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Archive for the ‘Flying Reports’ Category

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

 

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

Well it’s been quite some time since I last posted to this blog. I think the reason being that after my last post my season turned very frustrating. After the crash of my beloved Extreme Flight Extra 300 I purchased an Aeroworks 75cc Extra 260 and then started the frustration. Long story short the rest of the season including a trip to Dayton Ohio for a giant scale event saw me manage only a dozen flights on this airframe due to numerous failures. I won’t get into them.

So I was pretty discouraged and packed it in early.

Before calling it a season we made a road trip to the DOGS airshow in Dayton and a visit to the USAF Museum. The airshow didn’t thrill us but the museum was something else. I’ll post a trip report shortly.

So the new season is off to a good start with a trip to the local park for some park flyer action yesterday. Paulo, Emmanuel, Todd and I had a great time. Hopefully a sign of things to come.

This year I’ve got some new tools to make updating this blog more convenient so I’ll try and keep it a lot more fresh.

Happy Landings
Scotty

August 1st brought an absolutely perfect day for flying. Since I was only flying electrics today I figured I’d get up early and head to the field. What a day we were treated to. The air was still, the sky was blue with no signs of clouds and the temperature was warm but not humid. It was a perfect morning.

I managed to put in several great flights with the Trex 600 and tried out a few new things. I only managed to scare the crap out of myself twice. Doh!

I was also flying a Parkzone Extra 300. I continue to be impressed with how nicely these foam planes fly. This little plane groves along and tracks very nicely through all maneuvers. There’s some pitch to rudder coupling that I’ll need to mix out but no big deal really. I burned through 3 packs in short order. What a blast this plane is.

There were quite a few others out today including Ben, Ed, Brad and Jason, Marc and Mike to name a few. Ed brought along his new Eflite Extra 300 to maiden. This electric plane is almost as big as a 40 size glow plane. It looks great on the ground and when Ed got it in the air it didn’t disappoint. I didn’t fly it but it sure seemed to fly great and tracked like a much bigger plane.

Along with the planes and heli I brought my camera out to the field today to try out my new Satechi timer remote to do a little time lapse photography. I set the camera up on a tripod on top of the trailer, set the remote to fire a frame every 10 seconds and let it run for a couple hours. I used iMovie to convert all the still photos to a video and the results are below.

Leave a comment and let me know what you think.

Happy Landings

I had looked for it but could never find it. The expiration date in my Extra 300 that is. Yep that’s right it expired on July 25th at the Upper Canada Zone Fun Fly.

I performed a snap roll on my first flight of the second day of the event and the starboard side wing panel blew apart. Nothing I could do about it the plane was going in. The result…….well the pictures speak for themselves.

The crash aside it was a great weekend at the Fun Fly. Stephane, Josee, Emanuel and I all spent the weekend at the Smith Falls airport and had a great time flying, watching and socializing. This event has grown to be one of the premier events of the summer flying season drawing in pilots from across the zone as well as out of towners.

The Quebec Air Force once again showed up with a nice array of jet models. They’re always thrilling to watch.

Emanuel got to fly off of pavement and in front of a large crowd for the first time and he did a great job of it. No mishaps on his part.

The event is held at a full size airport and some of the members put on a show for us. A father and son team wowed us in their Pitts Specials and we were also treated to some close in and very low high speed fly pasts from an L39 Albatross. Nice toy for the rich.

Don’t worry about me and my Extra 300. I’ll miss it for sure, it was one of the best flying airplanes I have owned but I have found a replacement that I hope will fly just as well and will provide me with just as much pleasure. My new Aeroworks Extra 260 should arrive on Friday. I’ll try and post some pics of the build.

Happy Landings

Scott

The weather forecast was perfect for Sunday morning so I rounded up the troops and we had a great day of flying.

I flew both my Extra 300 and my Trex 600e FBL. I really love both these birds. I put on a smoke show for a photo enthusiast who dropped by the field with the Extra. I can’t wait to see his pics.

Jason, one of our newest and youngest Wings recipients (13 years old), was out to fly for the first time since receiving his wings. He did a great job considering a nice little cross wind had come up. On his final flight of the day he asked me to spot for him. I had a great time talking him through some new aerobatic maneuvers. Had him doing Immelmans, Reverse Cuban 8′s and Snap rolls before the flight was over. Congrats Jason!!

This weekend is the annual Upper Canada Zone Fun Fly at the Smiths Falls airport. It’s a great event for model pilots and spectators alike.

Happy Landings

Scott