Lakehurst July 4th and 1.4g F1D

From: Brett Sanborn <brett.d.sanborn_at_gmail.com>
Date: Sun, 6 Jul 2014 08:27:15 -0400

I went and flew at Lakehurst yesterday since the hole in the wall is fixed
up. The air was decent but not spectacular as there was about a 11-13 mph
wind according to weather.com, with a max temp inside of 80 degrees and 39%
relative humidity . There was end to end drift during the day and later in
the evening side to side drift. I had to leave the end garage door open
because some workers were going in and out with vans all day.

I flew 1.4 g F1D for the first time and despite my reservations, it was
still a lot of fun. I started by doing 1/2 motors off the carrier deck
without really looking how high the model was getting since Kagan told me
that I would never get to the top of Lakehurst. This couldn't have been
farther from the truth. I decided to launch my first full flight off the
carrier deck and it promptly got hung up in about 5 minutes and really
lodged itself into the girders. I completely destroyed the model getting it
down. After getting another model out and doing a few half motors, I flew
again, this time from the floor. In about 6 1/2 minutes, I hung the model
on the center catwalk. Great. After bumping the plane off safely, I rewound
the same motor thinking it would have a bit less climb; however, I hung the
model on one of the girders off to the side of the catwalk in about 8
minutes.

Resolved to not hang up again, I opened the high pitch a touch and
relaunched. This time the plane got right up under the catwalk but did not
bump. A few minutes later the plane drifted off to the side and brushed the
side girder a few times, but I was able to steer the plane out. This flight
landed at 30:07. For the next flight I decided to open the high pitch a 1/4
turn, which kept me a safe 10-15 feet from danger. I had about 50 winds
less than the previous flight in this motor but still managed a backup time
of 29:53.

I broke a lot of motors yesterday. It was hard to get the thinner motors up
to high enough torque to do any time. That was probably the biggest
challenge. So I don't believe the people who say we'll use less rubber
because we will be breaking more motors to get a flight off.

Anyways, Lakehurst is back to it's former glory now that the wall is fixed.
Plan on making a trip and bring a friend. The hangar is sanctioned for a
record trials in two weeks (July 19-20) and for our annual end of the year
contest on Labor Day.

Brett Sanborn
Received on Sun Jul 06 2014 - 05:27:16 CEST