Presidents Column
We can now put another Bentfield Memorial contest in the books. Right up front I want to thank everyone that helped set up and run the contest. I’ve had several people call and tell me how well I ran the event but the simple fact is that I had an abundance of help from our club members and that is something we all can be proud of.
Although attendance was somewhat down this year, the contest went off without a hitch. Saturday the weather for Beginner, Intermediate, and Classic was perfect and first thru third in each event were separated by only a hand full of points. As usually, Bob did a great job on the field and one of our out of town guests said it was one of the best grass fields he’d seen. The only downfall was a complaint, or tow, from our favorite neighbor. I was expecting that and handled it promptly.
Sunday was another beautiful day but during the afternoon the winds came up and became somewhat of an issue. I called Crystal airports weather and was told that winds were 13 mph, gusting to 19 mph and even though it added to the challenge both events (Advanced and P-40) were finished.
Throughout the weekend there were lots of nice planes on the flight line and most went home intact. Mike Moylan lost two planes to the gods of terra firma and Jeff Welliver lost one. I had my P-40 out on Sunday but it wasn’t all the way finished so I didn’t get to test fly it. Probably just as well considering the wind.
We decided back in 1999 we would try this contest thing for five years and then figure out if it’s something we want to pursue. In the coming months, I’m sure everyone will hear an opinion or two on this subject so here’s a couple of things I feel need to be taken under consideration:
- Do we want to give up the only Saturday we can use our field?
- Keep in mind the real work in holding a contest like this happens months before the event.
- In order to sanction a contest you must first apply for a date, if we stop having this contest it will be for good and I’m sure another club will pick up our weekend.
These are just some random thoughts that need to be looked at before a decision is made.
On a totally different subject you will have noticed by now that the days are getting shorter. This means that our flying season is winding down and although I’m not ready for it to end, I’m sure that it will. My suggestion is simple – get out and so me flying while you can or just stop by and hang out with the guys.
Remember the meeting is on the 26th of August.
Keith Sandberg
Vice President's Column
It’s Saturday morning, and we just came back from the EAA Chapter 100 Young Eagles Day. Ryan got a ride in a Velocity. I have a hard time telling the composite homebuilts apart, but the Velocity is the four seat one with an IO-360 engine. Very cool airplane. Interesting that this was considered a fast airplane when it came out, but now a conventional RV-8 is about as fast on the same power and has room for some luggage!
The Bentfield contest has come and gone again. I regret that we could only make the one-day, but I ended up working Friday night. I keep trying to break the work habit, but the clinic says it won’t pay me if I don’t work. Why is that? I’ll let Bob print the results, but this contest was notable for a shortage of out-of-town flyers. There were two contests, one for combat in Polk City and another in Chicago, that siphoned off a few folks that might have come. I don’t know how much gas prices, security jitters, and date conflicts play into it, but my impression is that attendance at contests (at least in the Midwest) is a little soft this year. Big Time Winner, if you see Bob Baldus, let him buy dinner. He cleaned up on the raffle!
The Internet circuit has been kind of quiet of late. Over the summer, there were huge disputes about eh BOM rule (again) and the OS FP 20. But the host at the Stuka Stunt Forum got fed up with the bickering and firmly shut both topics down! Since we are away from the ‘net here, I can tell you that the FP 20 is a really nice little motor. If you want to power an ARF Flight Streak, Skyray, or something else around 400 square inches, get a used ABC FP 20 (don’t pay a lot), use the stock muffler with its funny little insert in place, and an APC 9-4 prop. Run it on 10% 50/50 Sig fuel and enjoy. When I hit the needle right, mine runs like an electric fan. Launch RPM is 11,300 + or – 200. I need to play with tanks a little. My FS burps once in the middle of each flight and then burps again once or twice before it quits. Otherwise, it just runs! These are available on eBay or at swap meets for less than $50 ands often less than $40. This is about the same money as a Fox 35 and the FP is every bit as powerful, smoother, and quieter. I also have an older FP with the steel piston. I don’t seem to run as well as the ABC, but I only have limited time on it. When I have more time on it, maybe I’ll know more about the differences between the two.
We’ll talk about the Bentfield contest at this coming meeting and discuss some options for next year. Meanwhile, it is the prettiest day in weeks outside and flying field is calling!
Kelvin Heath
Members Space
Hello and thanks to the members who were at the field on contest day at the time requested for field setup. Once again when it becomes time to do something special, it is the dedicated people who show up to prepare. Clean up is easy as your to embarrassed to sneak out while others are working. So think about this: “What have I done for the betterment of the club?” or “What can I do for the club today?” remember paying dues is just a small part of the Piston Poppers.
Okay, I’m off my soapbox and we did have a great contest. Though I wasn’t planning on competing, Keith talked me into flying beginner and I’m glad that he did as I came in first with Norman Anderson a very close second.
I wanted to be a helper throughout the contest and I started when I noticed John being overwhelmed Saturday morning during registration and jumped in, asked what to do and got busy. This was also the first time I tabulated scores – easy job, but you only get to see the first flights of each round. Because your too busy adding the first flight scores while then ext flight is being flown. I really enjoyed doing this and will be happy to do it again.
As Keith has said, the days are getting shorter and with all the contests and club events over for us this year, now is the time to practice, test new planes, and just plain fly again and again.
Bob
The Design Page
Greetings All!
I’m sorry to have been so invisible lately, but I’m trying desperately to finish a sculpture project that (like some model plane projects) is never ending. Besides, it seems like there’s a weather issue on almost every “Flying Day”.
I’m not going to dole out any new silly ideas this time, but I do want to respond to a couple of things…
First, I want to thank Keith for his excellent and thorough discussion of fillets in a past “Prop Wash”. Everything Keith wrote makes good sense to me – given my various experiences with this recurring problem of bubbly, puffy, hideous fillets. There’s only one thing that could have made Keith’s solution even better; and that’s if it didn’t take three weeks to accomplish!
Seriously, next time I try to finish a model properly, I will follow your advice, Keith, to the letter. Then, if my problems persists, I will have yet another direction to exercise my profane exclamations.
The second topic concerns a point that Jim Ehlen made at D.A.D. regarding my last Design Page about stabilizer location. Jim mentioned the fact that one of the main reasons CL stabilizers are located about a half-inch to an inch about the wing plane (depending on the size of the model) is for sake of the control linkages.
I had intended to make this point in my article, but you can’t say everything you’d like, or a “Big Mouth” like me will never get the writing done.
But Jim makes a good point. If we’re going to be fussy about proportional equal-and-opposite responses between our flaps and our elevators, then it’s helpful to try to maintain perpendicular thrust lines and angles between push rods and control horns. According to Jim, if the elevator and flap control horns get out of alignment, the result will be less elevator in one direction and more in the other for equal amounts of flap deflection.
I argued that I didn’t think it made much difference, then dragged out one of my planes et-up with an angled push rod so we could try to evaluate. Truthfully, we couldn’t detect much difference by eye, but that doesn’t mean there wasn’t any. Arguably, the longer the tail moment, the less detrimental the offset. On a short plane with long control horns, the effect could be quite severe. To test the point, I worked up a little engineering drawing on the computer where I could maintain equal line lengths, etc.
As you can see, movement in one direction isn’t much of a problem, but the exaggeration of the angles is essentially exponential going in the other direction. In fact, according to my drawing, the elevator had to break its hinge point in order to accept the lengthening of the push rod. In essence, what you have here (in the third pair) is an extremely SHORT control horn on the elevator.
Sometimes I just have to run these experiments in order to verify a theory one way or the other; thanks Jim for straightening me out on this one.
There are, of course, various ways to neutralize the angled push-rod effect, but they likely involve further linkages, e.g. – a bell crank running diagonally through the fuselage, or a “Nyrod” type pushrod, etc.
So many details to consider when you’re putting together one of these things – they’re simply complex!
Until next time…
Norman Anderson