The Fly Paper

July 1999 If you have access to this on the WEB and are still getting it by U.S. MAIL we need to know, send an email to Eschlumber@aol.com. It saves a bunch of time and money.

August 14^th is an Electric Fun Fly day. Anything and Everything Electric powered. The intent is to learn more about the options of Electric R/C. 10a.m-Till? The field will be closed to other flying.

What a month! The ¼ scale event was fun for those who attended. The weather was great, everyone got to fly and visit as much as they wanted. I think that next year’s event will be scheduled for club members and friends also!

Lesson to be learned! Keep a check on the condition of your batteries, both in your transmitter and receivers. I was very fortunate a few weekends ago to not lose my 1/3 Scale Clipped Wing Cub. I had just taken off and noticed that I had to hold down on the elevator stick to maintain level flight. I had to increase down stick pressure in ever increasing amounts! I knew that something was not right so I set up to land. There is more to the approach and landing, but I did get it down in one piece. The transmitter battery was dead! It had been on charge for the entire night, but bad batteries are bad batteries!

Much to be discussed at the next meeting, please try and attend. I’m heading for the beach![Last thing a redneck says at the beach" Hey yawl That Shark is sure cute.]

The Prez

Have I got a story for you.. 16 years ago I went to a contest in Tullahoma. I was working out of town at the time and had $400 in my billfold. I rode with friends and in the process lost my billfold. Today while organizing and going through my Stuff, in an Aquila box I found my billfold lost for 13 years. And yes the money was still there. WronRange@aol.com

I have broken oh several airplanes over the years like most the rest of you. I usually get over it rather fast with the idea that this happened or that. The rational is always available if you want it to be. Usually I get the things back together in one large piece again to not a lot of fuss and fly again. I learned early on, if you want to build up a fleet of fun, the trick is to build them faster than you crash them. Anyway last Sunday I flew this P-47 arf that I have had in the air before always with Tommy's assistance. It had been flown about 6 flights over several weeks and the week before was doing just right, finally. I still had an artery twitch on landing it for some reason, it still had me intimidated. Tommy usually had the transmitter thrown at him at some point in the flight, and he would always grease the landing, with his experience it looks simple. Anyway I took off again as usual flogged it into the air,[dual rates on high YIKES] and managed to get it stable for a lap around the field. The thing was flying rather dull as compared to the week before and then it hit me[when Tommy said needs to fly faster] that the motor was gasping for something. Nice engine a new Magnum .53 quiet and plenty of power was sagging on me because I failed to RE-Adjust the mixture for the 98 degree day with a bazillion percent humidity. Running lean the motor was starting to cease, Tommy said I'd land. As I set the approach got the gear out and headed on in the power a was a wainin. I had plenty of speed, altitude and runway, but somehow managed to float down the length of it and at this point I made my bad mistake. I first should have made the landing[Tommy would have] then he had been landing it in the past. Blowing that approach then I should have just landed Long and in the thick grass.[ Motor was still churning as it went by us about 5 feet up]. BUT Noooooooo, I elected to throttle up in panic to save the model and go around[I blame the heat on my brow.] As it cleared the end of the runway and the very hot motor sank to it's knees the model stability went way low at the slow speed and It plunked in from about 15 feet just shy of the Creek . Now is when you appreciate the tall grass. Well it is about fixed to fly again, not the problem. Problem is I had the field in site gear down and locked and a bad motor, and elected to go around. DUH. It's times like these that I gain great admiration for those that make it look simple, but then it's maybe good to realize we are all students and still have things to learn. Thanks to those that make it look simple. It gives us something to shoot for.

Meeting Minutes: June 24,1999 by Ernie Schlumberger

Vice President, Randy Hawkins started off the meeting by talking about the website. Our website is up to 4500 hits so far. Randy also went over our new field emergency kit located on the front center shed post. It has a fire extinguisher, medical field kit, Solarcaine, Band-Aids and emergency use paper towels. It will use the same combination as the inner gate lock used to. There were 17 members and 2 guests in attendance. This was the first meeting held under the new shed at the field.

Treasurer, Roy Collins went over the financial report for June. We had $1164 in expenses and $0.00 in membership receipts. The Club dipped into the latest CD purchased earlier this year. The final cost for the shed at the field was $976.39. Money well spent.

Youth Director, Dave Zeigler talked about the Girl Scouts group he worked with at the Methodist church in PTC. They built and flew 162 gliders inside the church. Dave mentioned that next years Kids Spring Fling start time might be pushed later in the day to clear conflicts with other morning sporting events. Dave thanked Ron and Cheryl Nash for the help on this years Spring Fling and providing lunch.

President, Tommy Vinci talked about the building of the shed and thanked Charles Perkins for digging the holes for the posts. Tommy announced that the Big Bird event announcements did not appear in any magazine and the field would not be closed to other flying that day. Tommy also talked about the upcoming Combat Day in July.

The club received notice that one of our members and his wife were tragically killed in a head-on collision back in May. We would like to extend our deepest sympathy to the family of Ron and Carole Alexander.

The subject of a runway came up again. We are looking into getting approval for a paved runway. We have gotten estimates for black top and concrete. The black top will cost approximately $6500-$9000 for a 20’x400’ runway. Currently our Astroturf runway is 15’x300’. We are also looking into concrete. It might cost only $3000-$4000 if we do some of the prep work ourselves.

The topic quickly changed to paying for the runway (if approved). Ideas were kicked around about raising the dues up to $50.00 to cover maintenance and runway upgrade and also the possibility of capping the membership if a runway is put in. An executive decision was made to not require the inner gate to be locked anymore. [UNTIL NEXT YEAR] This will be on a trial basis and if no problems are noted then it will remain in effect. It was brought up that some of the tables at the field were getting into bad shape. Greg Reid volunteered to build some with some extra lumber he has. Tom Whitehead talked about setting up a training program and manual to help new members. He will take some info and try to put something together.[won'tcha Tom]

New Members: This month we welcome 3 new members: Craig McKeand, Carl Wolcott and Duane Radford.

Broken Prop Award: Tommy declared a three-way tie this month. #1) Charles Perkins received a S.A.D. patch for flying inverted and "dumb" thumbing it into the ground. #2) Greg Reid received a S.A.D. patch for his ¼ scale Taylor Craft’s demise on the runway during takeoff. #3) Stan McCollough received the Team Kamikaze for sudden vertical impact on a low fly by while on the trainer cord.[hint: instructor is a Yellow Jackets fan]

Well since the others didn't mention it very much [if at all] I thought I'd throw in some about our 3^rd I think annual Combat Fun Fly Day. Sorry forgot to turn off the Bold lock. We ended up having 8 flyers turnout to fly in the Combat and many qualified spectators. Most were flying varying types of mainly wings of sorts. Three, actually 4 Sig Wonders showed up and a Miss Martha [I think that is what.] and the rest were of Special original construction from Foam or whatever was left in the shop it appeared. At one point all were in the air at once and most was captured on Video by the none other Clare of Schlumberger fame. [It's going to be a GREAT Christmas Party this year with all the tape Clare has been taking. hint hint] Back to the heat of the battle… The Idea was to fly 5 each, 3-minute heats. The winner to be determined if at all by the most Streamer cuts. The Streamers about 15 foot long, were of different colors so as to help and verify a cut. A midair didn't count as a point gain. After 3 minutes your ready to land and get out the eye drops anyway. So as to make it short, Ernie took out my Sig Wonder in I think the Second round, [Not bad though it lasted longer than my Playboy.] Then Steve Dukes had a mechanical and was removed from the playing field [pheeeeww, he's good, and it's great to eliminate the competition.] Since I was out on the early rounds Bill Divens let me fly his spare airplane in rounds 3-5. Bill's Sig Wonder was a hoot to fly with a .28 in it and LOTS of aileron. Most of the others were well .09 to .25 I think. The Machine Screamed like a banshee, I was laughing most of the flight. I hope I get a chance to fly it again. At one point in the Fur Ball, I landed with a hot motor running a little lean. As I looked up, a Conley Flyer "Shane Alley", well just sort of turned Ernie's Sig Wonder in to a Blue PUFF of Monokote. I managed to be flying high on the 5^th or 6^th round and seeing in blurred vision "Kent Elder" also of Conley, flying straight and level below me. I made a dive on him and actually cut his steamer.[lucky shot]. Ernie claims to have cut mine at some point but no proof, nah nah. I think that last year Tommy won. I remember Dave Zeigler and something about batteries then a poof. Not sure though Steve Dukes may have. This year I can't say I did, though it was a clean cut on the video, using a borrowed plane? BUT we ALL had a HOOT of a time. If you haven't been out for this, You need to try it.

Kent Elder got there late and was not in the picture.