Member's Voice
Ray Halt writes:
Neither threat of rain nor darkening skies prevented an enthusiastic crowd
of volunteers from descending on the Thermal G flying site. In no time at
all the road was cleared, the berms were mowed and trimmed, the solar panels
installed and the charging station was up and running. Mower and tractor
repairs were also completed. Unfortunately, no one had the foresight to
bring a plane with floats and therefore flying off the club field was not
feasible.
A hearty thanks is to be extended to all participants. I know some members
were disappointed in their performance when compared to the effort expended
by our senior member – Malin. As you can see by the accompanying pictures he
was truly a terror with mower and string trimmer. Remember fellas – fox like
experience frequently trumps young muscle. Perhaps this will set the
standard for future work parties where hopefully we all may rise to the
level of Malin's performance.
Thanks Ray for your contributions, and thanks to all of the Work Party!
Sam Freeman writes:
Hi Folks,
Well I finally finished my Kadet Senior and have attached some pics. Since the weather is getting nice, I'll be maidening this baby soon!! Now it's time to start my Bruce Tharpe Flyin' King and I'm sure it won't take as long as the Senior!!!
Thanks Sam for your contributions!
Andy Williams writes:
Instead of a Flying Wing:
Here's another plane I've been itching to buy for many, many months - the Twirl Autogyro from LightFlite. I ordered an ARF (Almost Ready to Fly) kit and a motor, speed controller, Spektrum clone receiver and a couple of props.
Check this thing out. It's slow & gentle (good for indoor flying), stable, it hovers and it looks awesome when it's flying. CLICK HERE to see a video of it flying.
Champ Racer:
So I modified my raggedy-looking little Hobbyzone Champ into a 1930's era racer because it needed a facelift and I enjoy doing this sort of thing. Looking forward to flying it at the weekly indoor flying meet on Friday. It used to look like this (when it was brand new):
Now it looks like this:
Check out Spongebob Pilot Pants in the cockpit (I was scrounging around in my son's old toy box looking for a pilot):
Peter Cottontail and Reborn ParkJet:
I don't think I've ever shown you guys my biplane. I bought this used about 2 months ago. It's a WW1 British RAF S.E.5a. It's a real hoot to fly! Looks beautiful in the sky. Handles like a sportscar but it hates wind. It's made of a balsa wood framework (no foam) and covered with film and it's extremely lightweight. It gets knocked around if it's breezy so I only fly this one in calm weather.
Check it out. I put Peter Cottontail in the cockpit. I wanted to put Snoopy as a WW1 flying ace in the seat but I haven't found him yet. Peter's ears go flying around all over the place when he's pulling stunts.
The hatch hanging below the radiator is where the battery goes. I should've put it up for a better photo.
And here's my beloved little ParkJet that was lost in the woods for 3 days. I've got 'er back together and ready for action. I even put on a streamlined, red-chrome, motor fairing (part of a plastic Easter egg) and chrome film on the elevons (wing flaps). It's been beaten up pretty good but I tried my best to restore it. It weighs more now because of all the glue. This is still my favorite plane.
Check it out:
Bungee Launch Video:
Here's a couple of videos I recorded on Thursday. They were made with my "hat cam" which is a small video camera attached with velcro to the underside of my cap. I haven't done much with the new FPV 'live' TV camera system yet since its broacast frequency seems to be interferring with my radio control frequency. I tried the TV system one time and the plane was flying very badly (I almost crashed)... so I've gotta get that deal sorted out. I'm expecting a high-definition keychain camera in the mail soon. I'll be able to made much clearer videos both from the ground and in the air when I get that camera.
This is the bungee catapult launcher I made from PVC pipe. The video features two of my favorite but hard-to-launch planes - the Wild Wing and my very favorite plane, the lost-and-found ParkJet with Communist markings.
The other video features my Hawk 3D which I almost threw away recently because of wimpy, pathetic performance and numerous crashes. I recently hopped it up with more volts, a new receiver and a much better prop. Now it's probably my best-performing plane. It used to be my worst one. It's like a whole different plane now.
I hope you like them.
CLICK HERE for the "Bungee Catapult RC Launching" video or click on the image below:
CLICK HERE for the Hawk 3D Flight video or click on the image below:
Maiden Flight of the P-47:
Check out this video of the maiden flight of my flying buddy Jim's brand new Parkzone P-47 Thunderbolt featuring excellent camera work by me! Nah, it's crap camera work but I did a lot of editing and stuff to try and fix it up.
Unusual Camera Angle:
Check out this video of a electric-powered glider. This thing must have a very powerful motor because (A) it's swinging a huge prop, (B) it's able to push that cart-launcher thing, (C) it goes from zero to about a thousand feet in no time flat, and (D) it's got a camera hanging way out in front and to the right side of the plane on a stick.
SEFF Night Bowling:
Check it out, night bowling at SEFF 2011. I put 3 meters of multicolored LED lights on my Hammer 3D, it looks awesome at night, looks like a UFO. This night bowling looks like a lotta fun - CLICK HERE
Twirl Maiden Flight:
Sort of a cross between a helicopter and an airplane ( or aeroplane as they say in the UK) - it's the Twirl Autogyro from Lightflite in Albany, NY. It took me about a month to put this kit together... not that it was overly difficult, it's just that I have a very short attention span (ADD). This video was taken with my brand new HD keychain camera mounted to my hat (aka "Hatcam"). Check out my maiden flight please:
Swarm:
Check this recent video out from Utah. Three friends and I are currently in the process of building these exact flying wing kits made in Utah. We'll have our own 'micro swarm' here in NW Pennsylvania if the weather ever gets nice (Gawd, this spring has been sucking worse than ever!).
My Grim Reaper Design:
I may not go quite this elaborate with the logos and stuff but this is what I'd like my Grim Reaper flying wing to look like. I CAN do it with my vinyl cutter machine... just depends how much motivation I can muster (I'm getting pretty burned out at working on these planes every friggin' night):
Plane Art:
I love doing artwork and I love things mechanical. I was a professional (part time) artist when I lived in California. I was a screenprinting artist (my night job). My business was called "Graphicshouse" because I did graphics out of my house. Unfortunately, there's pretty much no demand for a part time graphics artist who works out of their home here in Pennsylvania. But I have other outlets for my artistic bug. I make vinyl decals, front license plates (no front license plate requirement in PA), a rare screenprinting/graphics job here and there (usually for someone in CA) and this RC airplane thing that I'm currently addicted to. I can't own a plain-looking anything. It just bugs me until I do my 'thing' to something I own.
Check out my latest planes and the artwork:
The old, worn-out original Hammer 3D (with LED lights) - it's pretty beaten... and the brand-new, homemade one without lights (yet).
The new one has day-glow orange on it so it's easy to find if it gets lost.
The undersides of the new one and the old one.
I put Snoopy in the cockpit of my new Twirl autogyro (this plane a real pain to put together!).
This plane didn't fly right at all. It just spiraled down and crashed... but it looked really cool for the 5 seconds that it was in the air. I may fix it and try again (probably not).
Vector Plane Art Available:
These are my latest vector artwork files (vector format - Adobe Illustrator & CorelDRAW - is for decals and most screenprinting art) that I have available for cutting. If anyone wants any of these, let me know and very important: I NEED to know the SIZE. The NASA one is very complex with all the tiny stars and whatnot so I'd have to hand- paint the stars onto the blue vinyl because the cutter can't cut that kind of detail. Of course it's not free, there's time, effort, wear
and tear on the cutter's blade and materials involved in the process - but I'm pretty cheap. I currently have 5 colors of vinyl material in stock - black, white, blue, red, yellow. The smaller the decal, the harder to cut out (or it may not cut it at all) so make it as big as possible. If you have a request for something in vinyl, email me and if it's not too detailed (tiny details give the vinyl cutter a heart attack) I can do it.
Check these out:
All American:
So I decided to keep the new plane - the "SkyFun" - all white except for the underside will be flat black. The small one - the "Parkjet" had communist insignia. This one is all-American. Red, white blue, silver and black. It certainly looks better than the stock version in my opinion. The first thing I did to the plane was remove the stock decals then I painted the inside of the cockpit flat black. It's ready to fly right now - just needs black underside paint, plastic covers to protect the servos under the wings and a hook so I can catapult launch it (I'm a bad thrower).
I really like how it turned out, but now it's too pretty to crash or lose. If I had known the chrome (on the wing tips) would stick so well, I would've covered the whole plane with it (next plane).It's probably not correct to put both NASA and military insignia on the same plane but they look good together.
This is what it looked like from the factory (way too many flames, white cockpit, toy-looking, just not right):
This is what I did to it:
Ice Skating:
I've never seen anything like this. Check out this "ice skating" demo in the gym with a 3D RC plane, he's good!
Ride the Wild Wind...Wing
It's Sunday (my only day off other than vacation or sick day) so of course, - IT'S RAINING!!! But it's a good excuse for NOT mowing my bro-in-law's 86 acres with his extreme s-l-o-w--m-o-t-i-o-n, antique tractor (I HATE that job!!!). By the way, WOW, what a shocker... we made it thru "the rapture and the end of the world as we know it" yesterday. OK, so I mounted my HD keychain camera on the nose of my 34" Wild Wing flying wing RC plane (my new 55" Wild Wing is still under construction) yesterday afternoon (when it wasn't raining) and took it for a bunch of left turns (I'm MUCH more comfortable turning left than turning right, I don't know why) and up and down and skimming the ground etc. I still have yet to figure out how to post a video on YouTube that FILLS THE ENTIRE SCREEN, that would be nice!!!
Check it out won't you?
CLICK HERE
Chasing Cars
This guy 'Trappy', is a very good FPV pilot. I'm going to bring my flying wing w/ camera with us on vacation at Myrtle Beach SC so I can make similar videos. By the way, my newest Air and Space Smithsonian magazine has an article of FPV flying featuring the same guy who made this video the world-famous 'Trappy' (he's Austrian).
Check this one out as he chases cars down the highway and flies around the beaches someplace in southern Europe (probably Spain or south of France)
Thanks Andy for your contributions!
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