Patch News – November 2020

2020 continues to be an awful year and Lockdown 2 prevented any flying after 4th November. As I write it appears that we’ll be able to fly again after 2nd December although the limit of six and social distancing rules will still apply. Never mind, we can cope with that. Still no club meetings for the foreseeable future but we do at least have a glimmer of hope with vaccines on the horizon so maybe meetings will be able to resume sometime next spring.Some of the Midweekers were fortunate enough to fly on the 3rd and 4th of the month but for most members there was no flying at all. November 3rd was cold and very windy so not terribly enjoyable but the following day was lovely with clear skies and very little wind, a perfect winter’s day in fact and the maximum of six booked to fly.The members maintained a safe separation both when in the pits and whilst flying. A few days after the start of lockdown a fresh herd of young and inquisitive bullocks moved into the field but the fence kept them off the patch so it remains in good condition. It will need another cut when we are able to do it although it’s perfectly flyable for most models at the moment and it should be pretty easy to mow as the bullocks have now moved out again. At last, we’ve found something good thing about the lockdown, we missed the bullocks!

I’m very sad to report that, as existing club members will already know, Gentleman Jim Hobday passed away in November. Jim had been a club member for around 10 years and was a regular at the flying field, mostly on midweek days so the Sunday fliers may not be aware of just how frequently he flew. Jim had a variety of models over the years choosing a range of foamies, ARTFs, several ’proper’ builds from kits, and a Splot built from the plan. He always did things properly, a ‘that’ll do’ job simply wasn’t in his mindset.Jim was an extremely private and modest individual so most of us knew little of his battle with cancer and it wasn’t until last month that we became aware how serious the situation had become. In the typical Gentleman Jim way he barely mentioned his health problems, merely brushing away any queries with “Oh it’s fine, everything is under control” or similar. When the inevitable became unavoidable Jim began ensuring all his affairs were in order which included asking me to take care of his modelling stuff. Many club members bought models or equipment and I bought the last model he had been assembling, a Max Thrust Riot which Jim had almost completed. Sadly, at the age of 76, Jim lost his battle on 2nd November, passing away at home in accordance with his wishes.By then Chas had purchased Jim’s Parkzone Wildcat and I had finished the Riot so we were able to fly both models in Jim’s memory before the lockdown. I have added my own personal tribute to the Riot wings.Jim’s wife Bobby has asked me to pass on her thanks to the members who bought Jim’s models and equipment raising £600 for the Macmillan Specialist Palliative Care Service at Midhurst. Rest in Peace Gentleman Jim.

Dougal Entendre wrote about the trials and tribulations of his new Jumper transmitter for us back in April and this month he’s pleased (?) to share part 2: During the first lockdown I used my Jumper T16 transmitter to buzz a couple of quadcopters around the garden. The April Patch News tells the tale of how I had to re-seat a couple of ribbon cables to get it to work properly, but it seemed fine after that.Then lockdown was lifted, and I went back to my Devo transmitters for flying proper models!
After a couple of months I thought I’d give the quads another go, but when I switched the Tx on, the gremlins had got back in and the buttons and roller didn’t work again. By then Jumper were offering replacement ribbon cables, so I got a set from a UK distributor. I was still busy with proper models though, so I didn’t get round to fitting the cables until the second lockdown.
In the photo of the Tx innards, the duff cables are the two ribbons at the top corners of the main circuit board (the one with the ARM processor on it). The replacement cables seem to be higher quality and are more flexible. At any rate, they seem to work OK (so far!).When I connected the Tx to my laptop, it advised that I update the transmitter firmware, so I downloaded the file and went through the procedure, which seemed to go fairly smoothly. However… when I switched the Tx on, all kinds of alarms went off, including one about the throttle stick not being at idle (though it was!). I recalibrated the sticks, but the message persisted. Eventually I found that the Tx had defaulted to Mode 1 when I updated the firmware, and switching it back to Mode 2 fixed that particular issue.
Then I tried to get it to work with my Devo receivers (the Tx is advertised as having a multi-protocol module which is compatible with these). When I went to the menu to select the right protocol, there was no Devo option available! It was also flashing a message that I also ought to update the firmware for the internal module. Why it couldn’t have told me that when I updated the main Tx firmware I don’t know. Instead it sat there beeping nasty alarm noises at me, making me want to hurl it across the workshop.
Anyway, I figured I had to update the module firmware. After watching several YouTube videos and getting confused about whether or not my Tx had the required bootloader, plus having to work out precisely which firmware file I needed, I eventually managed to get it sorted. It was a great relief when my Devo airborne set finally bound to the Tx and the servos moved, but my blood pressure was pretty high by then.
One of the reasons I bought this Tx was to learn how to set up models using the OpenTx firmware it runs. After many hours of re-wiring it, watching YouTube videos and faffing around updating it, I think I’m finally at the point where I can start to learn OpenTx! I note that they’ve stopped making the Jumper T16 now, and it’s been replaced by the very similar RadioMaster TX16S. It’s not a transmitter I would recommend to anyone who is not computer-literate. And come to think of it, it’s probably not a transmitter I would recommend to anyone who IS computer-literate either! Thanks for the report Dougal, I don’t think I’ll be rushing out to buy a Christmas Jumper…

During the first lockdown, realising that I would be short of material for Patch News, I asked members to send me information on any new projects they had on the building board and was promptly swamped with stuff. So this time I decided to just ask a select few and it turns out that none of them were doing much building, typical! Never mind, some of you are building and first up is one from 1066. I know 1066 isn’t keen on building models these days, preferring to buy ARTFs and just enjoy the flying. I can relate to that, gone are my days of spending months working on a new creation and I rarely build anything from scratch. But 1066 has made an exception and is building a Wasp e2k, a model that’s designed to compete in the E2K pylon racing class, not that he’ll be competing with it.E2K came about in an attempt to have a class of pylon racing that doesn’t require expensive motors or batteries. The rules state that competitors must use an esc that limits the motor revs to 15232rpm and an APC 8×8 propeller so with everybody using the same size prop and the maximum revs limited there’s no point in specially tuned racing motors and any old 4 cell lipo will do. There are rules about the size of the models, cross sectional areas and so on to ensure they are all well matched and the racing is close. So the winner should be the pilot with the best skills not the biggest wallet. None of the rules will apply to 1066 of course, he just wants a fast, fun, sport model and the Wasp promises to be exactly that, unlike the Pichler Hi-Speed that has never quite matched his expectations.The Wasp cost £63 including delivery and 1066 says he was a bit underwhelmed on opening the box but that may be because he’s used to receiving ready covered ARTFs rather than a box of laser cut wood and a foam wing.The laser cut parts made the fuselage build pretty straightforward build and it has all gone together quickly.The biggest problem was that 1066 didn’t have any blades for his razor plane so had to resort to his orbital sander! The only change 1066 made was to top hinge the ailerons rather than using the Mylar strip provided. It’s all looking good so far and should be ready to fly in December so hopefully I can give a flying report in the next Patch News.

As I mentioned earlier I bought the Max Thrust Riot that Gentleman Jim had assembled. There was very little work needed to get it flying but I checked it all over thoroughly and read some of the reviews to know what to look for.The Riot is a V2 and I think some of the negative points I read about 0n the original version have been addressed on the V2. I did remove the snake inners and lubricated them to make sure they were running reasonably smoothly. The worst thing about it is the flimsy plastic battery box which is barely deep enough to take the recommended 2200mAh 3 cell lipo and has weak and badly designed clips to hold it closed and stop the battery falling out.I can see me cutting the whole box out before too long and sorting out something better! The Riot has a couple of wingtip lights and the instructions mention plugging the leads into a circuit board but I think that was something on the earlier version as on this one there are simply a couple of adaptor leads that plug into the receiver via a Y-lead. I was able to fly the Riot for the first time on the day following Jim’s death which seemed somehow appropriate although it was hardly an ideal day with a strong gusty wind blowing. But all went well and the Riot handled the conditions with no problems. The following morning, the last flying day before lockdown, was glorious with very light winds so I was able to enjoy the Riot much more. It seems to be a good flier, fully aerobatic, and it will be as gentle or as wild as you want. Unsurprisingly it flies much like a Wot-4. You can see it performing in this month’s video.

Those of you who are in the PAM WhatsApp group will have seen that John Warren is getting on well with his replacement Albatross.  He managed to save the fin, rudder, and ailerons from the previous model but other than those parts it’s all new. John sent me some photos showing the progress he’s made and it’s looking good so far. Most of the actual woodwork is done, the tricky cabane struts made, motor fitted, and the fuselage and tail are already covered.  The plan calls for a 60 sized 4-stroke but John will be using the same powertrain as before, a Turnigy 710Kv motor swinging a 13×6 propeller, a 60A speed controller and a 4 cell lipo. The combined wing area of the top and bottom wings is around 1000sq. in. and John expects the final weight to be around 5lbs. John says he’s open to suggestions for improvements to the powertrain but I always thought the original one was well suited to the model so I wouldn’t change anything myself.

Although we could only fly for two days this month I captured some video and Kryten took lots of superb photos:

Video time now, this month with additional video from Captain Slow and Dougal Entendre  but all from just two days of flying. Please watch the video full screen, it’s so much better with small models flying around.If the video won’t play for you please click HERE

Rudolph the Red-nosed reindeer died over Barcelona today when he was hit by a flock of seagulls and a 747.
Eyewitnesses said “The reindeer in Spain was struck mainly by the plane…”

Merry Christmas, stay safe, here’s hoping for a better New Year.
Colin Cowplain