Patch News History

Sorry I’m so late with Patch News this month, I blame Christmas shopping & events, trips to London, grandchildren, and dealing with my late father’s affairs, not necessarily in that order. You can just blame me.  The larger photos proved popular in the last Patch News so I’ll continue with them until the webmaster complains about the space they use.

There wasn’t an awful lot to report until the end of November when the  shops had ‘Black Friday Sales’ and we had ‘Experts turned Idiots’!  More of that later…

Our new treasurer Nick Squire obviously didn’t take offence at my mickey taking in the last edition of Patch News, he was back flying again in November. I took this picture just as he was told that the meeting on 19^th December will be ‘club subs night’ and members will be showering him with money.

In the New Year I advise you to check your BMFA memberships carefully whilst admiring Nick’s Caribbean holiday snaps!

Speaking of memberships we were shocked and saddened to hear that Hapless Harper won’t be renewing for 2014. Several people remarked that I’ll have nothing to write about but I wouldn’t be so cruel. Although I did hear that certain trees let out a huge sigh of relief when they heard the news.  But joking apart Mick has been a great member for many years and we will miss him from both the patch and the meetings.  I remember the first day he approached the club when we had a stand at a hobbies event at the Grange Centre in Midhurst.  He said he wanted to build a specific type of R/C model and of course we all thought “Here we go, another nutter that wants his first model to be a Spitfire”.  But Mick went one better, he wanted a Lancaster! Now you have to remember this was a long time ago, before ARTFs, before foamies, before large models, before even 35meg let alone before 2.4gig, and well before electric power. We explained about single engined high wing trainers etc and he listened carefully before agreeing to join and promised to build a trainer…then a Lanc!

One of Mick’s first models was beautifully built and finished Cessna (high wing and trainerish). Unfortunately despite only being 54” span it weighed about 10lbs due largely to the 25 coats of perfect while paint. It was rapidly christened Midhurst White (after a house brick not a butterfly) and was soon sold on, but not before winning a local concours event. Mick tells me that he brought it along to a club meeting and I said I’d never seen a model using lead as a covering material before. That doesn’t sound like me at all…does it?

Mick went on to build many many models with varying degrees of success, one being a Splot, a high wing sport model designed by club member Graham Head. The wing was flat (no dihedral) and being 36” span meant it could be built from stock lengths of balsa without having to make any joints in the spars etc. This made for a very strong wing, they were almost indestructible. Except Mick’s… he was flying it one day and the wing folded in half resulting in a rather sudden arrival. We were all flabbergasted that he’d managed to break it in the air until we examined the wreckage and saw the two servo mounting holes he drilled straight down through the spar. Obviously we barely mentioned it!

But build a Lanc he did, in fact several, first I/c powered and then electric.They all flew but with varying degrees of success, as Mick was always able to come up with new things to go wrong, things that never happened to anyone else. But despite problems Mick always came back for more and always wanted to try something new. He was (I think) the second person in PAM to switch to electric power, he had one of the first EDFs, and above all he was an excellent builder. Mick produced many superb models, bounced back from problems with a smile and a new challenge, and always enjoyed (I hope) being the butt of our jokes.Despite his decision not to renew his membership I sincerely hope Mick will drop in and see us at the patch and at Buriton now and again.

John Warren has been flying this biplane for several months now, I think I mentioned ages ago that John had resurrected it after many years of retirement and converted it from I/C to electric.Apparently the last time it had flown was down at the old IBM club at Havant when I discovered it had a reluctance to turn in either direction! It only has rudder & elevator controls, ailerons would probably make a big difference, but it flies pretty well and can be enough of a challenge to make it interesting.  John’s had many flights with it and says he prefers it to his trainer because it’s that bit harder to fly. His next model is almost ready to be tested, another biplane but this time a scale model, a ‘proper’ balsa model built from plans, designed for I/C but John has converted it to electric. What is it? You’ll have to wait and see, watch this space!

Next up is new member Richard Bennett’s Cloud Fly from HobbyKing. Not sure why but it seems to be listed as an AXN Floater-Jet on the HK site, bit odd when it’s neither a float plane nor a jet.Anyway it’s a pretty little electric powered glider with a high mounted pusher motor so there shouldn’t be any problems with broken props or bent shafts. Steve 1066 Hastings has taken Richard under his wing so I’ve not flown the model much but it seems to be a good training model and Richard is coming on well with it.

Gentleman Jim Hobday has just finished a new model, a Grumman Wildcat no less.  Jim bought it at the Blackbushe Model Show in 2012 so he hasn’t exactly rushed constructing it (mind you I’ve got models I’ve been building for 20 years so perhaps I should shut up!).It’s a Parkzone model and I think it might have been a replacement airframe as it wasn’t in a box when Jim bought it and it didn’t come with a motor or any servos, ESC etc.  It certainly looks nice and the Parkzone models all seem to fly well so I have high hopes for this one.  All being well December Patch News will have a report of its first flight.

Discus Launch Gliders (DLG) are something we don’t see much of at the patch but Desperate Dan has being chucking this one around recently.It’s an Apollo 1550 from HobbyKing and the 1550 is the wingspan. It comes as an ARF so it’s fully covered, has a fibreglass fuselage with built up balsa and lite-ply wings, you just need to install your radio gear and give it a chuck. Dan hasn’t achieved any long flights that I’ve seen up to now but November is hardly the time of year for low level thermal activity. It certainly shows great promise and I reckon come the spring it should really show what its performance is like. It’s around £51 from the UK warehouse so not bad value when compared to the 900mm span Binary DLG with carbon reinforced wings at £125.

So onto the ‘Experts turned Idiots’ day I referred to earlier. Must have been something in the air I reckon, all the so-called experts seemed to be doing dumb things while the beginners were having no problems at all!

First off Cyano Steve missed the patch when he landed, a very rare occurrence these days. He then had to endure all the usual “We’ll get Roland to drag the patch over about 10 feet for you” etc comments.  How childish…  Then a little later we had a threesome, I was flying my SportJet, Wonky Wiltshire flying his Alpha Jet, and Mark Agate flying his Fun 3. First Wonky did a duff launch and knocked the nose off the Alpha Jet, but apart from that it was fine so he re-launched. Then we got into the bit of flying flat out screaming low passes over the patch in formation with Woody providing accompanying music from Top Gun on his mobile.  It’s all very well but there’s always some smart arse that has to go just that little bit lower. I was fine over the patch, but omitted to pull up when I reached the long grass at the end! The SportJet did a mild cartwheel and knocked the nose off. The resulting cheer from the pits was incredible, I’m sure it exceeded the 82db limit!Then, a few minutes later, I decided to fly the little EPP Mustang to reassure myself I wasn’t really an idiot. Turns out I was! I was doing the weird tumbling spins that I often do but somehow got disorientated and buried it. Fortunately it was far enough away that not too many people noticed, and the damage was pretty minimal.  I then decided it was time to beat a hasty retreat only to have Nigel Bastard Baker remark “Ok look, I’m taking two undamaged models home and you’re taking two broken ones”.  I’ll remember that Baker, I’ll remember!

Then…just as I arrived home my mobile vibrated and I opened up this photo.

Yup, as I was driving away Wonky got disorientated with the Alpha Jet and buried it big time! Like I said, something in the air that day…

 

A man is sitting in a plane which is about to take off, when another man with a dog occupies the empty seats alongside.  The dog is sat in the middle, and the first man is looking quizzically at the dog when the second man explains that they work for the airline. The airline rep said “Don’t mind Rover, he is a sniffer dog, the best there is, I’ll show you once we get airborne and I set him to work.”

The plane takes off and levels out when the handler says to the first man, “Watch this.” He tells the dog, “Rover, search.” The dog jumps down, walks along the aisle and sits next to a woman for a few seconds. It then returns to its seat and puts one paw on the handler’s arm. He says “Good boy.” He turns to the first man and says, “That woman is in possession of marijuana, so I’m making a note of this, and the seat number, for the police who will apprehend her upon arrival.” “Fantastic!” replies the first man.

Once again he sends the dog to search the aisles. The dog sniffs about, sits down beside a man for a few seconds, returns to its seat and places both paws on the handler’s arm. The airline rep says, “That man is carrying cocaine, so again, I’m making a note of this, and the seat number.” “I like it!” says the first man.

Once again he sends the dog to search the aisles. Rover goes up and down the plane aisle, and after a while sits down next to someone, and then comes racing back and jumps up onto the seat and craps all over the place. The first man is surprised and disgusted by this, and asks “What the heck is going on?” The handler nervously replies “He just found a bomb!”

Merry Christmas to all, hope to see you at the patch very soon.

Colin Cowplain

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             Patch News? What news? The weather was pretty awful for much of October and unfortunately personal commitments prevented me from attending some of the sessions even when the weather was suitable, so I’m afraid I have little to report. I’ll make up for it with some larger than usual photos!

Farmer George found a use for some of us one morning, that must be a first! It makes a change from George and his men doing their best to enable us to carry on flying while doing their work all around us. As we assembled planes down by the barn we were asked to form a line to guide the sheep from one field to another. There were all the usual comments about pretty ones but Hapless Harper didn’t seem to understand the joke, he said they were all pretty!

On one of the decent Sunday mornings newly seconded treasurer Nick Squire showed his face for a change. It was all very nostalgic, not only did he turn up with an I/C powered model, it was controlled with a 35meg radio! He attracted a lot of attention, all the old school fliers gathered round muttering things about the good old days, while the younger ones looked confused and asked questions such as “Why are you using a battery powered electric motor to start that noisy dirty thing?” and “What’s that long chrome tube sticking out of the transmitter, and why is there a peg on it?” How quaint!

 

The combat fun continues with more Mustangs appearing, they have proved excellent in the strong winds we’ve had recently. Bash ‘Em Bob and Hapless Harper are pictured immediately before launching into another sortie. I’m sure one of them should have been a German plane but they appeared to be perfectly happy to fight Mustang against Mustang!
One morning just Desperate Dan and I showed up, unsurprising considering the dubious weather conditions, and while we flying a magnificent rainbow appeared. I landed my model with the intention of taking a photo of Dan’s Wot 4 Foam-E with the rainbow as a backdrop but of course it had all but gone by the time I was ready. Hopefully you can just about see the remains of it in the photo. Dan’s plane is also there but it’s barely a dot!

In the last edition of Patch News I talked about Dan but had forgotten to take a mug shot of him. I’ve now done it, hopefully you’ll see why I call him Desperate Dan! As you can see he was checking the wind speed, it was only gusting 27mph that day, perfectly flyable! Apparently last Sunday it was gusting 32mph but the hardy (foolhardy?) still flew.

Also in the last Patch News I reported that Mark Agate had revived an old I/C model in order to take his BMFA Examiner’s Certificate but he had problems with both the motor and the radio. Since then he has converted the model (a Fun 3) to electric power and fitted 2.4GHz radio. Mark was kind enough to email a photo and the conversion information, this is what he said:

It’s been given a 21st century makeover with Devo 2.4GHz gear and electric power, as you can see in the attached photo. I test flew it at the patch today in extremely blustery conditions (Dan’s meter reported a 32-knot gust!), and I was really pleased with it.

The motor is a Turnigy 3542/6 1000kv running from a 3300mAh 4s pack, with a Hobby King 70-80A speed controller and an 11-7 prop. This seems to give the same or better power than the old 40 IC engine, but the whole plane is a bit lighter now (partly because I was able to remove half a church roof of lead from the tail), so the performance is even more sprightly. Needless to say, it’s also much quieter.

You’ll notice that I carefully built a precision mounting box to get the motor thrust line correct, and certainly didn’t just saw up an old lump of 2×2, no siree.

 

Thanks Mark, it’s always good to get information from the owner, it’s usually correct, unlike the rubbish I make up!

A group of airline passengers missed a connection flight and had to wait for another plane.  They all waited patiently except for one man who treated the ticket agent very rudely. “I had an aisle seat reserved and I’d BETTER get an aisle seat when we get on another plane,” he ranted and raved.
A few minutes later the ticket agent announced that there would be room for everyone. “And, sir,” she said, addressing the rude fella, “I’m happy to tell you that I was able to get you an aisle seat, sir.”
The man, still muttering, picked up his carry on, grabbed his boarding pass, and headed through the door.
The agent continued, “And I’m also pleased to announce the rest of you will be seated in First Class.”
 
Colin Cowplain

I’m afraid I’m a little late again with Patch News mainly because of lack of time but partly because I was short of material. This was because I haven’t been flying as much as usual, mostly due to personal commitments. The last Sunday in September was typical, we had grandson Luke stopping for the weekend and the forecast wasn’t promising so I was almost resigned to not flying.  I looked out at 9.30am, hmm… windy… overcast, with drizzle in the air. Shall I, shan’t I? Decision made, stop home, and earn some brownie points. Needless to say I spent the whole morning watching the weather brightening and the wind dropping…typical!
I said was short of material because the first Sunday in October was glorious weather, bright and sunny with very light winds.  This meant there was a really good turnout and some exciting developments to report on.
 
Mike Smith turned up a few weeks ago with a new EDF, a Phase 3 Squall. Some of you may remember Wonky Wiltshire flying a 4 cell one a while back but it was incredibly noisy and we banned it! But Mike’s is the 3 cell version rather than the 4 cell and it wasn’t at all noisy. It flew very well and although obviously not as fast as the 4 cell version it was pretty quick, I liked it a lot. “Give us a go mister!”
 
September seemed to have more than its fair share of mid-airs, and not the ‘expected’ ones that occur occasionally during combat with the little EPP models.  The first, and the most serious, was between Bob Hill’s all foam Yak 54 and the Edge 540 of Multiple Models Montague.  The models were both just doing their own thing and flying totally independently when they unexpectedly collided. Sometimes when there are several models in the air pilots are aware the models are close to each other but this time neither was aware of the other.  Both models stayed under control, Bob’s lost its undercarriage but belly landed safely.  Steve’s Edge was under control but obviously having problems. It sounded odd and was flying erratically. But Steve managed to get it down on the patch safely and then we could all see the problem!
    Bob’s undercarriage must have hit the left hand wingtip and pushed the whole wing rearward so it says a lot about the strength of the model that it stayed in one piece. Note  the damage to the wooden prop which caused the odd sound. I believe Steve has now successfully repaired it so all turned out well.
The other mid-air was between Gentleman Jim’s E-Flight Pulse and my little combat HK Mustang.  I said in the last Patch News that my Mustang had completed 150 flights…far too smug apparently! On flight number 170 with only me & Jim in the air, each minding our own business and with neither of us being aware we were anywhere near the other, there was a sudden bang!  Fortunately Jim’s Pulse carried on flying, although the motor was making odd noises, and he was able to land safely. It turned out that the impact with my P51 had broken the prop on the Pulse and the imbalance had torn the motor off the mount, but it was otherwise undamaged. Sadly the little Mustang didn’t fare so well, the collision being immediately followed by the dive of death! There were pieces of foam scattered over a wide area and although we managed to retrieve them all the wreckage was really beyond worthwhile repair. Luckily all the powertrain and radio gear was undamaged, even the prop survived, so I decided to just order another one. It had served me very well and was great fun to fly so I didn’t really begrudge sending HobbyKing another £36 odd.  The replacement went together better than the first one and is now flying well.  Obviously the whole event was 100% Gentleman Jim’s fault and he will now be known as Hooligan Hobday!
  
Speaking of nickname changes, Multiple Models Montague seems to have stopped buying new models every week (mainly because he very rarely damages them these days).  He was a very useful source of material for Patch News as I could always rely on him bringing several new planes to the patch every month. However, it turns out Steve has other uses; he has a seemingly endless supply of cyano and kicker if someone has the misfortune to break something. It’s become something of a joke at the patch that Steve is the first person to turn to when repairs are needed and he’s always happy to oblige. So MMM has morphed into Cyano Steve!
 
I haven’t mentioned Keith Evans’ late model Spitfire for a while. Keith has flown the model regularly and it’s undergone a few changes over the last year or so. He has tried a variety of undercarriage ‘systems’, ranging from none at all (looks good in the air but needs a decent chuck and belly landing), through fixed (good for take-off and landing but looks wrong in the air), to an ingenious ejecting dolly system (takes off, then the undercarriage is spat out by springs, model belly lands).  It’s suffered its fair share of damage during a few ’unscheduled arrivals’ but it has always re-emerged to fly again. Keith plans to up the cell count to 4 shortly as he feels it’s a bit marginal on power. I recently snapped this rather grainy photo of the Spit during a low pass.

 
Following the departure of Ian Hewlett the club has been left with just me as a BMFA Examiner.  Having only one examiner means the club would be unable to take any B certs without calling in someone from another club so Chairman Ron asked Mark Agate to take on the task. To become an examiner Mark needs to demonstrate he can fly the B cert schedule to a high standard and that means having an aircraft that can take-off. None of the electric models that Mark is currently flying have an undercarriage so he decided to resurrect a 33 year old I/C model he had stashed away.  I forget what the model is but it’s powered by a Meteor 40 with an 11 x 7 prop and the radio is DigiFleet 35meg.  We all thought it sounded noisy when it was being noise tested but the loudest reading was only 78.4dB, much much quieter than the regulation 82dB. I suppose it just goes to show how used we have become to electric powered models; I think Gary is now about the only regular I/C flier we have.  Anyway the model flew fine and I started talking Mark through the manoeuvres he needs to perfect. But after a few minutes the plane decided it didn’t like being told what to do and intermittently did its own thing! Luckily Mark was able to get it down safely and of course the radio was working perfectly on the ground.

There was lots of muttering about DodgyFleet and I think the set is going to be retired.  Interestingly Mark was involved with DigiFleet many years ago, doing some of their computer programming for the PCM system I believe. He’s giving us a talk about it one club night soon, should be an entertaining evening, I’m sure nobody will mention the problems!
 
With plenty of combat Mustangs present Wonky managed to convince four pilots to have some combat fun. Streamers were fitted and Wonky, Woody, and Tony and I took to the air. I was lucky and managed to take Tony’s streamer clean off as we climbed away from the launch, and it caught round my tail so I had two streamers! Shortly afterwards Wonky cut Woody’s streamer off in all the mayhem. I’m not too sure exactly what happened next as I was careering round the sky with the others but I saw Wonky’s plane suddenly dive into the deck. With the extra drag of streamers the little planes become slightly less agile and I think Phil just got caught out. There was little damage and it was soon repaired with an application of cyano. I got all cocky and did a low slow pass to show off my two streamers, at which point John Wheeley leapt into action and caught one of the streamers! I think it must have been the one that was tied to the tail as the model stopped dead and plonked into the grass.  But there was no damage so I just removed the offending streamer and chucked it back into the air. Loads of fun for all involved.
 
New member Dan (sorry, don’t know Dan’s surname yet) brought two models along on Sunday, a Wot 4 Foam-E and a HobbyKing Walrus. No I’d never heard of it either. It’s a fairly standard 1.4M span EPO foam electric glider although unusually it’s fitted with flaps. But the interesting thing about Dan’s is that he’s fitted it up with an FPV (first person view) system. This is a first for PAM so we were keen to see how it worked.
 
Now when Dan first came to the field he said he was a heli flier and had got an electric glider but needed to be taught how to fly it. I did hear the words ‘ringer’ and ‘hustler’ being bandied about; he didn’t seem to need much help to me! Anyway I flew the Walrus first while Dan wore the FPV goggles. The plane flew very well indeed and the FPV seemed to work pretty well although the prop was causing the usual lines in front of the camera.  The lens was apparently infrared which made the ground look as if there was a heavy frost although the sky was blue. Dan is going to change it to a normal lens that has a wider angle, which should improve it no end.

Unfortunately I didn’t get a photo of Dan wearing the goggles, only Wonky Wiltshire. But when you see him you’ll realise why a large heavily built guy with a beard called Dan can only be known as Desperate Dan. We’ll have to keep an eye on him when the farmer puts cattle back in the field, we don’t want Desperate Dan going for cow pie!
 
A man walks into a pub and says to the barman “Have you got any helicopter flavoured crisps?” The barman shakes his head and says, “No, we’ve only got plain.”             Oh stop groaning…
 
Colin Cowplain
 

Its the beginning of September so it must be time for another Patch News. Apologies for being a bit late with this issue, I’ve been pretty tied up with various things at home during August. It’s also meant I haven’t been out flying quite as much as usual, a real shame as the weather has been perfect for flying most days.
The little EPP Mustangs and ME109s that many of us have been flying are going well although we haven’t done much actual combat with streamers. The Mustangs are now back in stock in HobbyKing’s UK warehouse and several have been bought by PAM members.  Chairman Ron and I had a dogfighting session one morning, his 109 versus my P51, both without streamers. We careered around chasing each other all over the sky and after several minutes Ron decided he must be near the end of his battery so he throttled back. Big mistake! His tail viciously tore into my propeller (never let the truth get in the way of a good story!) and my prop won the battle.  The prop destroyed his tailplane and fin resulting in a rather sudden vertical arrival of the poor 109. Fortunately my P51 was undamaged.  We found most of the pieces of foam from Ron’s tail but they were badly chewed up so he simply made a replacement tail out of balsa and it’s now flying again, good as new.
 
Last Sunday we had another dogfighting session, this time with me, Wonky Wiltshire, and Woody, fortunately with no collisions.  It’s a lot of fun, really gets the adrenaline flowing and, if the worst does happen, the models are usually easily repaired.  They are so cheap that even in the case of a total write-off the loss wouldn’t be too great. Mine has now had more than 150 flights so it’s proved to be a real bargain.
Speaking of Wonky, he recently had a long holiday in France staying on a farm where he was surrounded by acres of flying field. Being a sensible chap he’d had the foresight to pack his P51 and a few batteries in with the wife’s frocks.  The first I knew of this was when I got a text “Pls send P51 prop ASAP”… not so sensible after all then!  Phil had remembered to everything he needed except a spare prop and he’d managed to break the original one on the very first day. I duly despatched one via a 2 day delivery service so when it arrived a week later (!) he was able to fly again. He didn’t break it…
 
When I first featured Woody’s new Texan a couple of months I mentioned it could be a bit of a handful with the typical Texan/Harvard tip-stall.  One flight ended in the bushes by the bottom track after I snatched the transmitter away from Woody because I thought he was going to tip-stall it on landing…oops! After much head scratching, nose-weight adding, lateral balancing, and aileron raising, it is now less likely to bite unexpectedly. Hopefully it will be ok now as it looks great in the air and in general it’s well behaved.

 After the first few flights Woody added a sound system that has been made especially for this particular kit. It’s a fairly basic system that only has the Pratt & Whitney Wasp sound and can’t be ‘fine-tuned’ to match the transmitter throttle position exactly but it’s very realistic and loud enough in the air to be effective. It can be a bit off putting when landing the model and trying desperately not to get it too slow but still land on the patch. Blipping the throttle to keep the speed just right produces very realistic coughing and spluttering noises and it’s difficult to ignore the noise and concentrate on the aircraft speed! To see and hear how it sounds click here: Woody’s Texan
 
Viv has been flying his beautiful Black Horse Models Ryan STA quite a bit recently. Originally the model was powered by a 120 4-stroke motor but Viv has now gone all electric and has converted the Ryan along with the rest of his models. You can see the model in its I/C form on the website homepage, a lovely shot taken by Nick Squire I believe. Now it’s electric it flies just the same and is clean and quiet as well. It’s a large model with a wingspan of 2350mm (92.5”) and weighs around 6.5kgs (14lbs) but it floats around the sky in a very scale like manner. It used to be a bit difficult to get it down when it was I/C, it would just continue flying even with the engine on a slow tick-over! But being electric now Viv can completely stop the motor, and he seems to have got the flaps sorted better so he is able to put it down on the patch fairly easily.
 

 

Chris Hard likes small models and along with his flying wings that’s I’ve featured previously he’s been flying a little F-16. Unlike most of the other jets in the club this one’s not an EDF but has a pusher prop.  It was produced by Align RC but I don’t think they are still made. I know nothing about it other than its pretty quick and manoeuvrable; perhaps Chris will tell us more in the Comments section…
 
Apparently Chris likes lovely weather but isn’t too keen on direct sun. I’m not going to say too much, I’ll be first in line to borrow that brolly next time we get caught at the patch in the rain!
 
Unusually Multiple Models Montague hasn’t bought any new planes this month, if fact he recently sold one to Steve 1066 Hastings. MMM decided he had too many models and needed some space, so 1066 obliged by taking the Extra 300 from 3D Hobby Shop off his hands.  He’s still getting used to the model and its characteristics but it’s looking good so far.
 
1066 has also been wheeling and dealing on eBay again and this time he has bought a Parkzone Typhoon 3D for a knockdown price. It’s another foamie, made from what Parkzone call Z foam; I reckon that’s just their name for EPO. It’s 1000mm span and weighs around 740gms. Unusually it comes with a geared inrunner brushless motor rather than the more normal direct drive outrunner which means it can swing a large diameter prop.  Steve hasn’t flown it much yet but it certainly looks promising and should be a good 3D machine once he gets it sorted to his liking.
  The first thing he did was add some nose weight, hence the yellow tape holding a piece of lead on the nose.  He let me have a fly and it was fine at the start of the flight but after one rather violent manoeuvre it went right out of trim. I landed to check it out and found the tailplane was hanging off!
I seemed to be dogged by dodgy models that particular day as I had a similar experience with Bob Hill’s foamie Mustang. Bob asked me to trim the model as he thought it was handling rather strangely.  It went away from the launch ok and all seemed normal at first but suddenly things changed. I thought the rudder servo had jammed over to one side and I couldn’t keep it in the air. Unfortunately it hit the fence and the barbed wire did nothing to improve its condition, but when we retrieved it we found most of the fin and rudder about 50 yards from the model. It must have been damaged previously and had broken off in the air, causing the very odd handling! Fortunately Bob soon had it repaired and it’s flying properly again now.
 
I snapped this photo at the patch a couple of weeks ago.
 Any guesses who owns this case full of lipos? Hapless Harper who has almost as many batteries as crashes? Smiffy who has to have bigger, better, faster, more than everybody else? MMM who must have loads of packs for all those planes? Or even me, I’ve been flying electric longer than anyone in PAM? Nope, none of those… it belongs to “I’ll never go electric, I’ve got too much I/C stuff” Steve Hastings!  Well you certainly can’t accuse him of going into electric power half-heartedly!
 
Do any of you remember the Multiplex Twin Jet that burst onto the scene around the turn of the century? In those days electric models were still very much in the minority and the Twin Jet was pretty revolutionary being a 36” span electric twin and an ARTF foamie. Multiplex reckoned it could be put together in one evening. The brushless outrunners we use almost exclusively nowadays were a rarity back then so Twin Jet was powered by a couple of the Speed 400 brushed ‘can’ motors. Similarly lipos were virtually unheard of so this model used a 7 cell NiCad or NiMH pack. Being cheap, quick to assemble, and fast and fun to fly it caused quite a stir and there were always several Twin Jets flying at electric events and model shows. Many were uprated with more powerful motors and some were very fast indeed. Oddly they were few and far between at the PAM patch even though several members were flying electric models by then. Multiplex stopped producing them several years ago but Mike Smith is still flying one.
 
I’m not sure how long Mike has had it but it must be several years old. It’s one of the later version ones that were moulded in white foam (the earlier ones were only available in dark grey) but it’s still powered by the original Speed 400 motors. I assume Mike uses a 3 cell lipo pack instead of a 7 cell NiCad but I’m not certain.  It still flies very well, is pretty quick and looks like a lot of fun to fly.
 
Finally, it’s time to show you Tony Neal’s latest model, a 1200mm (48”) span Ripmax Mustang.  It’s the same model that Woody has been flying successfully for a while, although his is currently awaiting repairs. I don’t think it’s still available and like the Twin Jet it was originally designed for a brushed ‘can’ motor and 7 cell NiCad, but being bigger it used a 600 can sized motor.  Like Woody’s, Tony’s model has a modern set-up of brushless outrunner motor and 3 cell lipo. Tony was having a bit of a bad day with his other models and declined to fly it but I’m sure it will prove to be a good flier once he decides to take the plunge.
 
 
British Airways recently introduced a special half priced fare for wives who accompanied their husbands on business trips. Expecting valuable testimonials, the PR department sent out letters to all the wives of businessmen who had used the special rates, asking how they enjoyed their trip. Letters are still pouring in… “WHAT TRIP?”!
Colin Cowplain