13-2-04 Video Night
We had an excellent and very entertaining evening thanks to contributions
from Jim Ruffell & Steve Morris. Jim has become adept at producing
very entertaining short films on aeromodelling subjects. The first
of these entitled 'First Frights' was a compilation of first flights
by yours truly with my Sopwith Pup, Andy Tubb with his Horton
Wing and Simon Peckham with his F15 Eagle, all set to music. This
was followed by Jim's piece-de-resistance featuring Neil Longman's
first flight with his Cougar interposed with parts edited from
the Thunderbirds puppet TV series. The Cougar finally being shot
down by a missile from Thunderbird 1 which brought a huge cheer
from the audience.
27-2-04 Indoor flying
15 people took part which is a decent attendance for an evening's
flying. Once again both halls opened for us so the heli flyers
disappeared into the back hall and left the remainder of us fly
in the main hall.
The popularity of small indoor helicopters seems to be increasing with more and more appearing at our indoor meetings. Knowing how difficult a discipline flying these models can be, I was intrigued by a web site dedicated to learning to fly electric model helicopters. This site can be found at www.dream-models.com and includes a comprehensive set of instructions for learning to fly these types of models, written in a very amusing and lighthearted manner. Even if you have mastered the art, the instructions are well worth reading.
12-3-04 Bring & buy sale with a good attendance
Lots of models but no trading takes place during the evening!
Jim was brave enough to bring his Hummingbird electric helicopter for its first fright. I could not but admire him for attempting this, as we all know how difficult these little machines are to control. Jim did this in the full view of members who carried out a considerable amount of good-natured barracking. Help and good advice from some of our more competent chopper guiders soon replaced this, and in the end Jim was beginning to get the hang of the little machine (see Photopage - Ed). So there we had one of the best plank fliers in the club embarking on a new discipline and doing the correct thing by getting help from more experienced fliers. There is a lesson for all here and Jim should be congratulated for setting this example.
9-04-04
We had a good turnout for the Scratch building talk by Mike Roach
and Andrew Tubb. Mike first outlined the process of producing
plans from various sources including photographs and scale drawings.
He explained how the resultant outline drawing, scaled to the
correct size, could be used to build a scale model, and with the
addition of photos taken whilst the model was being constructed,
could sometimes be sold to one of the various model magazines
that are always looking for new models. Andrew completed the lecture
with a talk on the various building methods to produce light strong
structures. The whole evening was rounded off by free tea all
round, so if you did not attend you missed out twofold.
16-04-04
Congratulations are in order to Keith Young who passed his 'A'
test at Kings Park using his TwinStar fitted with a quite novel
undercarriage, and that man again, Jim Ruffell who passed the
advanced 'B' test recently.
14-05-04 AGM + Construction & Finish
By the time you read this AGM will have taken place together with
the judging of the construction & finish competition (pictures here - Ed).
As for the AGM, the club is in a good financial state with a fairly constant membership and the committee is unchanged again this year.
Trevor Hewson with his Capiche won the Construction & Finish, which was rather nice as he was in hospital at the time. Hopefully he will be on the way to a full recovery by the time you read this.
So good flying until the next time.