Phil's SCSA Newsletter
14/09/2007
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This month's Photo page |
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URGENTISSIMO FOR SALE Pat Teakle 6M ASW22 ARC, Provided with Multiplex retract, 7 metal gear servos, (1Voltz in Stab) + 3 Std HTorque ones Wing Bags, battery Backer, + 2 New 2400 4 Volts Sanyo, 1 extra elevator+ Free 10m Airteck Vinyl covering etc... £ 350........(I know I am desperate!)
photo at http://www.ebley.plus.com/limbo/et2.jpg
and http://www.ebley.plus.com/limbo/et1.jpg |
Indoor
flying Indoor
flying will take in Gloucestershire. Venue the
main sports hall Chosen Hill School, Brookfield Road, Churchdown, Glos.
GL3 2PL. Dates for
the autumn/winter 2007 are: Saturday
20th October, Saturday 3rd
& 17th November, Saturday
1st,15th & 29th December Also AMRC Indoor Flying
at Bristol Grammar School post code BS8 1SR map
SCSA Club Meetings Wednesdays 8.00PM at the Bear, visitors and quests welcome October 17th
a talk on aero towing by Steve Holland (confirmed) It is hoped to draw the raffle for two 60 inch for Shandy glider/electric at the next meeting
14th October West Mendip Soaring cross country WMSA BMFA event list for October http://www.bmfa.org/events/ev_oct.html
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At last year's club auction I bought a small power plane made by Mike the
web.
Last week I fitted some servos and a small motor. The motor is an
Airpower 300XT out runner, this was designed to power a light shock flier,
but flies this model around well enough. I have the wrong prop an 8 X 4
slow fly, I will try a 7 X 5 next, the way it leaps away from a standstill
but does not go very fast suggests it is under pitched. The motor is rated
1150 RPM per volt and has a maximum current of 5 amps, I used a 3 cell
1300ma lipo
I don't fly power very
well, the broken off rudder/throttle stick on my transmitter doesn't help,
it is beyond me how you are supposed to control anything with your left
thumb, this should be a good model to practice with |
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http://www.scsa.org.uk/video/redblue.wmv
19 megs720 x 576
or http://www.scsa.org.uk/video/redblue-small.wmv
7 megs 320 x 240 Both in Windows Media Video 9 |
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Aerotow at Redmarley D'Abitot
The event was organized by Etienne Dodane and was at a private micro light air strip near to Redmarley D'Abitot right at the Northern edge of Gloucestershire and I was invited by Doug Garland. We arrived for about 9:30 and flying got under way about 10 o' clock after we had consumed coffee and warm croissants (breakfast the French way). First tow was a Minimoa which looked very good in the air - a bit like a giant moth. Second tow was with Etienne's 7 metre Duo Discus glider. This was a magnificent looking sailplane I hesitate to estimate the cost but it must have been in the several thousand of pounds bracket. The tug pulled it into the air and they were both gaining height gracefully. Etienne then found that the Duo Discus was stalling on the tow and he decided to release. |
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As soon as he released the model went into a stall and on the
pull out there was a very loud cracking noise the Duo Discus completed a
loop and on the down leg of the loop gained a lot of speed and it was
clear that Etienne no longer had control of it. The model raced
downwards and then suddenly the wings clapped hands and it transformed
into an unguided missile. Luckily (not for Etienne) the Duo Discus hit a
huge tree with a very large bang in fact the noisiest crash I have ever
heard.The airframe was completely wrecked and most of it is still up the tree.
Only the nose cone came to earth. Within 10 minutes the police and fire brigade had arrived. Joe public had reported seeing an aircraft crashing!! After this incident everything went back to normal after about an hour of waiting for Etienne to make sure he was happy for the event to continue. We had Doug Garland, Don Jones, Alan Ester and me flying from the SCSA. There was a relatively low cloud ceiling and wispy clouds were being blown around and you had to get off the tow below the clouds. |
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I had a good tug pilot talking me through the first launch which was
brilliant and all under control. This being my first aero-tow I
was very nervous, the tug raced away and within about 6 feet my ASK18 was
airborne and climbing way above the tug. This was the right position and
the tug gain height very quickly. My ASK18 was rolling about a bit
behind the tug and the tug pilot asked if I had rudder coupled to
ailerons, I had and when switched out things were much better. I was told
to just keep the wigs level and not to bank in the turns - this was a very
strange thing to do because I was not really fling the glider at all, just
keeping it level - but it worked. The release was trouble free, the tug
throttled back and I hit the release switch and I was soaring. My first
flight was 14 minutes which I thought pretty good considering that I came
off at a fairly low altitude (compared to the pros.) The landings were
great, a big strip of mown grass, you couldn't go wrong. My second flight started well and then after being released I strayed into some cloud and disappeared. What a dreadful feeling it is to lose sight of a 4 metre glider about 800 feet up. I opened the brakes and squeezed a little down elevator and luckily it came back into view – I suspect it only lasted a few seconds but it seemed like minutes to me, I was very pleased to get down even though my hands were still shaking. I had 5 flights altogether which was quite enough for my nerves, but I could have had lots more, there were plenty of tugs and willing tug pilots. There were loads of pilots – say 15 gliders and 3 tugs. There were some very good and well known UK pilots taking part. Simon Cocker, to name but one, was flying a large Ventus 2 and he was performing high speed passes and aerobatics with his high energy sailplane. I enjoyed talking to him reminiscing about a PSS LearJet that I saw him fly in a model magazine back in the 80s and I bought a kit and built one. It was a real posers model but needed much more lift than our slopes provided so I sold it in Antics in Gloucester before it got broken. I enjoyed the event and might even be tempted to fit an aero-tow release to my ASW27 and then take it along top another aero-tow meeting next year. Thanks to Doug Garland for talking me into trying an aero-tow, he's been trying for ages to tempt - me and now just maybe - I might try it again. That's all folks. Bryan Tucker |
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The week last week
Monday, a very light easterly breeze, I did a bit of electric thermalling with Guy. My Highlight got to cloud base once
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Thursday at Frocester, enough lift but hard to see with the sun
shining through the mist.
photo Andy's AlliaJ |
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Sunday, we did did not know where we should be. First we tried Haresfield but the wind was coming from the left of the slope , so we moved to Rodborough where the wind was coming over the trees from the right. Next to Minchinhampton common for some power flying. Photo:- not pantomime season yet but still the shout was
heard. |
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For more photos go to http://www.scsa.org.uk/photos/phil/photopage.htm the pages have been added to since last week |