Patch News – November 2023

As is to be expected at this time of year the weather varied greatly in November, we had some very pleasant days with little wind but also some truly awful wet and windy days.
The midweekers were fortunate that the nicer days seemed to be mostly during the working week, some Sundays were not good at all. I took this screenshot from Holfoy on Sunday 19^th showing that at 11am the wind speed was 27.3 mph gusting 40.3mph.

As far as I know not a single club member bothered going. Wimps, the lot of them!
The grass on the patch is hardly growing now but the Friday Afternoon Rural Trimming Society (FARTS) did their bit and mowed the patch a couple of times in November.

On some of the nicer days several new models were successfully flown the first one being a beautifully built electric glider belonging to Dwayne Pipe, I’ll let him tell you about it: Those of you who went to the EGM at the Hampshire Hog will remember the excitement of the auction of the planes donated by the widow of an ex-PAM member. I bought an elderly but beautifully made thermal glider, 6 ft wingspan and likely hand built from an unknown plan. The fuselage on investigation had had a number of evolutions, starting off as a catapult launch pure glider, then a huge brushed motor had been added powered by NiCad batteries. The wings were held on by rubber bands as was custom in the past. My upgrade was to remove the supplied motor and fit a 1000Kv brushless motor, 9”x6” folding prop, ESC and 3S 2200mAh Lipo battery. The wing mounting was upgraded to bolt the wing onto the fuselage and a new battery cover was made. The plane flies beautifully in still air but with any wind will float motionless above the patch.
Thanks for that Dwayne, as you can see in the video the model also looks great in the air.  The items sold at the auction actually came from two different sources, some were given to the club by the widow of ex-member Chris Davies who passed away twenty years ago, but most of the lots came from ex-member John Bourne who, along with his wife Kay, sadly now has to live in a care home. Their children are clearing the family home and John very kindly asked that Petersfield Aero Modellers be given first refusal on all of his modelling goods. John has always been a ‘character’, a slightly eccentric chap who could turn his hand to anything and always made a good job of whatever it was. The glider was one of John’s and, as Dwayne says, presumably it was built from a plan but neither of us know what it is. Does anyone have any ideas which model it might be?

The next new model is another of Dwayne’s, an updated version of his Sea Vixen.
Dwayne explains what is different on this version: The design of the foamboard Sea Vixen has been resurrected in the shape of the Mk IV. This is similar to the other three, but the design has evolved as a result of the experience gained in flying its predecessors.
The planform is identical to the original, but the paper covering on the foamboard is now retained and both sides are laminated with clear parcel tape. The tail booms are now fabricated from Correx as this was the weak spot in the original design.
As the model is now heavier than the original the prop has been upgraded to a 7”x4” with the original 2200Kv motor. The final change was the addition of a rudder so that the agile little plane can now do wingovers and stall turns when I get the hang of them!!
This latest version is definitely the most successful yet and you can see it flying in the video. There’s even video of Dwayne and Bob the Builder flying their Sea Vixens together.

In November several of us noticed that Woody’s piloting skills had improved considerably, something we all found a little puzzling initially. But then he explained that he’d recently got some new glasses. “It much better now, I can actually see the model while it’s flying.”
Yes, Woody, that would make a difference! And you look more like Tom Cruise…possibly!

Last month I said that the batteries I’d ordered in the HobbyKing backorder sale hadn’t arrived. I was a little disappointed as the site had said they were expected at the end of October, but then in the first week of November the order was processed and they arrived.
The order was for three 3 cell 2200mAh packs and three 4 cell 2200mAh packs, all 60C rated. As I always do with new batteries the first thing I did was check the cell voltages on a meter only to find that one of the 4 cell packs had a cell that was very low on voltage.
I followed the website instructions to submit a claim (just a few words and a couple of photos of the pack on the meter) and within a couple of hours I had a message saying my claim was agreed and they’d send a replacement pack, with no need to return the bad one.
Sure enough a few days later the new pack arrived and they also gave me an account credit of £2.21, not sure why! In the meantime I tried to charge the duff pack at 2.2A (1C) but it wouldn’t accept a charge so I tried 0.5A and that worked. After several hours all 4 cells had charged to the correct voltage and the pack was balanced perfectly. I expected the dodgy cell to quickly lose its charge but it stayed up so I flew it and it appeared to be fine. I’ve only used it for a couple of flights so far but it seems good so if it lasts I actually got seven packs for the price of six and they were already a very good price so I’m very happy.

Cream Egg appeared with a new model in November and this one is quite a beauty.
It’s a 1.5m span E-Flite Cirrus SR22T that Cream Egg had been threatening to bring along for a couple of weeks before he finally made it to the patch, I’ll let him explain all:
What a beautiful model. I’m really pleased with it. Construction is superb. And it was a pleasure putting it together. The only setback I experienced was a slight oversight when ordering the product. I ordered the model without the receiver. The alternative model comes with the receiver fully programmed for the Cirrus, which now requires me to program the receiver I subsequently ordered from Sussex Models, (presumably at higher cost than that supplied with the model), this requiring a special USB programming cable, which is not available anywhere, other than via a couple of the club members. Cable is 25 quid! Great that it incorporates flaps and excellent navigation / landing lights. The flaps should prove useful, given its wide wing span, yet quite slim wings.
As is usual, it has quite small wheels and on the 3^rd landing, it set down well and then dug in the nose wheel, causing it to flip over. This only bent the nose leg 4.5mm rod, which I’ve now fixed. Dougal Entendre kindly undertook the responsibility of the maiden flight, trimming the model for me. Minor adjustments were needed. It seems to need reasonably high minimum speed to remain airborne, and so flaps on landing might be a real bonus. I can set the flaps to around 20% and 100%, and so we will experiment carefully with this to avoid stalling! I need some guidance here. I’ve set three levels of Expo and throw on the surfaces. Dougal suggested having a differential on the ailerons to avoid tip stall, but the Spektrum DX7 transmitter does not appear to have this option. All in all, I’m really pleased with the model and the first flight session.
Thanks Cream Egg, the Cirrus looks good in this month’s video but I wasn’t at the patch when it flew so I look forward to seeing it for myself. Cream Egg is struggling to find a larger nose-wheel for the Cirrus so please contact him if you have a spare one that’s 65mm diameter x 20mm wide (2.5” x 0.79″). The axle diameter is 4.5mm (0.177”).

Gordon Bennett took a trip to a table top sale at Mountbatten School in Romsey recently, here’s his report and photos: On the 19th November the Hampshire Model Flying Association held the Southern Counties Autumn Auction Swapmeet. In fact, they had one last year but I got the timing wrong and arrived at midday, just as it was closing.. This year I thought I wouldn’t be able to attend as my mother-in-law was visiting and we had a trip out to Winchester planned. This was a shame. No, not the mother-in-law visit, I had wanted to go to the swapmeet as I wanted to flog my old Valiant trainer. However, prospective new member Rod Ashton was having a clear-out and had booked a table so offered to flog the Valiant for me. As it transpired my mother-in-law (Minette or Min for short) was only too happy to drop in at Romsey while on the way to Winchester. What a good egg she is. Arriving at the school hall I was greeted by the news that Rod had already flogged the Valiant for 75 quid and promptly put the cash into my hand.
The event was well stocked with about 40 tables and lots of lovely goodies.
I didn’t particularly want anything but remembered I needed a Y lead for my aileron servos on my Jet Provost build. Finding a table with tons of servos and cables I asked the chap if he had any and, after a short rummage, he came up with three for a quid.
Excellent! Next was a heavy-duty soldering iron for a fiver and then I found a table with a Stearman on it. This was a gorgeous little model, balsa frame and film covering, it was calling me… Sense prevailed as I remembered the last balsa frame and film model I bought (a Mini Bolero) which hit a tree and came out ‘worse for wear’. I didn’t think the Stearman’s small undercarriage would do well on the patch, so I gave it a miss.
In retrospect I kind of wish I had bought it as it was just so nice to look at. As you can see in the photo my wife (Pam) also liked the model, I really should have bought it for her as a Christmas present. Moving on I then came across a Multiplex Extra 330. I’ve been having great fun with my AcroWot and thought this would be a good progression. A tiny bit larger but heavier, more powerful and much more aerobatic. Some haggling was done and I got it with the money I’d received for the Valiant so felt pretty pleased with my swap. It’s resting in the garage at the moment, I need a bit of time to go carefully through it and make sure everything is as it should be. (It’s Multiplex, it’ll be perfect!)
So, all in all the swapmeet was pretty successful. It was well stocked and attended, you could get a cup of tea and it’s ‘mother-in –law friendly’. I think I’ll go again next year and see if the Stearman reappears. In the meantime there’s a swapmeet at Chobham on 10th of Feb, I’ll post some details nearer the date. Thanks Paul, actually HMFA run two swapmeets in Romsey every year and the next one is on Sunday 24^th March 2024.
I flew a Stearman for a while before selling it on the Page Boy who presumably still has it.
Kryten snapped me flying it three years ago and captured the pilot’s ‘salute’ very well!

Woody has built a foam Eurofighter Typhoon that was designed by Tomas Hellberg. Tomas has published the plans for seven different foam board models on the internet and they can be found HERE  The plan says to build the Typhoon from 6mm Depron but Woody used foam board from Hobby Craft which has a paper covering. He removed the paper from the wings for lightness but left it on the rest of the plane for strength.
Woody has fitted the Eurofighter with the usual set-up, a 2212 2200kv motor, 30A speed controller, and two 9g servos all powered by a three cell lipo. Woody has finished the Eurofighter in the colours of RAF Display Team and I must say it looks very smart.
The recommended prop size for this set-up is 6“ dia and the plan says a 6” prop will fit but because Woody has run the cables for his lights (yes, this Woody we’re talking about, lights are compulsory!) along the inside of the fuselage he had to fit a smaller diameter prop.
This became obvious on the test flight when the Eurofighter staggered round, distinctly underpowered. Other than the lack of power it seemed fine so Woody has gone away to re-route the lighting cable and fit a bigger prop. I’m sure it will be fine with more thrust.

The selection of action shots this month are nearly all taken from this month’s videos and are mostly of my Bush Mule dropping parachutes (my blog, my privilege)! The last, much better quality photo, is one of Captain Slow’s Wots Wot, snapped by Kryten last month.

Video time now with footage shot by me, MacFly, Gordon Bennett and Dougal Entendre. 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

How does Santa’s sleigh navigate through foggy weather?
With “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Radar”

Merry Christmas everyone
Colin Cowplain