breaking the restraining order he has on me.

Happy new year to you and your families.

Steve Hastings.

Following a few weekends of test flights, the new Yak  was not living up to expectations, this was mainly due to a very twitchy elevator. Initial thoughts were a rearward C/G, so this was moved forward by a large margin, this appeared to help but the elevator was still very sensitive. Further checks found that the expo on low rates was set the wrong way, so increasing the movement around the centre’s further compounding the effect of a  rearward C/G. This was corrected, and the Yak was now a much improved model but still seemed to be suffering from an elevator not centring properly.  The servo’s fitted are metal geared digital’s. Once on the ground we inspected the model in more detail,  we soon  realised how LUCKY Mick had been. The elevator was found to be not centring, the screw holding the drive arm onto the servo was too short to tighten the arm on the spline, allowing the arm to be pulled off the servo without removing the screw, the servo’s had been fitted with the hardware supplied but tended to rock from side to side, as they had been fitted into holes designed for bigger units.
 
We have all seen how much effort Mick goes to when building a model and how pedantic he is regarding the small details, and there is no doubting his craftsmanship. But I do think we can all learn from this story.

As I have said in previous reports, it doesn’t matter how much experience you have, mistake’s still get made. One way to avoid these problem’s being missed is to ask  a couple of your colleague’s to check over a new plane prior to test flying, it may even be worth coming up with a tick list for new planes, as it is all too easy to overlook the little fault which brings the model down. The model did return again but the elevator problem persisted, so Mick has now fitted better quality servo’s, “watch this space”. 

Ron Vears also had a “luck was on our side” incident this month. His was due to the type of linkage supplied in a lot of ARTF kits these day’s, coming loose causing the elevator trim to keep changing, and making the model very difficult to fly. Only luck stopped the pushrod pulling out completely. Moral of these two story’s, ARTF models  are great value and very quick to get flying, but you have to consider how the manufacturers keep the cost down and the speed of assembly up!

This month also saw the launch of the up dated, more interactive web site, Steve Montague gave a presentation on the new facilities. I hope some of you will use the ability to comment on my blogs to fight back, But don’t forget the whole world can see what you write, so keep it clean!!

I walked over to two members who were deep in conversation, what I heard went a bit like this, ” I don’t know about you g****e, but when I am watching videos on the internet, after the first 30 seconds I tend to fast forward to the money shot”. Was this appropriate small talk for a sunday morning, I had to enquire further. Apparently, according A**y  S***h after you have seen the take off and a little bit of the flight ,the best bit of the video is the landing, and he is a great believer in the old saying , it’s not how you start, it’s the way you finish. what were you all thinking!!!! 

Finally, I will wish all my avid readers a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year which dose not rely on so much luck. 

Paul Piddinghoe