2008 USA Team Manager Report
Most of the US Team got a great opportunity to preview the World
Champs site by flying in the International Open contest. In the days
prior to the world champs the US team and supporters became intimately
aware of the hazards of the flying site in Belgrade. John Kagan
learned early the hazards of the high temperatures on the wound rubber
bands when he lost a motor stick due to an exploded motor. And, from
the very first day, the team realized that it was pointless being at
the site earlier than about 1:00 pm. Numerous hours of struggling
against the low level drift and broken motors made several of team
members sleep late on the next practice day. Brett Sanborn should
have been wiser after seeing a Slovakian plane sucked out one of the
ceiling vents during the Open contest. A few days later it happened
to him. The vents quickly became one of the most avoided things on
the ceiling. Before the contest several people conjectured that the
disk would be quite friendly and planes would bounce around and come
down. This was not the case. Typically,when a plane would get about
2-3 feet from the ceiling, it would be sucked toward the roof and
begin quickly skating across.
Round 1 Highlights:
Jim Richmond showed promise early in the contest with a no touch fight
of 34:58. Jim was the first person of the contest to break the
current world record. Kagan also had a very promising initial flight.
His plane flew up into the danger-zone underneath one of the ceiling
vents and stalled out. His flight landed dead stick at 34:27; he
figured the large stall might have cost him a minute or so due to lost
height and increased prop RPM that burnt off the winds too early.
Doug Schaefer, on the other hand, worked on attaining the lowest time
of the contest after his first round try. Due to the ground level
turbulence, Doug's plane stalled out and came down at 1:12. It's
flights like these which really test a flier's resolve. It's tough
not to get psyched out.
The US juniors also had a promising first round showing. Tim Chang's
plane was trimmed to peak out at exactly the maximum height of the
building based on half motors. This is another trap that a lot of
people fall into—making the half motors go exactly high enough, but
then do not account for the bonus torque in a full motor and end up on
the ceiling. Luckily though after his plane skated across the disk
and hit the girders on the opposite side, Tim was able to catch the
plane after a few tries and pull it back to the middle of the floor.
His flight landed at about 27 minutes. Justin Young also had an
interesting first round that involved steering. Justin was on the
ceiling and initially reluctant to steer, but a full circle later the
plane bumped a girder and was off course—a steer was essential to save
the flight. Justin caught the plane and released it, but it still
needed some repositioning. While trying to move in with the balloon,
Justin missed and hit the middle of the fuselage. Rob Romash was
watching from a distance said that the tailboom made a 90 degree angle
to the rest of the plane. It was miraculous that the plane stayed in
the air! At the time the tailboom broke Justin's plane had stopped
climbing, and afterwards the circled widened, probably to his
advantage. His flight landed at 33:27—a spectacular time for anyone.
Things were really looking up for this world champion.
Though the senior team had a good round, they couldn't relax yet since
Lutz Schramm did a 36:18 to finish the round—everyone was on their toes.
Round 2 Highlights:
Jim and Tim both lost second round flights; steering problems lead to
damaged wings. Kagan had another good dead stick time of 34:15. Now
that John had two good times in for the team score he felt free to "go
for it" on the rest of his flights. Defending world champion Larry
Cailliau showed new promise after a rough first round. His second
round flight was a safe, no touch 34:06. Doug also improved his 1:12
time with a 32:18. Justin had another good flight 32:50— though this
one lacked the steering escapades which lead to his high time.
The heat was turned up again, this time by Ivan Tregar with a
seemingly ridiculous time of 36:23.
Round 3 Highlights:
Tim had a few stalling problems at launch but after a second toss the
plane took off. Unfortunately, though, enough torque burned off
during the first stall to effect the overall flight. Tim's plane only
got to about 65' instead of 85-90 and landed with 30:19. By this time
Tim's only competition was his own teammate Justin. Justin decided to
try a different plane. The VP on this one was setup a bit
differently. The flight profile was such that the plane would climb
to half altitude then a second climb would take the plane to the
ceiling after the prop closed. This turned out to be less efficient
since the plane landed at around 28 minutes.
Doug's third round flight did not reach the height that he wanted, but
the 31:44 was a good backup time to his higher 32 minute flight.
Larry Cailliau had a motor explode early in his third round flight.
Luckily the model was not damaged badly. John Kagan had an early mid
air during his flight—just a brush but it put his mind at ease in case
the flight landed short of the mark. Three stalls increased his prop
RPM enough to cause him to dead stick again. John decided to keep his
mid air time, though - a wise choice since it was 35:38.
Round 4 Highlights:
Doug Schaefer had a worrisome flight. Not many people can get away
with spending 12 minutes of flight time bumping the ceiling. Luckily
Doug had plenty of winds which provided a very good time—34:24.
Doug's plane reached the roof at 8 minutes and finally came off the
ceiling at 20 minutes. The majority of people who tried a flight
profile like that—albeit unintentionally—ended up plummeting to the
ground, hanging up, or getting sucked out a ceiling vent. Kagan had
rough round due to heavy top level drift. Forced to steer against the
ceiling early in flight, John had a tough time keeping the model
horizontal because of the highly torque motor. Several right hand
circles later, a dizzy Kagan released the model. Unfortunately John
got turned around and the model was not positioned where he wanted it.
He steered again, but while trying to release the model he pulled
down too hard and I saw both wing tips flare up into a V shape. I let
out a loud groan thinking a wing spar had broken. Kagan though—ever
on his game—raised the balloon a few inches and the wing popped back
into shape. After he released it everyone was amazed to see it still
in the air. This seems to be a clear indication of the superiority of
non-boron wing spars. John's flight ended up dead sticking again
probably due to the increased RPM at the ceiling, but still had good
time on the watch –35:15. Cailliau was forced to steer near the
ceiling on his flight as well. Like the Kibbie dome, models are
difficult to see near the white ceiling disk. Unknowingly, Larry
moved the line into the inboard wing tip and put a large slash in the
film and broke the tip. This greatly increased the drag on the
airplane and it landed at 29:33; there is no way of knowing how much
time the plane would have done without the damage. Justin had another
good flight of 32:14, but the time was not good enough to improve his
backup time. Justin showed fine form successfully steering his model
just a few feet beneath the roof. Tim Chang and Jim Richmond had
difficult rounds again. Tim stalled out twice, using both attempts.
Jim had problems at the ceiling and the flight ended early.
Round 5 Highlights:
Rounds five and six were bound to be the most difficult due their
placement in the schedule. Since the rounds started at 10:30 AM
instead of the afternoon it was the general strategy of the US team
to fly as late as possible to get in the best air of the day.
By the end of the second day the US team was in second place. It was
up to Jim to put in a flight of at least 23 minutes – child's play.
However, throughout the earlier rounds when Jim would attempt to steer
he would lose the flight due to difficulty in seeing the plane and
balloon. The US Team requested that Jim be allowed a proxy steerer,
and thanks to decisive action by the FAI Jury, the request was
granted. Although he was nervous, John did a fine job negotiating
Jim's model around the building hazards and other models on both 5th
and 6th round flights. Jim pulled off an excellent flight of 33:10 to
secure team gold for the United States. Tim Chang worked out his
stick-bow and launch problems. A good solid launch lead to a safe, no
touch flight of 30:40.
John went first in the 5th round and found out the hard way not to
wind and launch in direct sunlight. After breaking around five motors
John launched his plane. He later drifted to the side and needed to
steer. A few minutes later in the flight Kagan was forced to steer
again. Just as John parked the balloon to let the model run it, the
rubber motor exploded violently sending the plane into a glide. The
flight terminated when the middle rib of John's wing floated to the
floor. After the plane landed, John listed off about 8 things that
had broken or popped loose due to the motor. For most people this
would be a devastating occurrence that would ruin their day. But
before lunch, Kagan reported that he had fixed all the problems and
planned to fly the same plane in the last round. Remarkable.
Round 6 Highlights:
Since the US tried to launch as late as possible in the rounds the
logistics of round six were tough.
Because John was Jim's proxy steerer John was busy with Jim's plane
until very late in the flight. Jim's prop folded too late to bring
down the rest of the competition. The flight was still quite long for
how late the prop folded—32:42. Since John was in a position to
potentially move up in the final rankings he flew last. By the time
Jim's plane landed, John had only 20 minutes to process, wind, and
launch his plane—not that any one of these tasks is particularly time
consuming, but the travel time adds up. Though John's plane got up
high enough to do the time, it landed with turns and only 34:01 on the
clock. This was probably due to all the parts that broke from the
exploded motor and possibly the air in the building—people began going
in and out which probably caused more low level drift.
After a few days full of launch problems, Tim finally got a fully
torqued flight up. Though his plane had a nice slow climb it quickly
got sucked up against the disk. Tim's plane skated across in just one
or two circles. Usually when planes went across the disk and into
girder territory they bumped a few times. Tim was quite unlucky;
after just one pass under the girders the plane hung up on a
low-hanging wire.
Thank you to:-
Ray Harlan – Ray's balloons were a godsend for this contest. All
members of the US team used his balloons. One major advantage was
that the Mylar was a little tougher and held up better against the
rough concrete ceiling and girders than a rubber balloon would have
been. By watching our European counterparts we learned that Mylar
balloons must be handled with care. Plus, Mylar balloons seemed to be
"in-style;" everyone had them.
Also thank you to Phil Sullivan and the NFFS, Tim Goldstein, and the
Oakland Cloud Dusters for their generous contributions to the team.
The event organizers did a fine job running the contest. Though the
US team was concerned after the perils of the Open International
contest, the championships was truly a world class event.
US Senior Team manager Rob Romash also made a major contribution to
the team. Realizing the need for at-hand scissors, Zap CA glue, Zip
Kicker, and tweezers, Romash created a device he called "the caddy."
Brown leather epoxied to styrene outfitted with a belt clip served as
a holster for the essentials of launching an F1D. The items in the
caddy were not only used to aid the US fliers; one Czech Junior had a
motor break and scissors were needed to snip the motor. Quick on the
draw, Brett Sanborn rushed over and snipped the motor. After that,
the caddy was dubbed "the common denominator of F1D."
- Brett Sanborn and Rob Romash,
with severe editing by John Kagan
Received on Wed Sep 17 2008 - 17:03:26 CEST
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