Two-day Indoor FF event was a success
by Don Slusarczyk
don@donsrc.com
The two-day Kent State Golden Flash Indoor Bash has come and gone and fun was had by all who attended. If you missed this year’s event, please plan to come next year. It is a great flying site.
As is typical at the Kent State meet, multiple Indoor records were set. This year we had six new Indoor Free Flight (FF) Category II records set. Bill Gowen upped his Standard Catapult Glider record to a two-flight total of 2:00.1. Jim Richmond set the F1D record at 22:37, barely beating out Yuan Kang Lee by one second! I managed to set the F1R record with a flight time of 20:25.
The Open contestants were not the only ones setting records this year. The remaining three records were set by Indoor newcomer Logan Noel. Logan began flying Indoor earlier this year as part of an after-school model airplane club started by one of his teachers, Chris Glynn.
About a month before the Kent contest, Logan built his first A-6 model and set the Category I Junior record at a local flying session. From then on, he was hooked on Indoor FF and built some new models for the Kent event.
Logan went on to set the Category II Junior A-6 record with a 5:28 flight, the Category II Junior F1M record with a
Congratulations to Logan on his great work, and to Chris for starting the model club that got him interested in Indoor FF!
40-Minute Club Update
Jake Palmer went to the Kibbie Dome contest this year with the goal of flying an Indoor model for more than 40 minutes to become part of the 40-Minute Club. Current F1D rules prevent such long flight times, so Jake decided to build an older-style 65cm F1D model covered with microfilm.
Using a variable-pitch propeller, Jake finished the model a few days before the contest and was able to reach his goal. He put in two flights of more than 40 minutes—a 41:10 flight and a 41:04 one. Great job on making the 40-Minute Club. Jake now has his eyes set on the 50-Minute Club, and has already started working on a new, larger model design.
Durobatics Foam
In my last column, I mentioned that Durobatics foam was no longer available. Well, it seems that Plantraco Microflight is now offering uncoated Durobatics foam sheets. I am not sure if it is original stock or if someone has starting manufacturing it again.
The 12 x 13-inch sheets are .020 to .025 inches thick. The current cost is $19.99 for three sheets, plus postage.
Plantraco is located in Canada and it took approximately 10 days for my order to arrive. I calculated the sheets I received to be roughly 3.5 pounds per cubic foot density, which is not too bad.
Category I Glider Update
Also in the last column, I included a photo of a new Category I Catapult Glider utilizing 2-pound foam from the Science Toy Maker website.
I promised an update on the success or failure of the model in this column, and the result was a little bit of both.
The foam allowed for a lightweight glider approximately 1.5 grams and my low-power launches flew as expected. However, after more power was added to get the model to climb higher, it would hit the launching stick and damage the wing. The model was repaired on site several times, but after a few more test flights, the wing was damaged beyond repair.
During the Kent State Indoor contest I mentioned to Bill Gowen what happened and found that that he had encountered the same problem on his low-ceiling gliders. In fact, he even had some high-speed video footage that he took to help him diagnose the problem.
Bill found that the model was not actually hitting the launching stick, but was hitting the rubber itself. His solution for low-ceiling catapult strikes was to make a special curved, grooved launch handle as shown in the photos. His modified launch handle allows the rubber to turn the corner and get out of the way of the model.
Since Bill started using this new handle arrangement, the striking problem has nearly disappeared. He says it still occasionally happens, but not as frequently as before. I will need to give one of these handles a try with my next low-ceiling glider!
SOURCES:
Plantraco Microflight
(306) 955-1836
www.microflight.com
National Free Flight Society (NFFS)
www.freeflight.org
Science Toy Maker
www.sciencetoymaker.org
