Robert Samuels: Hi Flyers: My flying day started at 6:00 am when I went to church for my weekly dose of indoor 3D.  Also attending services were the usual group of guys who are relatively new and think I know something about flying, motors, batteries, etc.  I love the attention.

Bob Gill, as usual, taught and helped everyone.  His skill at helping new flyers is amazing to watch.  He is very gentle and can get anyone flying and loving it.

I left church and got to the sod farm at about 10:30.  Mark and Brendan M. already had the winch set up and Art, Nelson, Tony and Gene were getting ready to fly.  It was absolutely gorgeous out today.  A wonderful St. Louis spring day.  Warm, sunny and moderate winds.  The field and the road were bone dry.  Hard to believe after the last couple of weeks but true. 

We started off with the DLG planes.  Tony, despite his continual griping, was actually getting some pretty decent launches with his PhotonII.  Mark M. (with his XP-4.5),and Brendan and I kept him company in the air and gave him some practice flying the crowded skies that are the nature of handlaunch.

"Let's see, wind up and throw hard....WHOOPS! didn't see that other plane.... Wow!  sure didn't miss it by much!  Hope I remember to look next time".

Then we switched to the big planes.  Gene was getting strange launches and handling with his Organic until we discovered he had massive down trim in it.  Trimmed it up and suddenly it began flying right.  The moderate wind was giving us some dynamite launches.  Just looking at the weather one would think that lift would be booming.  But it wasn't.  Even Art and Nelson were scratching.  I bet I had 10-12 flights with my Graphite2.  I only had one instance of real lift.  I had a lot of "some" lift and a lot of spots where I could make 1-2 turns before losing it.  And with all the little bumps you could stay up for a decent time but it wasn't easy.  Which made it really interesting.  To me it seemed like the lift was a bunch of "strings" with no big bubbles.  Or maybe waves.  Whatever.  However I will note that Brendan was skying out pretty frequently.  I wonder how he does that without lift?

Art was flying his Zenith, Nelson his Daedalus, Tony his Ava (or whatever it is) and Mark and Brendan were flying a wide variety of various moldies, none of which I could identify.   Brendan had a flight with one of the planes that had an interesting ending.  I'll let him tell you about it.  If he feels up to it.  :(

After noon I pulled out the MicroFlash hotliner.  I don't know if it is interesting to see fly but I sure enjoy it.  And it gets my blood pumping!  Amazingly I completed another flying session without damaging it. Unbelievable.

After most of the guys finished flying and left it was just Mark and Brendan and me until Mark Gauding showed up with his DLG.  So I pulled mine out again and we filled the sky with those little devils.  Lift was no better down low than it was up high.  A lot of teasing bumps but little real lift.  I skyed out a couple of times from about 782 throws.  Despite the wind I could range waaaay out looking for lift.  I must have been in soft stuff to be able to range so far.  But mostly it was range out, circle back, land, throw.  HL is great fun.  But it becomes super fun when you have other HL planes in the air at the same time.  Which we did.

But after  9 1/2 hours of flying (counting church) I'd had as much fun as my marriage could stand.  So it was pack up and head home.  Mark M., Brendan and Mark G. were still there when I left.

What a great day at the field.  Just a casual Wednesday.... yes.... Wednesday.... fun fly at the sod farm.    And we had 8.....count'em.......8 guys flying.

That was fun ....   :)

El Roberto

Brendan Miller: Yea today was a fun day, except for the last flight and I mean last flight for the blizzard. I was coming down wind and had plenty of air speed when all of a sudden the plane rolled left and I corrected but to no avail. The plane slammed into the ground driving the nose into the ground and breaking both panels off. We don't know what happened and yes it was upsetting but maybe it was not meant to be. So we got the Pike S out and I seem to be good with it, I really need to get with Chris since the Pike can be a whole lot better. So with the end of the Blizzard the search begins for a new full house. Might look for a Pike S at a reasonable price.

Brendan

Mark Miller: What a wonderful day. I was beginning to think it may not happen after the rainy season started. Today it seemed the sun, moon and stars were all aligned. Brendan had the day off. The guys were going to the field. Bren and I had 2 planes ready for their maiden flights. I called in to work and played hooky.

I flew his Blizzard on it's first flight and it was a good thing because I had his programming messed up mostly because his Heli 9303 has launch switch going in the opposite direction from my Air version. It was just about controllable, scaring the crown and had guys running to move their cars. Luckily I got it on the ground with no more gymnastics. I flipped the switch and things seemed to be moving right so I launched again. It felt reasonable but you could tell it needed the usual trimming and radio tweaking. Bren launched it and it flew ok but had some small issues. The next to last flight he landed with the flaps down and I heard a click. I looked things over and all looked ok. Bren launched again and flew for awhile but when flying straight and level down wind it rolled to the right and kept on going finally nosing into the ground. He was correcting for the roll but it did not respond. I cannot say positively what happened. Radio glitch? Servo malfunction? Who knows. It would be repairable if the joiners were not bonded into the tip panels. They broke off but there is no way to get the old ones out. Maybe we can drill and it may be worth doing the surgery just to see if it can be done. I have some aluminum joiners from Don Richmond that might fit.

He was of course pretty upset. This and is recent few crashes got him down for a few minutes. We talked and I figured the best way to cheer him up would be to put together my beater Pike Superior and let him get back on the horse. How is that for confidence in your sons abilities? He crashes his first moldie and dad gives him his to fly. He seemed to be at one with it even though it was his first time flying it. All I need to do is look at his face when he is flying and you can tell if he is comfortable or not. With the Blizzard he was not and I hung around to offer encouragement. After 2 flights with the Pike he looked comfy so I went about my thing getting my new Zoom off the ground. It looks like Brendan is now on a mission to save his pennies and look for another good probably used Superior or something like that.

The Zoom is a moldie built in China that I got last fall. It is heavy at 95 ounces and strong in all the wrong places. The wing flexes like a woodie but did not break. While building it I saw that the wing joiner boxes were not built into the spar but lay along side of it. The spar looks like carbon caps with balsa shear webs and carbon but I cannot tell if it is a woven sock around the spar or just a piece of fabric bonded to the side for decoration. The finish is nice but as they say "Nice House...No one home". To say I am unimpressed is the truth. It was cheap so I did not have high expectations even though the shipping cost more than the plane which makes it maybe not so cheap. I will just use it for windy days or as a slope plane or to impress my friends with the wing flex.

We ended the day with DLG and it was more like fly fishing. Cast...Reel In. Cast...Reel in. I had some nibbles but nothing I'd call a keeper.

Bren and I hit our usual Sonic for a bite to eat. Sun roof was open and it was great to feel the warmth of the sun and recall what a great day it was with the best bunch of guys I know.

Mark Miller

Tony Estep: Well, it was the best of times, it was the worst of times. Glad you left with a positive feeling overall.

The mishap with the new plane was a real shame, but after some fiddling I think it will prove to be fixable. The idea of a Pike Superior is a good one -- they are great flyers and very reliable.

The air today was not too cooperative. I was launching at < 300 feet, not sure why, but anyway from that height it was not easy to get up and away. At least once I nearly beat the chute to the ground. I had the Topaz out for the first time this year and had to program it for my new transmitter by copying a full-house plane and then modifying the program for spoilers, no ailerons, no flaps. Needless to say I made a hash of it and didn't get it figured out until time to leave.

Notwithstanding any complaints about air, plane, dumb thumbs, inability to HL, or whatever, it was great to be out at the sod farm on green grass with 7 flying buddies in the sunshine. Beats working, beats just about anything.