Siloam Springs RC Modelers

Guys, I lost my Eurofighter yesterday evening. Too Fast, too far, too gray! Somewhere, East/South of the cement plant. We spent some time in the jungle hunting it with no luck. (Bob & Beth Lavey, Dennis & I) Have notified the crews of the cement/asphalt plant and put an add in the local paper that won’t get published till next Wednesday probably. Have emailed Matt Younkin asking him to keep a look out if he flys in that area. Keep your ears open and spread the word please. I expect if its found it will be a shattered mess but would like to get the electronics back. Thanks. “lectric Dave

Do to the rainy forcast and thunderstorms in the area, the fun fly will be rescheduled for May 22. I hope all can attend and look forward to another great turnout.

First off, make sure you congratulate Dennis Keigley the next time you see him at the field: Dennis stormed through the blue and silver level at the field today and is our newest Silver Card Member. Congratulations, Dennis!
Dennis, Bill Bergen, and I arranged to meet at the field at 1pm today for an out-of-the-ordinary flying session. I had another day off, and the weather was very nice again, so it was a great time to get in some extra practice.
Bill had his 40-sized Ultra Stick, and even though it only seemed to have 2/3 power, Bill flew it very well. He did lots of aerobatic maneuvers, and then he spent the last half of the flight doing touch-and-goes. It was fairly breezy, so that was no small trick.
Dennis had his Park Zone Corsair and his Magnum 52-powered Escapade. I think he flew the Corsair twice and the Escapade at least twice. Dennis started working on the blue level maneuvers with the Corsair and knocked quite a few off. He switched to the Escapade for some of the maneuvers, because it was handling the wind better. He had a few troubles with the normal stuff: three outside loops, horizontal eight, and cuban eight, but be hadn’t practiced them before, so that was understandable. He nailed them all, though, and he said he’s going to try the gold level maneuvers on the simulator until he’s comfortable, and then he’ll give them a go at the field.
I had my Black Magic and ran through the Intermediate Sequence three times. I wasn’t concentrating very well on the last flight, or I’d have gone for four

They were predicting a beautiful day for Friday, and I was worn down from 12&14 hour work days 5-6 days a week (and one day that started at 5:30am and didn’t end until nearly midnight!), so this was it a great time for a day off. I contacted a few people that I knew had planes ready and might be able to get out on a weekday. The weather turned out to be terrific: the winds were 10-12 but mostly down the runway, and it was tremendously sunny. It was beautiful. We had a great turn-out for a weekday, too: Tony Fox was out mowing at 10am, and he stayed to fly his electric helicopter and visit; Ed Jordan, Mark Labadie, Bill Bergen, and Dave Husher all came out around 1pm, and Dennis Keigley came out a bit later.
Tony spent 2 hours riding that mower around the field, and he mowed every inch. It looked great, and it even smashed the mole-hills down a bit I was glad Tony brought out his heli and stayed to fly with us, too. Tony got in a couple of flights, but he is still having a bit of trouble with the tail boom working loose and loosening up the tail rotor drive belt (not to mention messing up the tail rotor angle).
Ed Jordan brought out his OS 46-powereed Seagull Models Spacewalker. That’s just a terrific airplane. It’s easy to see in the sky, it looks like it flies very nice, and it handled the winds just fine. Ed was talking about a different motor for it, since it’s a bit underpowered.
Mark had his Tiger 60 and got in a couple of very good flights. I was tickled pink to see Mark get in a couple of nice flights, since he hasn’t been able to much this year because of the crappy weather. This weekend should be a good time to get his thumbs back under him
Bill had his electric GeeBee and his Saito 72-powered Ultra Stick. The winds were high enough that the GeeBee didn’t leave the hangar, but Bill got in one nice flight with the Ultra Stick. His engine seems to be running fine now, with no tendency to die at idle like it had for a while there. Bill’s aerobatic maneuvers were mostly very good. We won’t discuss his first attempt at a cross-field Humpty Bump
Dave had his Fieseler Storch and had two flights on it. That plane is really affected by the wind, but Dave did a great job of handling it. His second takeoff was very exciting, but Dave made all the right corrections. I didn’t know Dave had a plane ready to go, so I hadn’t included him on the email invitation. Sorry Dave.
Dennis came out around 2:30, and he had his P-51 and his Escapade. I think the P-51 is one of the Hangar-9 PTS deals that Dennis is flying without all the “hangy down” stuff. Those are nice flying airplanes, and Dennis was flying it well. Dennis’ Escapade has a Magnum 52 4-stroke and flies very nice. Those look like great airplanes. Dennis got in a flight on each before it was time to head home.
It was a great day of mid-week flying, and it led up to what looks to be some great weekend flying. The winds look a bit heavier for Saturday, but Sunday looks magnificent. Get your stuff charged up and come on out!
Don’t forget the work day this morning at 9am, too.

At the meeting on Monday night, we discussed bringing in rock to repair the road, but it was also decided that we need to have a work day before that. There is quite a bit of brush that needs to be cleaned up and lots of other work that needs to be done. Please plan to be at the field at 9am on Saturday, April 10, 2010 to help. Bring shovels, rakes, weed-eaters, loppers, chain saws, and anything else that you think will be helpful.

See you at the field!

The Alpha trainer doing aerobatics on his 3rd (yes 3rd) flight! His landing was rough but didnt get it on the video. This is the plane he crashed due to radio probs but resurrected it to fly again last week-end. Great job Dennis, and keep flying.

What a wonderful day! It wound up being sunny and warm, and the wind was lower than they’d been forecasting. Yay! We needed a nice flying day.
Mike and I got to the field at 12:30, because he had a new plane to range-check and hopefully maiden. Mike’s been putting this CA Models Epsilon together for a couple of months, and we had run in the new OS 120 about a month ago. We’ve just been waiting on decent weather since then. Mike also had his 60-size Ultra Stick, and he got in one warm-up flight on that, and then it was on to the Epsilon. The range-check went perfectly, so Mike fueled it up and took off. It took a couple of clicks of right aileron, but it flew very well otherwise. Mike got in two flights with that plane, and he had a huge smile on his face the rest of the day
I had my Black Magic and my Abbra, and I got 5 flights in. I managed to hit a mole hill so hard that I ripped the right side of the landing gear out of the Abbra! Arg! Moles!
Many people came out to enjoy the weather: Bill Bergen, Max Freeman, Dave Husher, Bob Stewart, Tony Fox, Ed Jordan, Bill Whitaker, Dan Stelljes, and Mark Labadie. I’ve probably missed someone Oh, Marvin Hexdrix was out, but he didn’t fly. He must have gotten his March flight already? No, this was the first Sunday in March…
Bergen had his 40-sized Stick, and he flew once. Max had his SNJ, and he flew once. Max had Ed Jordan helping, and Ed said they put about 8 clicks of down trim into it throughout the flight. We checked the plane as Max was putting it away, but we didn’t see anything out of the ordinary other than a loose fuel tank. The tank could possibly have moved fore and aft, so it’s possible it was changing the CG. We didn’t see anything else weird, so hopefully that’s it.
Dave had his Fieseler Storch out for show-and-tell, and he has his Edge 540 out for flying. Dave said he and Tony had been preparing the Storch for flight on Saturday and were pretty close.
Tony had his Cherokee, but he had trouble getting it started. I never did see him fly it.
Ed had his Spacewalker, and he flew once of twice. That looks like a nice flying airplane. Ed looks very comfortable with it, which is great to see.
Bill Whitaker has a new electric ducted fan that he maidened. It looked like it flew very nice. It was flat black and a bit difficult to see in the sky, but Bill didn’t seem to have any problems.
Dan Stelljes was out again, and he had his Seagull Models Yak. Saito 91 powered? I forget now. That’s a terrific plane, though. Dan flies it well.
Mark Labadie also had a new plane, a new 60-szed Tiger. Dan helped Mark maiden it, but Mark did a lot of flying once it was trimmed, and Mark brought it in for a nice landing. It’s great to see Mark with another Tiger!
Bob Stewart also had a new plane: a Great Planes Escapade. Bob has an eFlight 46 with a 4-cell Lipo, and it flew very nice. I think Bob flew it 3 or 4 times.
It was a great day of flying with four new planes maidened successfully. Hopefully it’s a good omen for the flying season ahead.

Another beautiful Wednesday and another afternoon where Bob could not be found at his desk With temperatures in the 50s, light winds, and cloud-free skies, I had to get out and do some more trimming on the Black Magic.
I got to the field about 1:15, and Kevin Sisco and Dennis Keigley were already out there. Dennis had his Alpha Trainer and his T-26 foamie electric, and he had already gotten a full day’s flying. Dennis flew his Alpha once while I was there, and he had a battery failure and crashed at the south end of the field. Bummer. Dennis said that he’d charged the batter 3-4 hours this morning with a wall-wart, but that was probably not enough for the 4 flights he put on it. Overnight charging is generally best before a flight session.
Kevin had his 50-sized Raptor helicopter, and I got to see him fly once. He is really getting good with that bird. I was doing loops and rolls and lots of inverted flight.
Mark Labadie, Bill Bergen, Max Freeman, Dan Stelljes, and Dave Husher all came out about 1:30. It has been a very long time since Dan has been out, and we were all happy to see him. He didn’t have a plane, but we were still glad to see him
Mark had his 40-sized Ultra Stick, and I think he flew twice. Bill may have had a plane, but it didn’t come out of the truck. Max, too, didn’t ever get anything out of the truck. The weather was nice, and we had a lot of people at the field, so Bill and Max kept busy visiting with the rest of us Dave had his electric Edge 540, and I saw him fly once.
Oh, I had my Black Magic out, and I’d done a bit of work on it since its maiden flight on Sunday: the fuel tank mounts had come loose, so I beefed those up. When I maidened it, it took 3-4 clicks of right aileron, which seemed weird, and I tracked that down to uneven incidence in the left stab and left wing (compared with the right stab and right wing). I evened all that up and removed reset the trim. I had also found that the plane require absolutely no elevator on inverted flight, which told me it was a bit tail-heavy. I used a different double prop nut that weighed 0.3oz more, which moved the CG forward slightly. I flew it the first time today, and the aileron trim was no longer necessary as I had hoped. The plane required a bit of elevator in inverted flight, which was much better also. I did notice that it now had a noticeable wobble in rolls (vertical and horizontal) and that it was not pulling to the canopy at all on downlines. That meant too much wing incidence to me, so after the first flight I took out half a turn of incidence on both wings. Since those are driven by 4-40 screws, that’s just 1/40 of an inch, which is not a heck of a lot I started right at 0.5 degrees positive, and I suspect I’m at 4.75 degrees positive now. That change made a world of difference, though: the rolls are axial now, and there’s a slight pull to the canopy on downlines. Yay! It flew very well, but I’m still long on my landings, because it floats more than I’m used to. I’ll get that worked out quickly, I hope. I also had problems with the Abbra on Sunday: it was running very lean, which prevented me from taking advantage of a really nice flying day. Mike and I checked it over really well and didn’t find anything other than the check valve on the fuel injector was a bit loose. It turns out that check valve is a press-fit over the injector and being loose it was allowing an air leak into the fuel stream. I found a post by Troy Newman on RCU saying that you could fly without the check valve, so I tried that Monday afternoon, and the engine ran great. I ordered a couple of new check valves, and the Abbra will be back in business this weekend. Whew! I was worried about needing to send it back to YS service. I’m glad it was a simple problem that was easy to fix.
Let’s see… Grover Parent and Ed Jordan both came out about 2pm. Grover had a new electric Reactor that he was ready to maiden. Dan went over it carefully and worked with Grover and Kevin to reduce the throws to more manageable levels Dan agreed to help Grover with the maiden, and that seemed to go very smoothly. Grover got into a bit of trouble once way south of the field and in a weird attitude. Luckily, Dan was able to pick up on what the plane was doing, and he got it back. Whew!
Ed had his spacewalker, and he was setting it up to fly as I was leaving at 3:30. I had a 4:00 meeting, but I wish I could have gotten in a couple more flights.
This weekend is looking pretty good. Get your stuff cleaned off and charged up, and come out. The time change is coming up in a little more than a week, which means more flying time in the afternoon! I’m ready for a bit of after-work practice, although it’s going to have to get warmer, too

About 10:30 this morning the clouds parted, and the sun popped out. I was hopeful that the weather forecasts were wrong. Unfortunately, about 11:30 the clouds regrouped and blocked out the sun for good. At least it was still in the mid 50s with very little wind. The forecast for Sunday was horrible, so any flying this weekend would happen today. I had all my stuff charged up and headed to the field about 12:30. I got there without any receiver batteries in the Abbra, but Beth was able to bring those out to me. She stayed and called the Intermediate Sequence for me twice. The first flight’s sequences weren’t very good, but the pair of sequences I did on the second flight was much improved. I’m looking forward to the springtime when I can get in 10-12 practice flights a week.
About 1:30, the rest of the Saturday gang showed up: Mark Labadie, Dave Husher, Bill Bergen, Tony Fox, and a new member, Dennis Keigley.
Mark had his 40-sized Ultra Stick, and he had replaced the y-harness on the ailerons and checked it out, so it was ready to maiden. Mark had also replaced the battery in his transmitter, and that seemed to be holding a charge much better. Mark and I went over the model, and he fueled it up. We got the engine running pretty well, and Mark carried it out to the runway. It didn’t run quite right and wound up dying what I was taxiing. Hmmm… Mark carried it back, and we wound up going in on the high-speed needle 1/4 to 1/2 turn. Mark carried it back out, and it was much improved. I gave it the gas and headed down the runway when I hit some mole hills on the east side of the runway and ripped the landing gear off. How embarrassing Luckily, Mark is a big believer in nylon landing bolts, so it was an easy fix. Mark fueled it back up, and carried it back out. The takeoff was uneventful this time, and the plane flew nice. It took about 1 click of up elevator, and it was in trim. Yay! Mark flew it around for quite a while (getting his February flight in), and then I landed it. Those are sweet-flying airplanes.
Dave Husher had the foamie electric he’s been scratch building out for show-and-tell, and it looked very nice! Dave said he expects the all-up weight to be around 9 ounces. Yikes! Dave also had his electric Edge 540, and he flew that once. His transmitter battery was going down quickly, so he brought it in and called it a day.
Bergen said he had a plane, but I didn’t see it, so I can’t confirm that When the rain started about 2 or 2:30, Bill headed for the house. I chose to put my stuff up at that point, too, but the rains quite, and it continued to be a decent flying day.
Dennis had an Alpha 40 trainer that he’s been flying by himself, and he got Tony to check it out and stand with him while he flew. Dennis did a terrific job, and he should be cleared for his green card, since he took off and landed by himself. Nice! It was Dennis’ first day as a member, and already making progress towards his gold card. As I was leaving about 3pm, I saw that Dennis had pulled out a foam T-26. It was great to see an enthusiastic new member!
Marvin Hendrix came out about 2:30 with his 25-sized SNJ. Marvin hadn’t gotten his February flight yet, and today might have been his last opportunity! He barely had enough juice in his flight box to fuel up the plane, and he had to borrow Dennis’ starter, but by golly he got that plane into the air! Yay!
Hopefully warmer temperatures are on the way. The days are getting longer, and the time change is only a few weeks away (March 14), so we should start getting more and more flying in. Keep you stuff changed and ready to go, because you never know from one day to the next