Our annual fun-fly event was held on Sunday, July 21st, ably conducted by Dan Morris. Here’s the list of events as posted by Dan.
- Skill taxi test. A timed event. Three cones will be placed ~25ft apart. Begin at the first cone pass the second cone on the left, loop the third cone on the right, pass the second cone on the left and return to the first cone. Best time puts you the the top of the leader board.
- Triple loop test. A timed event. Take off, climb to a safe altitude, perform a tripple loop (wings must be level at the beginning of each loop) and Land. Time is measured from launch to touch down. Shortest time is best.
- Maximum glide time. A timed event. Takeoff and climb for 15 seconds shut off power to prop and glide to contact with the ground(preferably the runway). Longest tim is best.
- Safe cargo transport. A timed event. Fit a cup to the top of your plane. Add the secret cargo to the cup. Take off, fly the pattern and land. Your time will be noted. If your cargo is still in the cup your time will be recorded, if not your time will be infinity. Shortest time is best.
- Bomb run. Not a timed event. Fit the cup to the top of your airplane (quads not eligible). Add bombing material. Take off, fly over target area, release your bomb (by a loop or roll). Bomb’s ground contact distance to target will be measured. Shortest distance is best.
- Bowling. Attach bowling ball to tail of your plane ( via 20′ string) fly over the pins and knock them down with the bowling ball. You have 3 pass attempts. The most pins knocked down is best.
- Limbo. A ribbon will strung across the runway. You get three attempts to fly under the ribbon. The ribbon will be lowered for the next round. Those successful in the last round will continue to the next round. The fewest cumulative attempts at the lowest ribbon height is best.
- Time for hot dogs and celebration of the fine flying by our members at the events.
Here are a few pictures from the event.
Bob Frogner completed his triple loops in the Pajaro River – – –
— ably retrieved by expert fisherman Steve Jones while Bob looks on!
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And soon ready to fly again, seen with other members of Bob’s fleet.
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Michael Andalora’s Valiant proved to be a good general purpose airplane for this type of event.
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He and Steve Boracca were tied for first place in the eyeball carrying event, with Steve just winning – by an eyelash!
Don’t get too concerned. The eyeballs were made by Dan from ping-pong balls, as seen here on Hugh Chalmers’ entry..
And here’s Steve’s winning T-28.
George McKeon’s Sukhoi wasn’t really designed for this kind of exotic transportation, but still managed to complete the course successfully.
David Tacklind’s entry was so old that he could afford to drill an egg-sized hole in the top of the canopy to mount the eyeball, without spoiling the looks of his airplane one bit!
Our youngest member, Joshua Albano, proudly shows off his eyeball-carrying entry.
And the final eyeball picture, showing some skill in mounting, is (hope I’ve got this right!) George McKeon’s Value Hobby Slick.
Contest director Dan Morris, did his customary fine job of running the competition, and summarized the event complete with final placings as follows.
Fun-fly highlights – by Dan Morris
Nine members chose to enter the competition. Hugh Chalmers, Steve Boracca, Mike Andalora, Joe Platin, Dave Tacklind, Don Edwards, Bob Frogner, Joshua Albano and George McKeon.
Jesse Gifford was planning on entering the events with his gas plane but in practice prior to the contest the throttle control jammed full open (while in flight) making participation impossible.
Not to be deterred Jesse grabbed his cameras to capture photos and videos of all events for publication in the news letter and our web site.
Steve, under the weather with a cold didn’t let that slow him down. He ran the barbecue and successfully flew in all events.
George arrived after the first event had finished but participated in the remaining events.
Don and Bob suffered fatal crashes in the triple loop contest and were unable to participate in the remaining events.
Joshua, our youngest competitor at first wasn’t comfortable to enter all events so he chose two events but later increased that number once it became clear this was a fun fly for all to enjoy.
I overheard Joshua’s mother give her son some tongue in cheek advice as he stepped to the flight line. “Joshua, Take off, fly the sequence and land”. Joshuas reply was “Oh Mom”. (How wonderfully classic was that!)
With dad at his side, Joshua demonstrated he was quite capable and is going to be another great pilot. We can be proud our club provides the place and group support to developed these young people in this hobby.
More Down by the River
Moving away from the competition, Bob Frogner came up with yet another useful tool, this a hot glue gun powered by a typical model airplane LiPo battery – a very useful item to bring to the field.
Next week saw us back at the field exercising our old and new airplanes. Here’s Dan Morris’s Beech Starship getting ready for take-off. A very pretty-looking airplane.
Bob Frogner is another of our members who seems to come up with a new airplane almost every week. And here’s his black biplane, built from down-loaded plans. He’s very pleased with its flying and handling.
Jesse Gifford’s ex- Michael Hushaw B-17, touches down nicely,
and taxis home after a successful mission.
Click here for B-17 Flight Footage
Mike Evans and Richard Ludt are both getting into the First Person View small multi-rotor game, and enjoying it immensely. Here’s Mike with his equipment, and below that Richard’s outfit.
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Bob Frogner tells us that his FRC Foamies F-14 flies very nicely, although aerodynamicists in the group may cringe at the rectangular airfoil section! Sweepback possibly helps a little in that respect.
Bob incorporates two-position sweepback, not variable in flight, as can be seen in the next picture. The airplane has one of the new Spektrum receivers from Horizon Hobbies on board with no visible antenna. All the works are incorporated inside one small box!
And our last item this month is another of Steve Jones’ pattern airplanes, this one an E-Flite Ultimate. Purists like your editor will appreciate the well-designed airfoil sections on both the wings and tail surfaces!
And that does it for another month. Enjoy!
