Club Update – November 2011

I promised Mick I would not use his recent Yak experience as material in this months blog, the problem is I am not very good at keeping  promises. I will however not be trying for a cheap laugh, this time, although feel the experience is worth sharing as another of those, Luck was on mick’s side, for a change.

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