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Last friday night my good friends Stephane and Josee invited Emmanuel and I to be their guests at the members only BBQ event at Vintage Wings in Gatineau. Along with dinner we were treated to several of VWC’s classic airplanes practicing their routines at dusk for the airshow that was going to take place the following day. Watching the Harvard perform aerobatics with smoke on and the sun setting in the background was great!

The highlight of the night came after the sun was fully set and darkness fell on the airport. The Gatineau fire department hosed down a section of the tarmac and two fighters took turns in the spotlight so the photogs in the crowd could take some unique shots of these impressive machines running up their engines.

It was amazing to watch and hear and I think I did a good job of capturing the event. Please click on the photo below to see a few of the shots I took on that darkened tarmac.

I hope you enjoy them.

Happy Landings

Scotty

The morning of September the 10th brought with it unseasonably warm weather, clear blue skies and a just a light breeze, perfect weather for the Stetson Flyers annual Giant Scale Rally and Pig Roast. We had the best turnout we’ve had in a few years, lots of planes, few mishaps, plenty of great flying and a lot of fun. This is an event I cohost with my good friend Ed and along with his help this year Emmanuel, Paulo, Don, Gerry and Dan all pitched in to make the two day event a great success. Ed out did himself with the pig this year as evidenced by the distinct lack of leftovers. Slowly cooked all day over a hardwood fire is what delicious. We served just over 60 people for dinner.

After dinner we had a campfire and the laughs and good times carried on until the early hours of the morning. Sunday the weather was just as nice as Saturday and again we got in plenty of flying. A great time was had by all in attendance even though some of us might have been a little slower moving than usual.

Rene let me warm up for the day of flying by taking the sticks of his Taylor Craft and I was quite pleasantly surprised at just how nice a plane it is to fly. Thanks Rene!

Larry and Goose were both out on Saturday to capture the events on film errr sort of. Click the photo below to check out Larry’s galleries. Goose hasn’t posted his shots yet but I’ll post a link when he gets them online. Thanks guys!

Thanks to everyone that came out to enjoy the event and those that helped out.

Happy Landings

Scotty

 

 

About an hour south of Syracuse just off I81 you’ll find the Chenango Bridge Airport, a beautiful grass strip airport and home to the Binghamton Aeros. The Aeros are a small club of modellers who fly giant scale models exclusively off this site. Every year on the second weekend in August they throw open the gates and welcome guests to come fly for the weekend.

This year a group of us decided to make the trip down to Chenango Bridge and check out this great site for ourselves. In all there was a 12 of us from the Ottawa area attending the event. We made up a quarter of the attendees. The organizers acknowledged our presence with the playing of Oh Canada at the official opening of the rally.

The weather for flying was great and I did plenty of it. The Aeroworks Extra 260 is finally working really well and I had a great time throwing it around the sky. I think I put a dozen or so flights on it over the weekend. Ed had fun with his Raven, Mike, Emmanuel, Gerry and Donny all got in multiple flights over the weekend. This was Paulo’s first time at a giant scale rally and after a rough first attempt managed to log a few flights with his newly acquired 1/4 scale Piper Cub.

Mike brought his TF Giant Scale P47 along and it was a crowd favorite. He really does a great job of flying it in a scale manner. He was in good company as there were 3 other Jugs there and plenty of other warbirds.

At noon the organizers arranged for a few different demonstration flights. First up was WWI airplanes. What a site!! Eight giant WWI planes all in the air at the same time. It was great to see and Joe would have loved it. Sorry I didn’t get any photos of it. Next up was a group of heavy metal WWII warplanes. I can’t remember how many but it was an impressive site as well. Next up some civilian planes including a 40% scale Cessna 140. Great looking plane. The organizers then invited Ed and I to try and wow the crowd with our two aerobats. It was a blast to share the sky with my good friend and have a little fun. I heard some Ooos and Awws and I think the crowd enjoyed the show. We enjoyed putting it on.

 

I didn’t take a lot of photos because frankly I was having too much fun flying but you can click on the image in this post and check out some of the pics I did take.

Next year the Binghamton Aeros will be hosting the annual IMAA Rally of Giants in June. It’s a great site and should be a great event. I know I’ll be there. Hope you can join us.

Happy Landings
Scott

 

Yesterday after the Electric Fun Fly, Emmanuel and I put the floats on the Fun Cubs and after dinner headed out to a local pond to try our hands at float flying. We had a great time. It was a completely new experience for me and I really enjoyed it. We went back again tonight for some more fun.

I shot a little video of the fun last night. Check it out.

Happy Landings

Two days down and one to go it’s been a great long so far.

Saturday was the first ever Electric Fun Fly hosted at the Stetson Flyers field. It turned out to be a great day. I don’t know how many pilots we had but the parking lot was full and there was plenty of action in the pits and on the flight line. It was pretty windy all day and of course it was crossing from the north so it made for some interesting flying and challenging to land in.

Emmanuel, Paulo and I brought the Fun Cubs out and had a great time dancing on the wind with them. These simple little planes are a blast to fly and are proving to be quite durable. Joe mistook us for a pack of Zeroes and took to the skies with his Corsair and tried to take us down. Paulo’s Zero err Cub and the Corsair made contact and the Cub won. That was it for the Corsair. Joe tried again with his Sea Fury and though there was contact both pilots kept their planes alive to fight another day.

I got my speed fix with both the Evader and the Habu32 and I think the crowd enjoyed the 200 km/h plus passes only a couple feet off the deck. I really love flying the Habu32. It looks great in the air and it really handles nicely.

Larry and Goose were both out shooting the event and you really should check out these guys’ galleries. They really do an awesome job of capturing the fun.

Goose has already posted a gallery. You can click on the photo below to go directly to it. I’m sure it won’t be long until Larry get’s his gallery up. You can find his photos by following the link in the sidebar.

Happy Landings

Well after collecting dust in my shop all winter I finally got the Multiplex Fun Cub built and ready for it’s maiden.

So tonight Emmanuel, Paulo and I headed out with 3 Fun Cubs for a little fun. Our usual park flying spot was occupied so we tried out the beach at Petrie Island.

It turned out to be a great spot. We had the wind and sun at our backs. There was plenty of open space and the hard packed sand made an interesting runway.

Using flaps was a lot of fun making landings and takeoffs super short. Get it just right and you could have the plane down and stopped in it’s own length.

Manu decided to try some Alaskan bush pilot style flying with not so great results. Hehe

I can’t wait to put this little bird in the air again

Happy landings

The AW Extra 260 got a little dressed up

Out with the boys for a great day of flying.

This past weekend was the annual MAAC Zone G Funfly once again hosted at the Russ Beach airport in Smiths Falls. The nice folks at the Smiths Falls flying club have graciously shutdown their airport for one weekend in July for the last few summers so a bunch of bigs kids can get together and play with their toys.

This year as in past years we had a good mix of planes. There were giant scale aerobats, trainers, scale birds and of course with a paves runway to use we had jets.

Saturday we had light winds slightly crossing the runway but not unmanageable and of course heat. Reports say the humidex hit 42. There was plenty of flying that day. Sunday proved to be a little more challenging. Though straight down the runway the wind was quite a bit stronger and deterred quite a few pilots from flying.

Saturday night we had a great steak dinner put on by the Shriners in one of the hangers and lots of great prizes. Unfortunately they took forever to hand out so I went and drank beer instead of seeing if I won anything.

Personally I got quite a bit of flying in. The AW Extra with it’s new ZDZ powerplant and a few new servos finally seemed to be working right. First time it’s returned home without needing repairs. I also flew quite a few flights with the Habu 32 and though I had some great flight time the landings on the first day left much to be desired. On Sunday after some discussion with Ed I decided to try something a little different on landing to see if it would help cure the bouncing. The plan was to retract the flaps as soon as I touched down. I gave it a shot and it worked like a charm. No bounce, not even a hint of it. Perfect!

All in all it was a great weekend. Once again Larry the camera guy was there to capture the event. Check out his galleries

Happy landings

At the end of last season a failed throttle servo and a cross wind conspired to see me stall on short final. The impact caused the landing gear to be driven up through the fuselage and caused significant structural damage. It’s been a long time coming but the repair work is finally nearing completion.

In the pic you can see all the woodwork is done and it’s time to cover.

Happy Landings
Scotty