I ATTENDED THE fourth annual Northeast Electric Aircraft
Technology (NEAT) Fair the weekend of September 11-14, 2003, in
Downsville, New York, and so did modelers from most of the nation
(39 states) and some other countries. As in the past, but more so than
ever, it was awesome!
The NEAT Fair is billed as the largest Electrics meet in the US and
is sponsored by the Silent Electric Flyers of Long Island (SEFLI) club.
SEFLI graciously stepped in to continue this East Coast tradition after
the Keystone Radio Control club (KRC) discontinued sponsorship of
its well-known KRC Electric Fly. “The KRC,” as it became known,
was held for 18 consecutive years.
As with any club undertaking, management and member support
are requirements for success. Of course, attendance and participation
are necessary ingredients as well. SEFLI member Tom Hunt, closely
assisted by Bob Aberle, provided the meet’s senior management, and
other SEFLI members aptly supplied the hands-on support. The nearly
300 registered participants rounded out the package.
The result was a wonderful, well-run meet with lots of participant
fun and overall contribution. I have nothing but warmly felt good
impressions and deep gratitude to everyone involved for one more job
extremely well done. Thank you, Tom, Bob, all of SEFLI, and all those
who came to “show and share their stuff” collectively for making this
one terrific Electric showing.
Many in attendance have been long-term regulars at the earlier
KRC affairs and previous NEAT Fairs. The former began in 1980 as
the first club-sponsored Electrics meet in the US with an attendance of
three (yes, three!). Thus this East Coast tradition has grown
approximately 100-fold in less than a quarter century.
Some participants spoke fondly of the earliest days and others had
never heard of KRC; the latter is a sure sign of substantial meet—and
Electric—growth. Based on gate passes, the 2003 NEAT Fair had
roughly 1,300 spectators.
60 MODEL AVIATION
2003 Neat Fair
Three generations of the legendary Shulmans showed up at the Fair (L-R): Don, his son Jason, and his father Leon.
by Bob Kopski
March 2004 61
Fliers enjoyed flyable weather during the three-day meet period.
There were scattered showers, periods of low-lying mist and fog, and
short, gusty times, but not enough of any to stop flying. Weekend
temperatures were comfortable, and overall the weather was our friend.
I have occasionally wondered about the name “NEAT”; I think
the “Technology Fair” was the curious part. However, upon
reflection the obvious became even clearer. That is, as best as I
can recall, in the long history of these meets (I’ve been to all 22) I
don’t think a year has gone by without some demonstrated
improvement in the technology of electric-powered flight. Closely
associated with this—or maybe because of this—is the steady
growth in E-interest and E-accomplishment, culminating in the
2003 NEAT Fair.
I’m sure that opinions and impressions vary among attendees,
but my vote for “most impressive”—if not “most important”—this
A MaxCim 13Y geared, brushless system and 25 CP1700s powers
Greg Covey’s 9-pound Hangar 9 AT-6 Texan ARF conversion.
Robert Frey holds his 1/12-scale Curtiss pusher. The 6-ounce
model uses a MIG 280 and a Kokam 340 3S Li-Poly pack.
Matt Keennon of AeroVironment Inc. shows off his 15-inch-span,
7-gram P-51 rubber power toy conversion.
Jason Shulman flew outstanding demonstrations with his
Rhapsody powered by a geared Hacker brushless motor.
Cindy Malinchak’s Roadkill-series Curtiss Junior pusher features
Microlite covering and three HS-50s.
Photos by the author
Thirteen-year-old Jonathon Ziering holds a prerelease version of
Miss June: a new 3-D kit from AeroLock Models.
A small-model Li-Poly meltdown underscores the need for all of
us to be especially careful with charging and usage.
Keith Shaw’s Park Hawk featured “scale markings” of the redshouldered
hawk that is indigenous to his Midwest home.
Bernard Cawley of E Zone “Controlling Interest” fame with
Switchback Sport featuring retracts, Nippy 1812/10 outrunner.
Leon Enkowitz’s enlarged vintage Rudderbug features an AXI
outrunner motor on 10 3300s turning a 12 x 6 propeller.
This sign of the times—on the driveway leading into the NEAT
Fair—speaks for itself!
62 MODEL AVIATION
March 2004 63
year was Jason Shulman’s dazzling performance/demonstration
with his Rhapsody glow-kit conversion.
Jason was a member of the US team that won the 2003 F3A (Radio
Control Aerobatics, or Pattern) World Championships in Deblin,
Poland. As I understand it, Jason was the only competitor with an
electric-powered model in that gas-dominated affair. His performance
at the World Championships positioned him in the seventh individual
spot and automatically put electric power in basically as top place as
might be imagined. Jason is a gracious showman, and he happily
shared his talent—and technology—to the thrill and amazement of
everyone at the NEAT Fair.
Raymond Foley gets eight- to 10-minute flights from his 8.5-
pound Sig LT-40 ARF conversion using an Aveox 1415-3Y motor.
Sombra Labs’ new six-channel dual-conversion receiver (R) and
plug-in programmer that tunes it to any RC frequency.
This is one of several containers of tiny RC aircraft at the NEAT
Fair. Many of these are multichannel models!
Art Cangialosi’s 1⁄3-size Cloud Cruiser Old-Timer also flew at KRC
in 1984! Has geared Astro FAI motor on seven CP1300 cells.
Chris Balser converted this 9.5-pound Great Planes Lancair 60
ARF to electric. It uses a geared Hacker B50 12L motor.
Consider what all of this means. It means
that, for all practical purposes, there is no
longer a gap between flying with electric
power and flying any other way. (I’ll
understand if you need to read that again!)
This accomplishment is owed to Jason’s
piloting prowess combined with recent
advancements in electric technology. So what
technology leap made this possible? Two
words: “brushless” and “Lithium-Polymer
(Li-Poly).” Brushless in electric is not exactly
new, but the winning combination of it and
Lithium battery technology at this level is.
Jason’s 10.75-pound Rhapsody was
“motovated” by a Hacker brushless C50 FAI
14XL motor with 6.7:1 gears to an APC 22 x
12E propeller sourced by a Thunder Power
10S3P 6100 mAh pack. That’s a nominal 42-
volt battery supplying roughly 2,400 watts
when needed throughout the 10- to 11-minute
flight, and the result is world-class Pattern
performance. Step aside, wet power, and
allow room for a quiet equal on the
aeromodeling stage!
If there is a downside to this, it’s only that
there’s nothing left to do. It is now shown and
known that electric power can do it all, and, in
effect, the goal has been taken. From here on
it’s only a matter of continuing technical
refinement—some no doubt with
motors/controllers and much more with
batteries.
I forecast that E-power will eventually
pull ahead as the favored aeromodeling
“motovation.” I don’t see this as anyone
“losing” but rather as everyone “gaining”
because I’ve never heard of a field lost
because of quiet.
As best as I could discern, brushless was
the dominant motor at the NEAT event this
year; most fliers seemed to favor brushless
almost no matter the model. There were quite
a few quality brushed motors privately for
sale up and down the flightline—cheap! I
believe that with its associated better
performance and rapidly declining prices,
brushless will soon replace all but a few of the
classic brushed motors in E-flying.
While Jason and several others
demonstrated the largest power systems, Bob
Boucher of AstroFlight showed his newly
designed Firefly coreless motor “hop-up” kit.
Based on the existing AstroFlight motor, this
package is specifically designed to replace
GWS brushed motors in some familiar and
popular GWS gear drives and fans.
The Firefly hop-up kit is said to offer
excellent performance with a dramatic
increase in motor life and flight duration for
these popular “park” applications. AstroFlight
has a tiny proprietary speed controller to go
with the Firefly motor.
Between the mighty Hacker FAI motor
and the Firefly there exists an often-confusing
abundance of brushless motors that fills the
range in between. The result is that you can
fly whatever you’re likely to want to fly
brushless, but you do have to figure out which
manufacturer/product you want. As many
lamented to me, this is not necessarily easy to
do.
In that respect, the industry has
simultaneously done a magnificent job
producing and a terrible job describing this
product. As with any technically intensive
consumer-product category with multiple
sources, it is important for suppliers to
collectively help the user use it easily. A
standardized, concise, meaningful motor label
would go a long way.
In a fashion similar to the motor story, Li-
Poly battery technology at the NEAT Fair
also covered the application range. From the
2,400 watts all the way down to a few
hundred milliwatts, this battery technology
permeated the flightline. Whether for the
Rhapsody or those tiny, subounce handfuls of
guided indoor E-flight models, Li-Poly
offered long flights with generally enhanced
performance. But there is at least one serious
downside to Li-Poly: safety issues.
Li-Poly has exploded onto the Electrics
scene in roughly one year’s time, but Li-Poly
itself can explode—or at least melt down or
burn up, depending on who tells the tale. So
far I’ve heard of this happening in improperly
charged batteries and in charged packs on the
shelf.
One thing is for sure: it’s necessary to use
chargers designed especially for Li-Poly cells.
The flip side to this is that you cannot safely
charge these batteries with a conventional Ni-
Cd/NiMH charger.
There are several chargers on the market
with Li-Poly capability, and NEAT Fair
vendors did brisk business with them. In fact,
AstroFlight introduced a new, high-capability,
well-received Lithium-specific charger at the
NEAT meet.
In my long association with Electrics
(more than three decades), I haven’t seen a
single product or technology with so much
promise and so much safety concern at the
same time as Li-Poly has. At the same time, I
have no reservations about this technology
and product eventually maturing and
becoming safe and commonplace. In the
meantime, be careful!
There was other new technology at the
2003 NEAT Fair. The spirited guys from the
Ottawa-based Sombra Labs—a
communications firm—described their
forthcoming, small, double-conversion,
crystalless six-channel receiver. It is designed
to cover all 50, 72, and 75 MHz US RC
frequencies, and it covers several foreign
frequency assignments—all with the same
receiver with no parts changes, they say.
Tuning (channel selection) in this receiver
is set (programmed) with a removable, lowcost,
“plug-on” accessory module. Imagine
combining this with an existing Hitec
64 MODEL AVIATION
March 2004 67
Spectra-equipped transmitter! I’m eager to
see it on six meters because existing
receivers are old and bulky. This receiver
is not electric-dedicated; it is applicable
throughout RC.
West Mountain Radio described its
forthcoming Computerized Battery
Analyzer (CBA). The compact, 4-inch,
cube-shaped CBA comes with a USB
(Universal Serial Bus) interface to test and
record, store, and compare battery
performance. It’s designed to do this for
any type of battery, and it requires no
separate external power source or internal
battery to function. This is another goodie
I’m eager to try.
My impression is that the favored Electric
at the 2003 NEAT affair was a “smaller”
aircraft—say, spanning 50 inches and less.
Many (but not all) were park flyer types;
at times there seemed to be a near-ground
cloud of these in the air! It was clear that
some had been “hopped up” with beyondnormal
motors and batteries because of
their 3-D performance.
Speaking of 3-D, several pilots put on a
fine flying show with large and small 3-D
models. Accomplished crowd-pleasing 3-
D expert Gary Wright flew his E3D-XL,
and the presentation was exhilarating to
watch. I also greatly appreciated 13-yearold
Jonathan Ziering with his Razorbrushless-
equipped prototype Miss June 3-
D. Jonathan flew like he’d been doing it
for more years than he is old.
For more senior fliers—those with
slower fingers, “lesser” eyesight, and
scaled-down reaction time (like me!)—3-
D is out of reach, and watching it is about
as close as one can get. Some wondered if
this was really “flying,” and others tried to
quantify at what age one should not bother
to attempt this activity! Everyone seemed
to enjoy, if not envy, the 3-D
performances.
Many attendees flew conversions at the
NEAT event. One that caught my eye was
Horizon Hobby’s popular Ultra Stick 60
wet-power airplane converted to electric
power. I saw three, although there may
have been more. All were brushless
equipped—one with a Hacker motor, one
with a MaxCim system, and one with an
AXI outrunner—and two had Li-Poly and
one had Ni-Cd energy storage. A flight I
witnessed had the Hacker/Li-Poly Stick
going sustained vertical. This spectacle
merely added more glue to that gap that is
now closed.
I also observed that Almost Ready to
Flys (ARFs), if not in majority, were well
represented. These included electric ARFs
and ARF conversions.
Of course, model building is still
represented, but far less so than ever
before. In earlier days when electric power
levels were more meager and power
systems weighed more, building light was
mandatory. But, again, years of
technology growth have made this less
necessary, and the meet left no doubt
about this. (Overall, lighter still flies
better!)
One unique and memorable spectacle was
a spontaneously organized ornithopter
mass launch. Unfortunately my camera
was unable to capture all of the widespread
(spread-wide?) flapping; it was
everywhere! How about a scheduled Ebirdie
All-Up/Last Down or maybe a
“birdfight” next year? Or how about a
“scale-bird” challenge?
There were eye-catching airplanes and
performances by high-profile E-fliers, but
many participants seemed happy to show
and fly their more ordinary Electrics. This
largely explains the busy flight stations all
day, every day.
Many I spoke to were not only firsttimers
at the NEAT Fair but were firsttimers
in Electrics. Some had recently
started in the hobby. This compares
favorably with a certain wee-powered,
one-circle-of-sink E-beginning I know
of—31 years ago!
Despite all of the happy awe, there is
paradoxically one sad aspect of the NEAT
Fair for me: the anguish associated with
too much to see and do and too little time
to see and do it. Despite being on-site
more than three days, I was unable to
savor all that was there; I know I missed a
great deal. And despite taking three
airplanes—one newly constructed
specifically for the meet—I got none out
of the car because of so much else to do.
Add everyday, day-long continuous
flying at a dozen flight stations, much
conversation and many photo
opportunities, the noon shows with a dozen
captivating individual performances, and
all of the conversation and photo
opportunities that brings. Mix in the many
scheduled seminars each day, which were
dedicated to the small RC models and
given by a long list of standout presenters.
Factor in the Friday-night kickoff
dinner following a full and busy day on the
field, and then the off-site, Saturday-night
indoor fly at the same time as the on-site,
Saturday-night outdoor fly. (How do you
do that?) Along with that was the all-day,
each day “kid in a candy store” aura of the
vendor line; it was only slightly shorter
than the flightline, which filled the field—
perhaps for 1,000 feet or so.
Now you might better understand why I
ended the first paragraph of this report
with the word “awesome”! But this
naturally brings us to “what next”? It’s the
2004 NEAT Fair, and it’s scheduled for
September 17-19. I’m sure some people
will be unhappy about this; several wanted
a day added to the event, and one wanted it
to be a week-long affair!
You can get more info about the 2003
NEAT Fair at www.neatfair.org. Later you
will be able to preregister for the 2004
NEAT Fair at the same site. I also
encourage you to check out other modeling
magazines and Web sites such as
www.ezonemag.com for additional and
varied NEAT Fair coverage. And I’m told
that by the time you read this, you should
be able to watch much of the 2003 NEAT
Fair on a video by SKS Video Productions.
Check out the www.sksvideo.com site.
See you at the 2004 NEAT Fair. If it will
be a first for you, do go prepared to be
awed. If you’re a NEAT Fair regular, do
go prepared to be awed—again! MA
Bob Kopski
25 West End Dr.
Lansdale PA 19446
Edition: Model Aviation - 2004/03
Page Numbers: 60,61,62,63,64,67
Edition: Model Aviation - 2004/03
Page Numbers: 60,61,62,63,64,67
I ATTENDED THE fourth annual Northeast Electric Aircraft
Technology (NEAT) Fair the weekend of September 11-14, 2003, in
Downsville, New York, and so did modelers from most of the nation
(39 states) and some other countries. As in the past, but more so than
ever, it was awesome!
The NEAT Fair is billed as the largest Electrics meet in the US and
is sponsored by the Silent Electric Flyers of Long Island (SEFLI) club.
SEFLI graciously stepped in to continue this East Coast tradition after
the Keystone Radio Control club (KRC) discontinued sponsorship of
its well-known KRC Electric Fly. “The KRC,” as it became known,
was held for 18 consecutive years.
As with any club undertaking, management and member support
are requirements for success. Of course, attendance and participation
are necessary ingredients as well. SEFLI member Tom Hunt, closely
assisted by Bob Aberle, provided the meet’s senior management, and
other SEFLI members aptly supplied the hands-on support. The nearly
300 registered participants rounded out the package.
The result was a wonderful, well-run meet with lots of participant
fun and overall contribution. I have nothing but warmly felt good
impressions and deep gratitude to everyone involved for one more job
extremely well done. Thank you, Tom, Bob, all of SEFLI, and all those
who came to “show and share their stuff” collectively for making this
one terrific Electric showing.
Many in attendance have been long-term regulars at the earlier
KRC affairs and previous NEAT Fairs. The former began in 1980 as
the first club-sponsored Electrics meet in the US with an attendance of
three (yes, three!). Thus this East Coast tradition has grown
approximately 100-fold in less than a quarter century.
Some participants spoke fondly of the earliest days and others had
never heard of KRC; the latter is a sure sign of substantial meet—and
Electric—growth. Based on gate passes, the 2003 NEAT Fair had
roughly 1,300 spectators.
60 MODEL AVIATION
2003 Neat Fair
Three generations of the legendary Shulmans showed up at the Fair (L-R): Don, his son Jason, and his father Leon.
by Bob Kopski
March 2004 61
Fliers enjoyed flyable weather during the three-day meet period.
There were scattered showers, periods of low-lying mist and fog, and
short, gusty times, but not enough of any to stop flying. Weekend
temperatures were comfortable, and overall the weather was our friend.
I have occasionally wondered about the name “NEAT”; I think
the “Technology Fair” was the curious part. However, upon
reflection the obvious became even clearer. That is, as best as I
can recall, in the long history of these meets (I’ve been to all 22) I
don’t think a year has gone by without some demonstrated
improvement in the technology of electric-powered flight. Closely
associated with this—or maybe because of this—is the steady
growth in E-interest and E-accomplishment, culminating in the
2003 NEAT Fair.
I’m sure that opinions and impressions vary among attendees,
but my vote for “most impressive”—if not “most important”—this
A MaxCim 13Y geared, brushless system and 25 CP1700s powers
Greg Covey’s 9-pound Hangar 9 AT-6 Texan ARF conversion.
Robert Frey holds his 1/12-scale Curtiss pusher. The 6-ounce
model uses a MIG 280 and a Kokam 340 3S Li-Poly pack.
Matt Keennon of AeroVironment Inc. shows off his 15-inch-span,
7-gram P-51 rubber power toy conversion.
Jason Shulman flew outstanding demonstrations with his
Rhapsody powered by a geared Hacker brushless motor.
Cindy Malinchak’s Roadkill-series Curtiss Junior pusher features
Microlite covering and three HS-50s.
Photos by the author
Thirteen-year-old Jonathon Ziering holds a prerelease version of
Miss June: a new 3-D kit from AeroLock Models.
A small-model Li-Poly meltdown underscores the need for all of
us to be especially careful with charging and usage.
Keith Shaw’s Park Hawk featured “scale markings” of the redshouldered
hawk that is indigenous to his Midwest home.
Bernard Cawley of E Zone “Controlling Interest” fame with
Switchback Sport featuring retracts, Nippy 1812/10 outrunner.
Leon Enkowitz’s enlarged vintage Rudderbug features an AXI
outrunner motor on 10 3300s turning a 12 x 6 propeller.
This sign of the times—on the driveway leading into the NEAT
Fair—speaks for itself!
62 MODEL AVIATION
March 2004 63
year was Jason Shulman’s dazzling performance/demonstration
with his Rhapsody glow-kit conversion.
Jason was a member of the US team that won the 2003 F3A (Radio
Control Aerobatics, or Pattern) World Championships in Deblin,
Poland. As I understand it, Jason was the only competitor with an
electric-powered model in that gas-dominated affair. His performance
at the World Championships positioned him in the seventh individual
spot and automatically put electric power in basically as top place as
might be imagined. Jason is a gracious showman, and he happily
shared his talent—and technology—to the thrill and amazement of
everyone at the NEAT Fair.
Raymond Foley gets eight- to 10-minute flights from his 8.5-
pound Sig LT-40 ARF conversion using an Aveox 1415-3Y motor.
Sombra Labs’ new six-channel dual-conversion receiver (R) and
plug-in programmer that tunes it to any RC frequency.
This is one of several containers of tiny RC aircraft at the NEAT
Fair. Many of these are multichannel models!
Art Cangialosi’s 1⁄3-size Cloud Cruiser Old-Timer also flew at KRC
in 1984! Has geared Astro FAI motor on seven CP1300 cells.
Chris Balser converted this 9.5-pound Great Planes Lancair 60
ARF to electric. It uses a geared Hacker B50 12L motor.
Consider what all of this means. It means
that, for all practical purposes, there is no
longer a gap between flying with electric
power and flying any other way. (I’ll
understand if you need to read that again!)
This accomplishment is owed to Jason’s
piloting prowess combined with recent
advancements in electric technology. So what
technology leap made this possible? Two
words: “brushless” and “Lithium-Polymer
(Li-Poly).” Brushless in electric is not exactly
new, but the winning combination of it and
Lithium battery technology at this level is.
Jason’s 10.75-pound Rhapsody was
“motovated” by a Hacker brushless C50 FAI
14XL motor with 6.7:1 gears to an APC 22 x
12E propeller sourced by a Thunder Power
10S3P 6100 mAh pack. That’s a nominal 42-
volt battery supplying roughly 2,400 watts
when needed throughout the 10- to 11-minute
flight, and the result is world-class Pattern
performance. Step aside, wet power, and
allow room for a quiet equal on the
aeromodeling stage!
If there is a downside to this, it’s only that
there’s nothing left to do. It is now shown and
known that electric power can do it all, and, in
effect, the goal has been taken. From here on
it’s only a matter of continuing technical
refinement—some no doubt with
motors/controllers and much more with
batteries.
I forecast that E-power will eventually
pull ahead as the favored aeromodeling
“motovation.” I don’t see this as anyone
“losing” but rather as everyone “gaining”
because I’ve never heard of a field lost
because of quiet.
As best as I could discern, brushless was
the dominant motor at the NEAT event this
year; most fliers seemed to favor brushless
almost no matter the model. There were quite
a few quality brushed motors privately for
sale up and down the flightline—cheap! I
believe that with its associated better
performance and rapidly declining prices,
brushless will soon replace all but a few of the
classic brushed motors in E-flying.
While Jason and several others
demonstrated the largest power systems, Bob
Boucher of AstroFlight showed his newly
designed Firefly coreless motor “hop-up” kit.
Based on the existing AstroFlight motor, this
package is specifically designed to replace
GWS brushed motors in some familiar and
popular GWS gear drives and fans.
The Firefly hop-up kit is said to offer
excellent performance with a dramatic
increase in motor life and flight duration for
these popular “park” applications. AstroFlight
has a tiny proprietary speed controller to go
with the Firefly motor.
Between the mighty Hacker FAI motor
and the Firefly there exists an often-confusing
abundance of brushless motors that fills the
range in between. The result is that you can
fly whatever you’re likely to want to fly
brushless, but you do have to figure out which
manufacturer/product you want. As many
lamented to me, this is not necessarily easy to
do.
In that respect, the industry has
simultaneously done a magnificent job
producing and a terrible job describing this
product. As with any technically intensive
consumer-product category with multiple
sources, it is important for suppliers to
collectively help the user use it easily. A
standardized, concise, meaningful motor label
would go a long way.
In a fashion similar to the motor story, Li-
Poly battery technology at the NEAT Fair
also covered the application range. From the
2,400 watts all the way down to a few
hundred milliwatts, this battery technology
permeated the flightline. Whether for the
Rhapsody or those tiny, subounce handfuls of
guided indoor E-flight models, Li-Poly
offered long flights with generally enhanced
performance. But there is at least one serious
downside to Li-Poly: safety issues.
Li-Poly has exploded onto the Electrics
scene in roughly one year’s time, but Li-Poly
itself can explode—or at least melt down or
burn up, depending on who tells the tale. So
far I’ve heard of this happening in improperly
charged batteries and in charged packs on the
shelf.
One thing is for sure: it’s necessary to use
chargers designed especially for Li-Poly cells.
The flip side to this is that you cannot safely
charge these batteries with a conventional Ni-
Cd/NiMH charger.
There are several chargers on the market
with Li-Poly capability, and NEAT Fair
vendors did brisk business with them. In fact,
AstroFlight introduced a new, high-capability,
well-received Lithium-specific charger at the
NEAT meet.
In my long association with Electrics
(more than three decades), I haven’t seen a
single product or technology with so much
promise and so much safety concern at the
same time as Li-Poly has. At the same time, I
have no reservations about this technology
and product eventually maturing and
becoming safe and commonplace. In the
meantime, be careful!
There was other new technology at the
2003 NEAT Fair. The spirited guys from the
Ottawa-based Sombra Labs—a
communications firm—described their
forthcoming, small, double-conversion,
crystalless six-channel receiver. It is designed
to cover all 50, 72, and 75 MHz US RC
frequencies, and it covers several foreign
frequency assignments—all with the same
receiver with no parts changes, they say.
Tuning (channel selection) in this receiver
is set (programmed) with a removable, lowcost,
“plug-on” accessory module. Imagine
combining this with an existing Hitec
64 MODEL AVIATION
March 2004 67
Spectra-equipped transmitter! I’m eager to
see it on six meters because existing
receivers are old and bulky. This receiver
is not electric-dedicated; it is applicable
throughout RC.
West Mountain Radio described its
forthcoming Computerized Battery
Analyzer (CBA). The compact, 4-inch,
cube-shaped CBA comes with a USB
(Universal Serial Bus) interface to test and
record, store, and compare battery
performance. It’s designed to do this for
any type of battery, and it requires no
separate external power source or internal
battery to function. This is another goodie
I’m eager to try.
My impression is that the favored Electric
at the 2003 NEAT affair was a “smaller”
aircraft—say, spanning 50 inches and less.
Many (but not all) were park flyer types;
at times there seemed to be a near-ground
cloud of these in the air! It was clear that
some had been “hopped up” with beyondnormal
motors and batteries because of
their 3-D performance.
Speaking of 3-D, several pilots put on a
fine flying show with large and small 3-D
models. Accomplished crowd-pleasing 3-
D expert Gary Wright flew his E3D-XL,
and the presentation was exhilarating to
watch. I also greatly appreciated 13-yearold
Jonathan Ziering with his Razorbrushless-
equipped prototype Miss June 3-
D. Jonathan flew like he’d been doing it
for more years than he is old.
For more senior fliers—those with
slower fingers, “lesser” eyesight, and
scaled-down reaction time (like me!)—3-
D is out of reach, and watching it is about
as close as one can get. Some wondered if
this was really “flying,” and others tried to
quantify at what age one should not bother
to attempt this activity! Everyone seemed
to enjoy, if not envy, the 3-D
performances.
Many attendees flew conversions at the
NEAT event. One that caught my eye was
Horizon Hobby’s popular Ultra Stick 60
wet-power airplane converted to electric
power. I saw three, although there may
have been more. All were brushless
equipped—one with a Hacker motor, one
with a MaxCim system, and one with an
AXI outrunner—and two had Li-Poly and
one had Ni-Cd energy storage. A flight I
witnessed had the Hacker/Li-Poly Stick
going sustained vertical. This spectacle
merely added more glue to that gap that is
now closed.
I also observed that Almost Ready to
Flys (ARFs), if not in majority, were well
represented. These included electric ARFs
and ARF conversions.
Of course, model building is still
represented, but far less so than ever
before. In earlier days when electric power
levels were more meager and power
systems weighed more, building light was
mandatory. But, again, years of
technology growth have made this less
necessary, and the meet left no doubt
about this. (Overall, lighter still flies
better!)
One unique and memorable spectacle was
a spontaneously organized ornithopter
mass launch. Unfortunately my camera
was unable to capture all of the widespread
(spread-wide?) flapping; it was
everywhere! How about a scheduled Ebirdie
All-Up/Last Down or maybe a
“birdfight” next year? Or how about a
“scale-bird” challenge?
There were eye-catching airplanes and
performances by high-profile E-fliers, but
many participants seemed happy to show
and fly their more ordinary Electrics. This
largely explains the busy flight stations all
day, every day.
Many I spoke to were not only firsttimers
at the NEAT Fair but were firsttimers
in Electrics. Some had recently
started in the hobby. This compares
favorably with a certain wee-powered,
one-circle-of-sink E-beginning I know
of—31 years ago!
Despite all of the happy awe, there is
paradoxically one sad aspect of the NEAT
Fair for me: the anguish associated with
too much to see and do and too little time
to see and do it. Despite being on-site
more than three days, I was unable to
savor all that was there; I know I missed a
great deal. And despite taking three
airplanes—one newly constructed
specifically for the meet—I got none out
of the car because of so much else to do.
Add everyday, day-long continuous
flying at a dozen flight stations, much
conversation and many photo
opportunities, the noon shows with a dozen
captivating individual performances, and
all of the conversation and photo
opportunities that brings. Mix in the many
scheduled seminars each day, which were
dedicated to the small RC models and
given by a long list of standout presenters.
Factor in the Friday-night kickoff
dinner following a full and busy day on the
field, and then the off-site, Saturday-night
indoor fly at the same time as the on-site,
Saturday-night outdoor fly. (How do you
do that?) Along with that was the all-day,
each day “kid in a candy store” aura of the
vendor line; it was only slightly shorter
than the flightline, which filled the field—
perhaps for 1,000 feet or so.
Now you might better understand why I
ended the first paragraph of this report
with the word “awesome”! But this
naturally brings us to “what next”? It’s the
2004 NEAT Fair, and it’s scheduled for
September 17-19. I’m sure some people
will be unhappy about this; several wanted
a day added to the event, and one wanted it
to be a week-long affair!
You can get more info about the 2003
NEAT Fair at www.neatfair.org. Later you
will be able to preregister for the 2004
NEAT Fair at the same site. I also
encourage you to check out other modeling
magazines and Web sites such as
www.ezonemag.com for additional and
varied NEAT Fair coverage. And I’m told
that by the time you read this, you should
be able to watch much of the 2003 NEAT
Fair on a video by SKS Video Productions.
Check out the www.sksvideo.com site.
See you at the 2004 NEAT Fair. If it will
be a first for you, do go prepared to be
awed. If you’re a NEAT Fair regular, do
go prepared to be awed—again! MA
Bob Kopski
25 West End Dr.
Lansdale PA 19446
Edition: Model Aviation - 2004/03
Page Numbers: 60,61,62,63,64,67
I ATTENDED THE fourth annual Northeast Electric Aircraft
Technology (NEAT) Fair the weekend of September 11-14, 2003, in
Downsville, New York, and so did modelers from most of the nation
(39 states) and some other countries. As in the past, but more so than
ever, it was awesome!
The NEAT Fair is billed as the largest Electrics meet in the US and
is sponsored by the Silent Electric Flyers of Long Island (SEFLI) club.
SEFLI graciously stepped in to continue this East Coast tradition after
the Keystone Radio Control club (KRC) discontinued sponsorship of
its well-known KRC Electric Fly. “The KRC,” as it became known,
was held for 18 consecutive years.
As with any club undertaking, management and member support
are requirements for success. Of course, attendance and participation
are necessary ingredients as well. SEFLI member Tom Hunt, closely
assisted by Bob Aberle, provided the meet’s senior management, and
other SEFLI members aptly supplied the hands-on support. The nearly
300 registered participants rounded out the package.
The result was a wonderful, well-run meet with lots of participant
fun and overall contribution. I have nothing but warmly felt good
impressions and deep gratitude to everyone involved for one more job
extremely well done. Thank you, Tom, Bob, all of SEFLI, and all those
who came to “show and share their stuff” collectively for making this
one terrific Electric showing.
Many in attendance have been long-term regulars at the earlier
KRC affairs and previous NEAT Fairs. The former began in 1980 as
the first club-sponsored Electrics meet in the US with an attendance of
three (yes, three!). Thus this East Coast tradition has grown
approximately 100-fold in less than a quarter century.
Some participants spoke fondly of the earliest days and others had
never heard of KRC; the latter is a sure sign of substantial meet—and
Electric—growth. Based on gate passes, the 2003 NEAT Fair had
roughly 1,300 spectators.
60 MODEL AVIATION
2003 Neat Fair
Three generations of the legendary Shulmans showed up at the Fair (L-R): Don, his son Jason, and his father Leon.
by Bob Kopski
March 2004 61
Fliers enjoyed flyable weather during the three-day meet period.
There were scattered showers, periods of low-lying mist and fog, and
short, gusty times, but not enough of any to stop flying. Weekend
temperatures were comfortable, and overall the weather was our friend.
I have occasionally wondered about the name “NEAT”; I think
the “Technology Fair” was the curious part. However, upon
reflection the obvious became even clearer. That is, as best as I
can recall, in the long history of these meets (I’ve been to all 22) I
don’t think a year has gone by without some demonstrated
improvement in the technology of electric-powered flight. Closely
associated with this—or maybe because of this—is the steady
growth in E-interest and E-accomplishment, culminating in the
2003 NEAT Fair.
I’m sure that opinions and impressions vary among attendees,
but my vote for “most impressive”—if not “most important”—this
A MaxCim 13Y geared, brushless system and 25 CP1700s powers
Greg Covey’s 9-pound Hangar 9 AT-6 Texan ARF conversion.
Robert Frey holds his 1/12-scale Curtiss pusher. The 6-ounce
model uses a MIG 280 and a Kokam 340 3S Li-Poly pack.
Matt Keennon of AeroVironment Inc. shows off his 15-inch-span,
7-gram P-51 rubber power toy conversion.
Jason Shulman flew outstanding demonstrations with his
Rhapsody powered by a geared Hacker brushless motor.
Cindy Malinchak’s Roadkill-series Curtiss Junior pusher features
Microlite covering and three HS-50s.
Photos by the author
Thirteen-year-old Jonathon Ziering holds a prerelease version of
Miss June: a new 3-D kit from AeroLock Models.
A small-model Li-Poly meltdown underscores the need for all of
us to be especially careful with charging and usage.
Keith Shaw’s Park Hawk featured “scale markings” of the redshouldered
hawk that is indigenous to his Midwest home.
Bernard Cawley of E Zone “Controlling Interest” fame with
Switchback Sport featuring retracts, Nippy 1812/10 outrunner.
Leon Enkowitz’s enlarged vintage Rudderbug features an AXI
outrunner motor on 10 3300s turning a 12 x 6 propeller.
This sign of the times—on the driveway leading into the NEAT
Fair—speaks for itself!
62 MODEL AVIATION
March 2004 63
year was Jason Shulman’s dazzling performance/demonstration
with his Rhapsody glow-kit conversion.
Jason was a member of the US team that won the 2003 F3A (Radio
Control Aerobatics, or Pattern) World Championships in Deblin,
Poland. As I understand it, Jason was the only competitor with an
electric-powered model in that gas-dominated affair. His performance
at the World Championships positioned him in the seventh individual
spot and automatically put electric power in basically as top place as
might be imagined. Jason is a gracious showman, and he happily
shared his talent—and technology—to the thrill and amazement of
everyone at the NEAT Fair.
Raymond Foley gets eight- to 10-minute flights from his 8.5-
pound Sig LT-40 ARF conversion using an Aveox 1415-3Y motor.
Sombra Labs’ new six-channel dual-conversion receiver (R) and
plug-in programmer that tunes it to any RC frequency.
This is one of several containers of tiny RC aircraft at the NEAT
Fair. Many of these are multichannel models!
Art Cangialosi’s 1⁄3-size Cloud Cruiser Old-Timer also flew at KRC
in 1984! Has geared Astro FAI motor on seven CP1300 cells.
Chris Balser converted this 9.5-pound Great Planes Lancair 60
ARF to electric. It uses a geared Hacker B50 12L motor.
Consider what all of this means. It means
that, for all practical purposes, there is no
longer a gap between flying with electric
power and flying any other way. (I’ll
understand if you need to read that again!)
This accomplishment is owed to Jason’s
piloting prowess combined with recent
advancements in electric technology. So what
technology leap made this possible? Two
words: “brushless” and “Lithium-Polymer
(Li-Poly).” Brushless in electric is not exactly
new, but the winning combination of it and
Lithium battery technology at this level is.
Jason’s 10.75-pound Rhapsody was
“motovated” by a Hacker brushless C50 FAI
14XL motor with 6.7:1 gears to an APC 22 x
12E propeller sourced by a Thunder Power
10S3P 6100 mAh pack. That’s a nominal 42-
volt battery supplying roughly 2,400 watts
when needed throughout the 10- to 11-minute
flight, and the result is world-class Pattern
performance. Step aside, wet power, and
allow room for a quiet equal on the
aeromodeling stage!
If there is a downside to this, it’s only that
there’s nothing left to do. It is now shown and
known that electric power can do it all, and, in
effect, the goal has been taken. From here on
it’s only a matter of continuing technical
refinement—some no doubt with
motors/controllers and much more with
batteries.
I forecast that E-power will eventually
pull ahead as the favored aeromodeling
“motovation.” I don’t see this as anyone
“losing” but rather as everyone “gaining”
because I’ve never heard of a field lost
because of quiet.
As best as I could discern, brushless was
the dominant motor at the NEAT event this
year; most fliers seemed to favor brushless
almost no matter the model. There were quite
a few quality brushed motors privately for
sale up and down the flightline—cheap! I
believe that with its associated better
performance and rapidly declining prices,
brushless will soon replace all but a few of the
classic brushed motors in E-flying.
While Jason and several others
demonstrated the largest power systems, Bob
Boucher of AstroFlight showed his newly
designed Firefly coreless motor “hop-up” kit.
Based on the existing AstroFlight motor, this
package is specifically designed to replace
GWS brushed motors in some familiar and
popular GWS gear drives and fans.
The Firefly hop-up kit is said to offer
excellent performance with a dramatic
increase in motor life and flight duration for
these popular “park” applications. AstroFlight
has a tiny proprietary speed controller to go
with the Firefly motor.
Between the mighty Hacker FAI motor
and the Firefly there exists an often-confusing
abundance of brushless motors that fills the
range in between. The result is that you can
fly whatever you’re likely to want to fly
brushless, but you do have to figure out which
manufacturer/product you want. As many
lamented to me, this is not necessarily easy to
do.
In that respect, the industry has
simultaneously done a magnificent job
producing and a terrible job describing this
product. As with any technically intensive
consumer-product category with multiple
sources, it is important for suppliers to
collectively help the user use it easily. A
standardized, concise, meaningful motor label
would go a long way.
In a fashion similar to the motor story, Li-
Poly battery technology at the NEAT Fair
also covered the application range. From the
2,400 watts all the way down to a few
hundred milliwatts, this battery technology
permeated the flightline. Whether for the
Rhapsody or those tiny, subounce handfuls of
guided indoor E-flight models, Li-Poly
offered long flights with generally enhanced
performance. But there is at least one serious
downside to Li-Poly: safety issues.
Li-Poly has exploded onto the Electrics
scene in roughly one year’s time, but Li-Poly
itself can explode—or at least melt down or
burn up, depending on who tells the tale. So
far I’ve heard of this happening in improperly
charged batteries and in charged packs on the
shelf.
One thing is for sure: it’s necessary to use
chargers designed especially for Li-Poly cells.
The flip side to this is that you cannot safely
charge these batteries with a conventional Ni-
Cd/NiMH charger.
There are several chargers on the market
with Li-Poly capability, and NEAT Fair
vendors did brisk business with them. In fact,
AstroFlight introduced a new, high-capability,
well-received Lithium-specific charger at the
NEAT meet.
In my long association with Electrics
(more than three decades), I haven’t seen a
single product or technology with so much
promise and so much safety concern at the
same time as Li-Poly has. At the same time, I
have no reservations about this technology
and product eventually maturing and
becoming safe and commonplace. In the
meantime, be careful!
There was other new technology at the
2003 NEAT Fair. The spirited guys from the
Ottawa-based Sombra Labs—a
communications firm—described their
forthcoming, small, double-conversion,
crystalless six-channel receiver. It is designed
to cover all 50, 72, and 75 MHz US RC
frequencies, and it covers several foreign
frequency assignments—all with the same
receiver with no parts changes, they say.
Tuning (channel selection) in this receiver
is set (programmed) with a removable, lowcost,
“plug-on” accessory module. Imagine
combining this with an existing Hitec
64 MODEL AVIATION
March 2004 67
Spectra-equipped transmitter! I’m eager to
see it on six meters because existing
receivers are old and bulky. This receiver
is not electric-dedicated; it is applicable
throughout RC.
West Mountain Radio described its
forthcoming Computerized Battery
Analyzer (CBA). The compact, 4-inch,
cube-shaped CBA comes with a USB
(Universal Serial Bus) interface to test and
record, store, and compare battery
performance. It’s designed to do this for
any type of battery, and it requires no
separate external power source or internal
battery to function. This is another goodie
I’m eager to try.
My impression is that the favored Electric
at the 2003 NEAT affair was a “smaller”
aircraft—say, spanning 50 inches and less.
Many (but not all) were park flyer types;
at times there seemed to be a near-ground
cloud of these in the air! It was clear that
some had been “hopped up” with beyondnormal
motors and batteries because of
their 3-D performance.
Speaking of 3-D, several pilots put on a
fine flying show with large and small 3-D
models. Accomplished crowd-pleasing 3-
D expert Gary Wright flew his E3D-XL,
and the presentation was exhilarating to
watch. I also greatly appreciated 13-yearold
Jonathan Ziering with his Razorbrushless-
equipped prototype Miss June 3-
D. Jonathan flew like he’d been doing it
for more years than he is old.
For more senior fliers—those with
slower fingers, “lesser” eyesight, and
scaled-down reaction time (like me!)—3-
D is out of reach, and watching it is about
as close as one can get. Some wondered if
this was really “flying,” and others tried to
quantify at what age one should not bother
to attempt this activity! Everyone seemed
to enjoy, if not envy, the 3-D
performances.
Many attendees flew conversions at the
NEAT event. One that caught my eye was
Horizon Hobby’s popular Ultra Stick 60
wet-power airplane converted to electric
power. I saw three, although there may
have been more. All were brushless
equipped—one with a Hacker motor, one
with a MaxCim system, and one with an
AXI outrunner—and two had Li-Poly and
one had Ni-Cd energy storage. A flight I
witnessed had the Hacker/Li-Poly Stick
going sustained vertical. This spectacle
merely added more glue to that gap that is
now closed.
I also observed that Almost Ready to
Flys (ARFs), if not in majority, were well
represented. These included electric ARFs
and ARF conversions.
Of course, model building is still
represented, but far less so than ever
before. In earlier days when electric power
levels were more meager and power
systems weighed more, building light was
mandatory. But, again, years of
technology growth have made this less
necessary, and the meet left no doubt
about this. (Overall, lighter still flies
better!)
One unique and memorable spectacle was
a spontaneously organized ornithopter
mass launch. Unfortunately my camera
was unable to capture all of the widespread
(spread-wide?) flapping; it was
everywhere! How about a scheduled Ebirdie
All-Up/Last Down or maybe a
“birdfight” next year? Or how about a
“scale-bird” challenge?
There were eye-catching airplanes and
performances by high-profile E-fliers, but
many participants seemed happy to show
and fly their more ordinary Electrics. This
largely explains the busy flight stations all
day, every day.
Many I spoke to were not only firsttimers
at the NEAT Fair but were firsttimers
in Electrics. Some had recently
started in the hobby. This compares
favorably with a certain wee-powered,
one-circle-of-sink E-beginning I know
of—31 years ago!
Despite all of the happy awe, there is
paradoxically one sad aspect of the NEAT
Fair for me: the anguish associated with
too much to see and do and too little time
to see and do it. Despite being on-site
more than three days, I was unable to
savor all that was there; I know I missed a
great deal. And despite taking three
airplanes—one newly constructed
specifically for the meet—I got none out
of the car because of so much else to do.
Add everyday, day-long continuous
flying at a dozen flight stations, much
conversation and many photo
opportunities, the noon shows with a dozen
captivating individual performances, and
all of the conversation and photo
opportunities that brings. Mix in the many
scheduled seminars each day, which were
dedicated to the small RC models and
given by a long list of standout presenters.
Factor in the Friday-night kickoff
dinner following a full and busy day on the
field, and then the off-site, Saturday-night
indoor fly at the same time as the on-site,
Saturday-night outdoor fly. (How do you
do that?) Along with that was the all-day,
each day “kid in a candy store” aura of the
vendor line; it was only slightly shorter
than the flightline, which filled the field—
perhaps for 1,000 feet or so.
Now you might better understand why I
ended the first paragraph of this report
with the word “awesome”! But this
naturally brings us to “what next”? It’s the
2004 NEAT Fair, and it’s scheduled for
September 17-19. I’m sure some people
will be unhappy about this; several wanted
a day added to the event, and one wanted it
to be a week-long affair!
You can get more info about the 2003
NEAT Fair at www.neatfair.org. Later you
will be able to preregister for the 2004
NEAT Fair at the same site. I also
encourage you to check out other modeling
magazines and Web sites such as
www.ezonemag.com for additional and
varied NEAT Fair coverage. And I’m told
that by the time you read this, you should
be able to watch much of the 2003 NEAT
Fair on a video by SKS Video Productions.
Check out the www.sksvideo.com site.
See you at the 2004 NEAT Fair. If it will
be a first for you, do go prepared to be
awed. If you’re a NEAT Fair regular, do
go prepared to be awed—again! MA
Bob Kopski
25 West End Dr.
Lansdale PA 19446
Edition: Model Aviation - 2004/03
Page Numbers: 60,61,62,63,64,67
I ATTENDED THE fourth annual Northeast Electric Aircraft
Technology (NEAT) Fair the weekend of September 11-14, 2003, in
Downsville, New York, and so did modelers from most of the nation
(39 states) and some other countries. As in the past, but more so than
ever, it was awesome!
The NEAT Fair is billed as the largest Electrics meet in the US and
is sponsored by the Silent Electric Flyers of Long Island (SEFLI) club.
SEFLI graciously stepped in to continue this East Coast tradition after
the Keystone Radio Control club (KRC) discontinued sponsorship of
its well-known KRC Electric Fly. “The KRC,” as it became known,
was held for 18 consecutive years.
As with any club undertaking, management and member support
are requirements for success. Of course, attendance and participation
are necessary ingredients as well. SEFLI member Tom Hunt, closely
assisted by Bob Aberle, provided the meet’s senior management, and
other SEFLI members aptly supplied the hands-on support. The nearly
300 registered participants rounded out the package.
The result was a wonderful, well-run meet with lots of participant
fun and overall contribution. I have nothing but warmly felt good
impressions and deep gratitude to everyone involved for one more job
extremely well done. Thank you, Tom, Bob, all of SEFLI, and all those
who came to “show and share their stuff” collectively for making this
one terrific Electric showing.
Many in attendance have been long-term regulars at the earlier
KRC affairs and previous NEAT Fairs. The former began in 1980 as
the first club-sponsored Electrics meet in the US with an attendance of
three (yes, three!). Thus this East Coast tradition has grown
approximately 100-fold in less than a quarter century.
Some participants spoke fondly of the earliest days and others had
never heard of KRC; the latter is a sure sign of substantial meet—and
Electric—growth. Based on gate passes, the 2003 NEAT Fair had
roughly 1,300 spectators.
60 MODEL AVIATION
2003 Neat Fair
Three generations of the legendary Shulmans showed up at the Fair (L-R): Don, his son Jason, and his father Leon.
by Bob Kopski
March 2004 61
Fliers enjoyed flyable weather during the three-day meet period.
There were scattered showers, periods of low-lying mist and fog, and
short, gusty times, but not enough of any to stop flying. Weekend
temperatures were comfortable, and overall the weather was our friend.
I have occasionally wondered about the name “NEAT”; I think
the “Technology Fair” was the curious part. However, upon
reflection the obvious became even clearer. That is, as best as I
can recall, in the long history of these meets (I’ve been to all 22) I
don’t think a year has gone by without some demonstrated
improvement in the technology of electric-powered flight. Closely
associated with this—or maybe because of this—is the steady
growth in E-interest and E-accomplishment, culminating in the
2003 NEAT Fair.
I’m sure that opinions and impressions vary among attendees,
but my vote for “most impressive”—if not “most important”—this
A MaxCim 13Y geared, brushless system and 25 CP1700s powers
Greg Covey’s 9-pound Hangar 9 AT-6 Texan ARF conversion.
Robert Frey holds his 1/12-scale Curtiss pusher. The 6-ounce
model uses a MIG 280 and a Kokam 340 3S Li-Poly pack.
Matt Keennon of AeroVironment Inc. shows off his 15-inch-span,
7-gram P-51 rubber power toy conversion.
Jason Shulman flew outstanding demonstrations with his
Rhapsody powered by a geared Hacker brushless motor.
Cindy Malinchak’s Roadkill-series Curtiss Junior pusher features
Microlite covering and three HS-50s.
Photos by the author
Thirteen-year-old Jonathon Ziering holds a prerelease version of
Miss June: a new 3-D kit from AeroLock Models.
A small-model Li-Poly meltdown underscores the need for all of
us to be especially careful with charging and usage.
Keith Shaw’s Park Hawk featured “scale markings” of the redshouldered
hawk that is indigenous to his Midwest home.
Bernard Cawley of E Zone “Controlling Interest” fame with
Switchback Sport featuring retracts, Nippy 1812/10 outrunner.
Leon Enkowitz’s enlarged vintage Rudderbug features an AXI
outrunner motor on 10 3300s turning a 12 x 6 propeller.
This sign of the times—on the driveway leading into the NEAT
Fair—speaks for itself!
62 MODEL AVIATION
March 2004 63
year was Jason Shulman’s dazzling performance/demonstration
with his Rhapsody glow-kit conversion.
Jason was a member of the US team that won the 2003 F3A (Radio
Control Aerobatics, or Pattern) World Championships in Deblin,
Poland. As I understand it, Jason was the only competitor with an
electric-powered model in that gas-dominated affair. His performance
at the World Championships positioned him in the seventh individual
spot and automatically put electric power in basically as top place as
might be imagined. Jason is a gracious showman, and he happily
shared his talent—and technology—to the thrill and amazement of
everyone at the NEAT Fair.
Raymond Foley gets eight- to 10-minute flights from his 8.5-
pound Sig LT-40 ARF conversion using an Aveox 1415-3Y motor.
Sombra Labs’ new six-channel dual-conversion receiver (R) and
plug-in programmer that tunes it to any RC frequency.
This is one of several containers of tiny RC aircraft at the NEAT
Fair. Many of these are multichannel models!
Art Cangialosi’s 1⁄3-size Cloud Cruiser Old-Timer also flew at KRC
in 1984! Has geared Astro FAI motor on seven CP1300 cells.
Chris Balser converted this 9.5-pound Great Planes Lancair 60
ARF to electric. It uses a geared Hacker B50 12L motor.
Consider what all of this means. It means
that, for all practical purposes, there is no
longer a gap between flying with electric
power and flying any other way. (I’ll
understand if you need to read that again!)
This accomplishment is owed to Jason’s
piloting prowess combined with recent
advancements in electric technology. So what
technology leap made this possible? Two
words: “brushless” and “Lithium-Polymer
(Li-Poly).” Brushless in electric is not exactly
new, but the winning combination of it and
Lithium battery technology at this level is.
Jason’s 10.75-pound Rhapsody was
“motovated” by a Hacker brushless C50 FAI
14XL motor with 6.7:1 gears to an APC 22 x
12E propeller sourced by a Thunder Power
10S3P 6100 mAh pack. That’s a nominal 42-
volt battery supplying roughly 2,400 watts
when needed throughout the 10- to 11-minute
flight, and the result is world-class Pattern
performance. Step aside, wet power, and
allow room for a quiet equal on the
aeromodeling stage!
If there is a downside to this, it’s only that
there’s nothing left to do. It is now shown and
known that electric power can do it all, and, in
effect, the goal has been taken. From here on
it’s only a matter of continuing technical
refinement—some no doubt with
motors/controllers and much more with
batteries.
I forecast that E-power will eventually
pull ahead as the favored aeromodeling
“motovation.” I don’t see this as anyone
“losing” but rather as everyone “gaining”
because I’ve never heard of a field lost
because of quiet.
As best as I could discern, brushless was
the dominant motor at the NEAT event this
year; most fliers seemed to favor brushless
almost no matter the model. There were quite
a few quality brushed motors privately for
sale up and down the flightline—cheap! I
believe that with its associated better
performance and rapidly declining prices,
brushless will soon replace all but a few of the
classic brushed motors in E-flying.
While Jason and several others
demonstrated the largest power systems, Bob
Boucher of AstroFlight showed his newly
designed Firefly coreless motor “hop-up” kit.
Based on the existing AstroFlight motor, this
package is specifically designed to replace
GWS brushed motors in some familiar and
popular GWS gear drives and fans.
The Firefly hop-up kit is said to offer
excellent performance with a dramatic
increase in motor life and flight duration for
these popular “park” applications. AstroFlight
has a tiny proprietary speed controller to go
with the Firefly motor.
Between the mighty Hacker FAI motor
and the Firefly there exists an often-confusing
abundance of brushless motors that fills the
range in between. The result is that you can
fly whatever you’re likely to want to fly
brushless, but you do have to figure out which
manufacturer/product you want. As many
lamented to me, this is not necessarily easy to
do.
In that respect, the industry has
simultaneously done a magnificent job
producing and a terrible job describing this
product. As with any technically intensive
consumer-product category with multiple
sources, it is important for suppliers to
collectively help the user use it easily. A
standardized, concise, meaningful motor label
would go a long way.
In a fashion similar to the motor story, Li-
Poly battery technology at the NEAT Fair
also covered the application range. From the
2,400 watts all the way down to a few
hundred milliwatts, this battery technology
permeated the flightline. Whether for the
Rhapsody or those tiny, subounce handfuls of
guided indoor E-flight models, Li-Poly
offered long flights with generally enhanced
performance. But there is at least one serious
downside to Li-Poly: safety issues.
Li-Poly has exploded onto the Electrics
scene in roughly one year’s time, but Li-Poly
itself can explode—or at least melt down or
burn up, depending on who tells the tale. So
far I’ve heard of this happening in improperly
charged batteries and in charged packs on the
shelf.
One thing is for sure: it’s necessary to use
chargers designed especially for Li-Poly cells.
The flip side to this is that you cannot safely
charge these batteries with a conventional Ni-
Cd/NiMH charger.
There are several chargers on the market
with Li-Poly capability, and NEAT Fair
vendors did brisk business with them. In fact,
AstroFlight introduced a new, high-capability,
well-received Lithium-specific charger at the
NEAT meet.
In my long association with Electrics
(more than three decades), I haven’t seen a
single product or technology with so much
promise and so much safety concern at the
same time as Li-Poly has. At the same time, I
have no reservations about this technology
and product eventually maturing and
becoming safe and commonplace. In the
meantime, be careful!
There was other new technology at the
2003 NEAT Fair. The spirited guys from the
Ottawa-based Sombra Labs—a
communications firm—described their
forthcoming, small, double-conversion,
crystalless six-channel receiver. It is designed
to cover all 50, 72, and 75 MHz US RC
frequencies, and it covers several foreign
frequency assignments—all with the same
receiver with no parts changes, they say.
Tuning (channel selection) in this receiver
is set (programmed) with a removable, lowcost,
“plug-on” accessory module. Imagine
combining this with an existing Hitec
64 MODEL AVIATION
March 2004 67
Spectra-equipped transmitter! I’m eager to
see it on six meters because existing
receivers are old and bulky. This receiver
is not electric-dedicated; it is applicable
throughout RC.
West Mountain Radio described its
forthcoming Computerized Battery
Analyzer (CBA). The compact, 4-inch,
cube-shaped CBA comes with a USB
(Universal Serial Bus) interface to test and
record, store, and compare battery
performance. It’s designed to do this for
any type of battery, and it requires no
separate external power source or internal
battery to function. This is another goodie
I’m eager to try.
My impression is that the favored Electric
at the 2003 NEAT affair was a “smaller”
aircraft—say, spanning 50 inches and less.
Many (but not all) were park flyer types;
at times there seemed to be a near-ground
cloud of these in the air! It was clear that
some had been “hopped up” with beyondnormal
motors and batteries because of
their 3-D performance.
Speaking of 3-D, several pilots put on a
fine flying show with large and small 3-D
models. Accomplished crowd-pleasing 3-
D expert Gary Wright flew his E3D-XL,
and the presentation was exhilarating to
watch. I also greatly appreciated 13-yearold
Jonathan Ziering with his Razorbrushless-
equipped prototype Miss June 3-
D. Jonathan flew like he’d been doing it
for more years than he is old.
For more senior fliers—those with
slower fingers, “lesser” eyesight, and
scaled-down reaction time (like me!)—3-
D is out of reach, and watching it is about
as close as one can get. Some wondered if
this was really “flying,” and others tried to
quantify at what age one should not bother
to attempt this activity! Everyone seemed
to enjoy, if not envy, the 3-D
performances.
Many attendees flew conversions at the
NEAT event. One that caught my eye was
Horizon Hobby’s popular Ultra Stick 60
wet-power airplane converted to electric
power. I saw three, although there may
have been more. All were brushless
equipped—one with a Hacker motor, one
with a MaxCim system, and one with an
AXI outrunner—and two had Li-Poly and
one had Ni-Cd energy storage. A flight I
witnessed had the Hacker/Li-Poly Stick
going sustained vertical. This spectacle
merely added more glue to that gap that is
now closed.
I also observed that Almost Ready to
Flys (ARFs), if not in majority, were well
represented. These included electric ARFs
and ARF conversions.
Of course, model building is still
represented, but far less so than ever
before. In earlier days when electric power
levels were more meager and power
systems weighed more, building light was
mandatory. But, again, years of
technology growth have made this less
necessary, and the meet left no doubt
about this. (Overall, lighter still flies
better!)
One unique and memorable spectacle was
a spontaneously organized ornithopter
mass launch. Unfortunately my camera
was unable to capture all of the widespread
(spread-wide?) flapping; it was
everywhere! How about a scheduled Ebirdie
All-Up/Last Down or maybe a
“birdfight” next year? Or how about a
“scale-bird” challenge?
There were eye-catching airplanes and
performances by high-profile E-fliers, but
many participants seemed happy to show
and fly their more ordinary Electrics. This
largely explains the busy flight stations all
day, every day.
Many I spoke to were not only firsttimers
at the NEAT Fair but were firsttimers
in Electrics. Some had recently
started in the hobby. This compares
favorably with a certain wee-powered,
one-circle-of-sink E-beginning I know
of—31 years ago!
Despite all of the happy awe, there is
paradoxically one sad aspect of the NEAT
Fair for me: the anguish associated with
too much to see and do and too little time
to see and do it. Despite being on-site
more than three days, I was unable to
savor all that was there; I know I missed a
great deal. And despite taking three
airplanes—one newly constructed
specifically for the meet—I got none out
of the car because of so much else to do.
Add everyday, day-long continuous
flying at a dozen flight stations, much
conversation and many photo
opportunities, the noon shows with a dozen
captivating individual performances, and
all of the conversation and photo
opportunities that brings. Mix in the many
scheduled seminars each day, which were
dedicated to the small RC models and
given by a long list of standout presenters.
Factor in the Friday-night kickoff
dinner following a full and busy day on the
field, and then the off-site, Saturday-night
indoor fly at the same time as the on-site,
Saturday-night outdoor fly. (How do you
do that?) Along with that was the all-day,
each day “kid in a candy store” aura of the
vendor line; it was only slightly shorter
than the flightline, which filled the field—
perhaps for 1,000 feet or so.
Now you might better understand why I
ended the first paragraph of this report
with the word “awesome”! But this
naturally brings us to “what next”? It’s the
2004 NEAT Fair, and it’s scheduled for
September 17-19. I’m sure some people
will be unhappy about this; several wanted
a day added to the event, and one wanted it
to be a week-long affair!
You can get more info about the 2003
NEAT Fair at www.neatfair.org. Later you
will be able to preregister for the 2004
NEAT Fair at the same site. I also
encourage you to check out other modeling
magazines and Web sites such as
www.ezonemag.com for additional and
varied NEAT Fair coverage. And I’m told
that by the time you read this, you should
be able to watch much of the 2003 NEAT
Fair on a video by SKS Video Productions.
Check out the www.sksvideo.com site.
See you at the 2004 NEAT Fair. If it will
be a first for you, do go prepared to be
awed. If you’re a NEAT Fair regular, do
go prepared to be awed—again! MA
Bob Kopski
25 West End Dr.
Lansdale PA 19446
Edition: Model Aviation - 2004/03
Page Numbers: 60,61,62,63,64,67
I ATTENDED THE fourth annual Northeast Electric Aircraft
Technology (NEAT) Fair the weekend of September 11-14, 2003, in
Downsville, New York, and so did modelers from most of the nation
(39 states) and some other countries. As in the past, but more so than
ever, it was awesome!
The NEAT Fair is billed as the largest Electrics meet in the US and
is sponsored by the Silent Electric Flyers of Long Island (SEFLI) club.
SEFLI graciously stepped in to continue this East Coast tradition after
the Keystone Radio Control club (KRC) discontinued sponsorship of
its well-known KRC Electric Fly. “The KRC,” as it became known,
was held for 18 consecutive years.
As with any club undertaking, management and member support
are requirements for success. Of course, attendance and participation
are necessary ingredients as well. SEFLI member Tom Hunt, closely
assisted by Bob Aberle, provided the meet’s senior management, and
other SEFLI members aptly supplied the hands-on support. The nearly
300 registered participants rounded out the package.
The result was a wonderful, well-run meet with lots of participant
fun and overall contribution. I have nothing but warmly felt good
impressions and deep gratitude to everyone involved for one more job
extremely well done. Thank you, Tom, Bob, all of SEFLI, and all those
who came to “show and share their stuff” collectively for making this
one terrific Electric showing.
Many in attendance have been long-term regulars at the earlier
KRC affairs and previous NEAT Fairs. The former began in 1980 as
the first club-sponsored Electrics meet in the US with an attendance of
three (yes, three!). Thus this East Coast tradition has grown
approximately 100-fold in less than a quarter century.
Some participants spoke fondly of the earliest days and others had
never heard of KRC; the latter is a sure sign of substantial meet—and
Electric—growth. Based on gate passes, the 2003 NEAT Fair had
roughly 1,300 spectators.
60 MODEL AVIATION
2003 Neat Fair
Three generations of the legendary Shulmans showed up at the Fair (L-R): Don, his son Jason, and his father Leon.
by Bob Kopski
March 2004 61
Fliers enjoyed flyable weather during the three-day meet period.
There were scattered showers, periods of low-lying mist and fog, and
short, gusty times, but not enough of any to stop flying. Weekend
temperatures were comfortable, and overall the weather was our friend.
I have occasionally wondered about the name “NEAT”; I think
the “Technology Fair” was the curious part. However, upon
reflection the obvious became even clearer. That is, as best as I
can recall, in the long history of these meets (I’ve been to all 22) I
don’t think a year has gone by without some demonstrated
improvement in the technology of electric-powered flight. Closely
associated with this—or maybe because of this—is the steady
growth in E-interest and E-accomplishment, culminating in the
2003 NEAT Fair.
I’m sure that opinions and impressions vary among attendees,
but my vote for “most impressive”—if not “most important”—this
A MaxCim 13Y geared, brushless system and 25 CP1700s powers
Greg Covey’s 9-pound Hangar 9 AT-6 Texan ARF conversion.
Robert Frey holds his 1/12-scale Curtiss pusher. The 6-ounce
model uses a MIG 280 and a Kokam 340 3S Li-Poly pack.
Matt Keennon of AeroVironment Inc. shows off his 15-inch-span,
7-gram P-51 rubber power toy conversion.
Jason Shulman flew outstanding demonstrations with his
Rhapsody powered by a geared Hacker brushless motor.
Cindy Malinchak’s Roadkill-series Curtiss Junior pusher features
Microlite covering and three HS-50s.
Photos by the author
Thirteen-year-old Jonathon Ziering holds a prerelease version of
Miss June: a new 3-D kit from AeroLock Models.
A small-model Li-Poly meltdown underscores the need for all of
us to be especially careful with charging and usage.
Keith Shaw’s Park Hawk featured “scale markings” of the redshouldered
hawk that is indigenous to his Midwest home.
Bernard Cawley of E Zone “Controlling Interest” fame with
Switchback Sport featuring retracts, Nippy 1812/10 outrunner.
Leon Enkowitz’s enlarged vintage Rudderbug features an AXI
outrunner motor on 10 3300s turning a 12 x 6 propeller.
This sign of the times—on the driveway leading into the NEAT
Fair—speaks for itself!
62 MODEL AVIATION
March 2004 63
year was Jason Shulman’s dazzling performance/demonstration
with his Rhapsody glow-kit conversion.
Jason was a member of the US team that won the 2003 F3A (Radio
Control Aerobatics, or Pattern) World Championships in Deblin,
Poland. As I understand it, Jason was the only competitor with an
electric-powered model in that gas-dominated affair. His performance
at the World Championships positioned him in the seventh individual
spot and automatically put electric power in basically as top place as
might be imagined. Jason is a gracious showman, and he happily
shared his talent—and technology—to the thrill and amazement of
everyone at the NEAT Fair.
Raymond Foley gets eight- to 10-minute flights from his 8.5-
pound Sig LT-40 ARF conversion using an Aveox 1415-3Y motor.
Sombra Labs’ new six-channel dual-conversion receiver (R) and
plug-in programmer that tunes it to any RC frequency.
This is one of several containers of tiny RC aircraft at the NEAT
Fair. Many of these are multichannel models!
Art Cangialosi’s 1⁄3-size Cloud Cruiser Old-Timer also flew at KRC
in 1984! Has geared Astro FAI motor on seven CP1300 cells.
Chris Balser converted this 9.5-pound Great Planes Lancair 60
ARF to electric. It uses a geared Hacker B50 12L motor.
Consider what all of this means. It means
that, for all practical purposes, there is no
longer a gap between flying with electric
power and flying any other way. (I’ll
understand if you need to read that again!)
This accomplishment is owed to Jason’s
piloting prowess combined with recent
advancements in electric technology. So what
technology leap made this possible? Two
words: “brushless” and “Lithium-Polymer
(Li-Poly).” Brushless in electric is not exactly
new, but the winning combination of it and
Lithium battery technology at this level is.
Jason’s 10.75-pound Rhapsody was
“motovated” by a Hacker brushless C50 FAI
14XL motor with 6.7:1 gears to an APC 22 x
12E propeller sourced by a Thunder Power
10S3P 6100 mAh pack. That’s a nominal 42-
volt battery supplying roughly 2,400 watts
when needed throughout the 10- to 11-minute
flight, and the result is world-class Pattern
performance. Step aside, wet power, and
allow room for a quiet equal on the
aeromodeling stage!
If there is a downside to this, it’s only that
there’s nothing left to do. It is now shown and
known that electric power can do it all, and, in
effect, the goal has been taken. From here on
it’s only a matter of continuing technical
refinement—some no doubt with
motors/controllers and much more with
batteries.
I forecast that E-power will eventually
pull ahead as the favored aeromodeling
“motovation.” I don’t see this as anyone
“losing” but rather as everyone “gaining”
because I’ve never heard of a field lost
because of quiet.
As best as I could discern, brushless was
the dominant motor at the NEAT event this
year; most fliers seemed to favor brushless
almost no matter the model. There were quite
a few quality brushed motors privately for
sale up and down the flightline—cheap! I
believe that with its associated better
performance and rapidly declining prices,
brushless will soon replace all but a few of the
classic brushed motors in E-flying.
While Jason and several others
demonstrated the largest power systems, Bob
Boucher of AstroFlight showed his newly
designed Firefly coreless motor “hop-up” kit.
Based on the existing AstroFlight motor, this
package is specifically designed to replace
GWS brushed motors in some familiar and
popular GWS gear drives and fans.
The Firefly hop-up kit is said to offer
excellent performance with a dramatic
increase in motor life and flight duration for
these popular “park” applications. AstroFlight
has a tiny proprietary speed controller to go
with the Firefly motor.
Between the mighty Hacker FAI motor
and the Firefly there exists an often-confusing
abundance of brushless motors that fills the
range in between. The result is that you can
fly whatever you’re likely to want to fly
brushless, but you do have to figure out which
manufacturer/product you want. As many
lamented to me, this is not necessarily easy to
do.
In that respect, the industry has
simultaneously done a magnificent job
producing and a terrible job describing this
product. As with any technically intensive
consumer-product category with multiple
sources, it is important for suppliers to
collectively help the user use it easily. A
standardized, concise, meaningful motor label
would go a long way.
In a fashion similar to the motor story, Li-
Poly battery technology at the NEAT Fair
also covered the application range. From the
2,400 watts all the way down to a few
hundred milliwatts, this battery technology
permeated the flightline. Whether for the
Rhapsody or those tiny, subounce handfuls of
guided indoor E-flight models, Li-Poly
offered long flights with generally enhanced
performance. But there is at least one serious
downside to Li-Poly: safety issues.
Li-Poly has exploded onto the Electrics
scene in roughly one year’s time, but Li-Poly
itself can explode—or at least melt down or
burn up, depending on who tells the tale. So
far I’ve heard of this happening in improperly
charged batteries and in charged packs on the
shelf.
One thing is for sure: it’s necessary to use
chargers designed especially for Li-Poly cells.
The flip side to this is that you cannot safely
charge these batteries with a conventional Ni-
Cd/NiMH charger.
There are several chargers on the market
with Li-Poly capability, and NEAT Fair
vendors did brisk business with them. In fact,
AstroFlight introduced a new, high-capability,
well-received Lithium-specific charger at the
NEAT meet.
In my long association with Electrics
(more than three decades), I haven’t seen a
single product or technology with so much
promise and so much safety concern at the
same time as Li-Poly has. At the same time, I
have no reservations about this technology
and product eventually maturing and
becoming safe and commonplace. In the
meantime, be careful!
There was other new technology at the
2003 NEAT Fair. The spirited guys from the
Ottawa-based Sombra Labs—a
communications firm—described their
forthcoming, small, double-conversion,
crystalless six-channel receiver. It is designed
to cover all 50, 72, and 75 MHz US RC
frequencies, and it covers several foreign
frequency assignments—all with the same
receiver with no parts changes, they say.
Tuning (channel selection) in this receiver
is set (programmed) with a removable, lowcost,
“plug-on” accessory module. Imagine
combining this with an existing Hitec
64 MODEL AVIATION
March 2004 67
Spectra-equipped transmitter! I’m eager to
see it on six meters because existing
receivers are old and bulky. This receiver
is not electric-dedicated; it is applicable
throughout RC.
West Mountain Radio described its
forthcoming Computerized Battery
Analyzer (CBA). The compact, 4-inch,
cube-shaped CBA comes with a USB
(Universal Serial Bus) interface to test and
record, store, and compare battery
performance. It’s designed to do this for
any type of battery, and it requires no
separate external power source or internal
battery to function. This is another goodie
I’m eager to try.
My impression is that the favored Electric
at the 2003 NEAT affair was a “smaller”
aircraft—say, spanning 50 inches and less.
Many (but not all) were park flyer types;
at times there seemed to be a near-ground
cloud of these in the air! It was clear that
some had been “hopped up” with beyondnormal
motors and batteries because of
their 3-D performance.
Speaking of 3-D, several pilots put on a
fine flying show with large and small 3-D
models. Accomplished crowd-pleasing 3-
D expert Gary Wright flew his E3D-XL,
and the presentation was exhilarating to
watch. I also greatly appreciated 13-yearold
Jonathan Ziering with his Razorbrushless-
equipped prototype Miss June 3-
D. Jonathan flew like he’d been doing it
for more years than he is old.
For more senior fliers—those with
slower fingers, “lesser” eyesight, and
scaled-down reaction time (like me!)—3-
D is out of reach, and watching it is about
as close as one can get. Some wondered if
this was really “flying,” and others tried to
quantify at what age one should not bother
to attempt this activity! Everyone seemed
to enjoy, if not envy, the 3-D
performances.
Many attendees flew conversions at the
NEAT event. One that caught my eye was
Horizon Hobby’s popular Ultra Stick 60
wet-power airplane converted to electric
power. I saw three, although there may
have been more. All were brushless
equipped—one with a Hacker motor, one
with a MaxCim system, and one with an
AXI outrunner—and two had Li-Poly and
one had Ni-Cd energy storage. A flight I
witnessed had the Hacker/Li-Poly Stick
going sustained vertical. This spectacle
merely added more glue to that gap that is
now closed.
I also observed that Almost Ready to
Flys (ARFs), if not in majority, were well
represented. These included electric ARFs
and ARF conversions.
Of course, model building is still
represented, but far less so than ever
before. In earlier days when electric power
levels were more meager and power
systems weighed more, building light was
mandatory. But, again, years of
technology growth have made this less
necessary, and the meet left no doubt
about this. (Overall, lighter still flies
better!)
One unique and memorable spectacle was
a spontaneously organized ornithopter
mass launch. Unfortunately my camera
was unable to capture all of the widespread
(spread-wide?) flapping; it was
everywhere! How about a scheduled Ebirdie
All-Up/Last Down or maybe a
“birdfight” next year? Or how about a
“scale-bird” challenge?
There were eye-catching airplanes and
performances by high-profile E-fliers, but
many participants seemed happy to show
and fly their more ordinary Electrics. This
largely explains the busy flight stations all
day, every day.
Many I spoke to were not only firsttimers
at the NEAT Fair but were firsttimers
in Electrics. Some had recently
started in the hobby. This compares
favorably with a certain wee-powered,
one-circle-of-sink E-beginning I know
of—31 years ago!
Despite all of the happy awe, there is
paradoxically one sad aspect of the NEAT
Fair for me: the anguish associated with
too much to see and do and too little time
to see and do it. Despite being on-site
more than three days, I was unable to
savor all that was there; I know I missed a
great deal. And despite taking three
airplanes—one newly constructed
specifically for the meet—I got none out
of the car because of so much else to do.
Add everyday, day-long continuous
flying at a dozen flight stations, much
conversation and many photo
opportunities, the noon shows with a dozen
captivating individual performances, and
all of the conversation and photo
opportunities that brings. Mix in the many
scheduled seminars each day, which were
dedicated to the small RC models and
given by a long list of standout presenters.
Factor in the Friday-night kickoff
dinner following a full and busy day on the
field, and then the off-site, Saturday-night
indoor fly at the same time as the on-site,
Saturday-night outdoor fly. (How do you
do that?) Along with that was the all-day,
each day “kid in a candy store” aura of the
vendor line; it was only slightly shorter
than the flightline, which filled the field—
perhaps for 1,000 feet or so.
Now you might better understand why I
ended the first paragraph of this report
with the word “awesome”! But this
naturally brings us to “what next”? It’s the
2004 NEAT Fair, and it’s scheduled for
September 17-19. I’m sure some people
will be unhappy about this; several wanted
a day added to the event, and one wanted it
to be a week-long affair!
You can get more info about the 2003
NEAT Fair at www.neatfair.org. Later you
will be able to preregister for the 2004
NEAT Fair at the same site. I also
encourage you to check out other modeling
magazines and Web sites such as
www.ezonemag.com for additional and
varied NEAT Fair coverage. And I’m told
that by the time you read this, you should
be able to watch much of the 2003 NEAT
Fair on a video by SKS Video Productions.
Check out the www.sksvideo.com site.
See you at the 2004 NEAT Fair. If it will
be a first for you, do go prepared to be
awed. If you’re a NEAT Fair regular, do
go prepared to be awed—again! MA
Bob Kopski
25 West End Dr.
Lansdale PA 19446
Edition: Model Aviation - 2004/03
Page Numbers: 60,61,62,63,64,67
I ATTENDED THE fourth annual Northeast Electric Aircraft
Technology (NEAT) Fair the weekend of September 11-14, 2003, in
Downsville, New York, and so did modelers from most of the nation
(39 states) and some other countries. As in the past, but more so than
ever, it was awesome!
The NEAT Fair is billed as the largest Electrics meet in the US and
is sponsored by the Silent Electric Flyers of Long Island (SEFLI) club.
SEFLI graciously stepped in to continue this East Coast tradition after
the Keystone Radio Control club (KRC) discontinued sponsorship of
its well-known KRC Electric Fly. “The KRC,” as it became known,
was held for 18 consecutive years.
As with any club undertaking, management and member support
are requirements for success. Of course, attendance and participation
are necessary ingredients as well. SEFLI member Tom Hunt, closely
assisted by Bob Aberle, provided the meet’s senior management, and
other SEFLI members aptly supplied the hands-on support. The nearly
300 registered participants rounded out the package.
The result was a wonderful, well-run meet with lots of participant
fun and overall contribution. I have nothing but warmly felt good
impressions and deep gratitude to everyone involved for one more job
extremely well done. Thank you, Tom, Bob, all of SEFLI, and all those
who came to “show and share their stuff” collectively for making this
one terrific Electric showing.
Many in attendance have been long-term regulars at the earlier
KRC affairs and previous NEAT Fairs. The former began in 1980 as
the first club-sponsored Electrics meet in the US with an attendance of
three (yes, three!). Thus this East Coast tradition has grown
approximately 100-fold in less than a quarter century.
Some participants spoke fondly of the earliest days and others had
never heard of KRC; the latter is a sure sign of substantial meet—and
Electric—growth. Based on gate passes, the 2003 NEAT Fair had
roughly 1,300 spectators.
60 MODEL AVIATION
2003 Neat Fair
Three generations of the legendary Shulmans showed up at the Fair (L-R): Don, his son Jason, and his father Leon.
by Bob Kopski
March 2004 61
Fliers enjoyed flyable weather during the three-day meet period.
There were scattered showers, periods of low-lying mist and fog, and
short, gusty times, but not enough of any to stop flying. Weekend
temperatures were comfortable, and overall the weather was our friend.
I have occasionally wondered about the name “NEAT”; I think
the “Technology Fair” was the curious part. However, upon
reflection the obvious became even clearer. That is, as best as I
can recall, in the long history of these meets (I’ve been to all 22) I
don’t think a year has gone by without some demonstrated
improvement in the technology of electric-powered flight. Closely
associated with this—or maybe because of this—is the steady
growth in E-interest and E-accomplishment, culminating in the
2003 NEAT Fair.
I’m sure that opinions and impressions vary among attendees,
but my vote for “most impressive”—if not “most important”—this
A MaxCim 13Y geared, brushless system and 25 CP1700s powers
Greg Covey’s 9-pound Hangar 9 AT-6 Texan ARF conversion.
Robert Frey holds his 1/12-scale Curtiss pusher. The 6-ounce
model uses a MIG 280 and a Kokam 340 3S Li-Poly pack.
Matt Keennon of AeroVironment Inc. shows off his 15-inch-span,
7-gram P-51 rubber power toy conversion.
Jason Shulman flew outstanding demonstrations with his
Rhapsody powered by a geared Hacker brushless motor.
Cindy Malinchak’s Roadkill-series Curtiss Junior pusher features
Microlite covering and three HS-50s.
Photos by the author
Thirteen-year-old Jonathon Ziering holds a prerelease version of
Miss June: a new 3-D kit from AeroLock Models.
A small-model Li-Poly meltdown underscores the need for all of
us to be especially careful with charging and usage.
Keith Shaw’s Park Hawk featured “scale markings” of the redshouldered
hawk that is indigenous to his Midwest home.
Bernard Cawley of E Zone “Controlling Interest” fame with
Switchback Sport featuring retracts, Nippy 1812/10 outrunner.
Leon Enkowitz’s enlarged vintage Rudderbug features an AXI
outrunner motor on 10 3300s turning a 12 x 6 propeller.
This sign of the times—on the driveway leading into the NEAT
Fair—speaks for itself!
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March 2004 63
year was Jason Shulman’s dazzling performance/demonstration
with his Rhapsody glow-kit conversion.
Jason was a member of the US team that won the 2003 F3A (Radio
Control Aerobatics, or Pattern) World Championships in Deblin,
Poland. As I understand it, Jason was the only competitor with an
electric-powered model in that gas-dominated affair. His performance
at the World Championships positioned him in the seventh individual
spot and automatically put electric power in basically as top place as
might be imagined. Jason is a gracious showman, and he happily
shared his talent—and technology—to the thrill and amazement of
everyone at the NEAT Fair.
Raymond Foley gets eight- to 10-minute flights from his 8.5-
pound Sig LT-40 ARF conversion using an Aveox 1415-3Y motor.
Sombra Labs’ new six-channel dual-conversion receiver (R) and
plug-in programmer that tunes it to any RC frequency.
This is one of several containers of tiny RC aircraft at the NEAT
Fair. Many of these are multichannel models!
Art Cangialosi’s 1⁄3-size Cloud Cruiser Old-Timer also flew at KRC
in 1984! Has geared Astro FAI motor on seven CP1300 cells.
Chris Balser converted this 9.5-pound Great Planes Lancair 60
ARF to electric. It uses a geared Hacker B50 12L motor.
Consider what all of this means. It means
that, for all practical purposes, there is no
longer a gap between flying with electric
power and flying any other way. (I’ll
understand if you need to read that again!)
This accomplishment is owed to Jason’s
piloting prowess combined with recent
advancements in electric technology. So what
technology leap made this possible? Two
words: “brushless” and “Lithium-Polymer
(Li-Poly).” Brushless in electric is not exactly
new, but the winning combination of it and
Lithium battery technology at this level is.
Jason’s 10.75-pound Rhapsody was
“motovated” by a Hacker brushless C50 FAI
14XL motor with 6.7:1 gears to an APC 22 x
12E propeller sourced by a Thunder Power
10S3P 6100 mAh pack. That’s a nominal 42-
volt battery supplying roughly 2,400 watts
when needed throughout the 10- to 11-minute
flight, and the result is world-class Pattern
performance. Step aside, wet power, and
allow room for a quiet equal on the
aeromodeling stage!
If there is a downside to this, it’s only that
there’s nothing left to do. It is now shown and
known that electric power can do it all, and, in
effect, the goal has been taken. From here on
it’s only a matter of continuing technical
refinement—some no doubt with
motors/controllers and much more with
batteries.
I forecast that E-power will eventually
pull ahead as the favored aeromodeling
“motovation.” I don’t see this as anyone
“losing” but rather as everyone “gaining”
because I’ve never heard of a field lost
because of quiet.
As best as I could discern, brushless was
the dominant motor at the NEAT event this
year; most fliers seemed to favor brushless
almost no matter the model. There were quite
a few quality brushed motors privately for
sale up and down the flightline—cheap! I
believe that with its associated better
performance and rapidly declining prices,
brushless will soon replace all but a few of the
classic brushed motors in E-flying.
While Jason and several others
demonstrated the largest power systems, Bob
Boucher of AstroFlight showed his newly
designed Firefly coreless motor “hop-up” kit.
Based on the existing AstroFlight motor, this
package is specifically designed to replace
GWS brushed motors in some familiar and
popular GWS gear drives and fans.
The Firefly hop-up kit is said to offer
excellent performance with a dramatic
increase in motor life and flight duration for
these popular “park” applications. AstroFlight
has a tiny proprietary speed controller to go
with the Firefly motor.
Between the mighty Hacker FAI motor
and the Firefly there exists an often-confusing
abundance of brushless motors that fills the
range in between. The result is that you can
fly whatever you’re likely to want to fly
brushless, but you do have to figure out which
manufacturer/product you want. As many
lamented to me, this is not necessarily easy to
do.
In that respect, the industry has
simultaneously done a magnificent job
producing and a terrible job describing this
product. As with any technically intensive
consumer-product category with multiple
sources, it is important for suppliers to
collectively help the user use it easily. A
standardized, concise, meaningful motor label
would go a long way.
In a fashion similar to the motor story, Li-
Poly battery technology at the NEAT Fair
also covered the application range. From the
2,400 watts all the way down to a few
hundred milliwatts, this battery technology
permeated the flightline. Whether for the
Rhapsody or those tiny, subounce handfuls of
guided indoor E-flight models, Li-Poly
offered long flights with generally enhanced
performance. But there is at least one serious
downside to Li-Poly: safety issues.
Li-Poly has exploded onto the Electrics
scene in roughly one year’s time, but Li-Poly
itself can explode—or at least melt down or
burn up, depending on who tells the tale. So
far I’ve heard of this happening in improperly
charged batteries and in charged packs on the
shelf.
One thing is for sure: it’s necessary to use
chargers designed especially for Li-Poly cells.
The flip side to this is that you cannot safely
charge these batteries with a conventional Ni-
Cd/NiMH charger.
There are several chargers on the market
with Li-Poly capability, and NEAT Fair
vendors did brisk business with them. In fact,
AstroFlight introduced a new, high-capability,
well-received Lithium-specific charger at the
NEAT meet.
In my long association with Electrics
(more than three decades), I haven’t seen a
single product or technology with so much
promise and so much safety concern at the
same time as Li-Poly has. At the same time, I
have no reservations about this technology
and product eventually maturing and
becoming safe and commonplace. In the
meantime, be careful!
There was other new technology at the
2003 NEAT Fair. The spirited guys from the
Ottawa-based Sombra Labs—a
communications firm—described their
forthcoming, small, double-conversion,
crystalless six-channel receiver. It is designed
to cover all 50, 72, and 75 MHz US RC
frequencies, and it covers several foreign
frequency assignments—all with the same
receiver with no parts changes, they say.
Tuning (channel selection) in this receiver
is set (programmed) with a removable, lowcost,
“plug-on” accessory module. Imagine
combining this with an existing Hitec
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March 2004 67
Spectra-equipped transmitter! I’m eager to
see it on six meters because existing
receivers are old and bulky. This receiver
is not electric-dedicated; it is applicable
throughout RC.
West Mountain Radio described its
forthcoming Computerized Battery
Analyzer (CBA). The compact, 4-inch,
cube-shaped CBA comes with a USB
(Universal Serial Bus) interface to test and
record, store, and compare battery
performance. It’s designed to do this for
any type of battery, and it requires no
separate external power source or internal
battery to function. This is another goodie
I’m eager to try.
My impression is that the favored Electric
at the 2003 NEAT affair was a “smaller”
aircraft—say, spanning 50 inches and less.
Many (but not all) were park flyer types;
at times there seemed to be a near-ground
cloud of these in the air! It was clear that
some had been “hopped up” with beyondnormal
motors and batteries because of
their 3-D performance.
Speaking of 3-D, several pilots put on a
fine flying show with large and small 3-D
models. Accomplished crowd-pleasing 3-
D expert Gary Wright flew his E3D-XL,
and the presentation was exhilarating to
watch. I also greatly appreciated 13-yearold
Jonathan Ziering with his Razorbrushless-
equipped prototype Miss June 3-
D. Jonathan flew like he’d been doing it
for more years than he is old.
For more senior fliers—those with
slower fingers, “lesser” eyesight, and
scaled-down reaction time (like me!)—3-
D is out of reach, and watching it is about
as close as one can get. Some wondered if
this was really “flying,” and others tried to
quantify at what age one should not bother
to attempt this activity! Everyone seemed
to enjoy, if not envy, the 3-D
performances.
Many attendees flew conversions at the
NEAT event. One that caught my eye was
Horizon Hobby’s popular Ultra Stick 60
wet-power airplane converted to electric
power. I saw three, although there may
have been more. All were brushless
equipped—one with a Hacker motor, one
with a MaxCim system, and one with an
AXI outrunner—and two had Li-Poly and
one had Ni-Cd energy storage. A flight I
witnessed had the Hacker/Li-Poly Stick
going sustained vertical. This spectacle
merely added more glue to that gap that is
now closed.
I also observed that Almost Ready to
Flys (ARFs), if not in majority, were well
represented. These included electric ARFs
and ARF conversions.
Of course, model building is still
represented, but far less so than ever
before. In earlier days when electric power
levels were more meager and power
systems weighed more, building light was
mandatory. But, again, years of
technology growth have made this less
necessary, and the meet left no doubt
about this. (Overall, lighter still flies
better!)
One unique and memorable spectacle was
a spontaneously organized ornithopter
mass launch. Unfortunately my camera
was unable to capture all of the widespread
(spread-wide?) flapping; it was
everywhere! How about a scheduled Ebirdie
All-Up/Last Down or maybe a
“birdfight” next year? Or how about a
“scale-bird” challenge?
There were eye-catching airplanes and
performances by high-profile E-fliers, but
many participants seemed happy to show
and fly their more ordinary Electrics. This
largely explains the busy flight stations all
day, every day.
Many I spoke to were not only firsttimers
at the NEAT Fair but were firsttimers
in Electrics. Some had recently
started in the hobby. This compares
favorably with a certain wee-powered,
one-circle-of-sink E-beginning I know
of—31 years ago!
Despite all of the happy awe, there is
paradoxically one sad aspect of the NEAT
Fair for me: the anguish associated with
too much to see and do and too little time
to see and do it. Despite being on-site
more than three days, I was unable to
savor all that was there; I know I missed a
great deal. And despite taking three
airplanes—one newly constructed
specifically for the meet—I got none out
of the car because of so much else to do.
Add everyday, day-long continuous
flying at a dozen flight stations, much
conversation and many photo
opportunities, the noon shows with a dozen
captivating individual performances, and
all of the conversation and photo
opportunities that brings. Mix in the many
scheduled seminars each day, which were
dedicated to the small RC models and
given by a long list of standout presenters.
Factor in the Friday-night kickoff
dinner following a full and busy day on the
field, and then the off-site, Saturday-night
indoor fly at the same time as the on-site,
Saturday-night outdoor fly. (How do you
do that?) Along with that was the all-day,
each day “kid in a candy store” aura of the
vendor line; it was only slightly shorter
than the flightline, which filled the field—
perhaps for 1,000 feet or so.
Now you might better understand why I
ended the first paragraph of this report
with the word “awesome”! But this
naturally brings us to “what next”? It’s the
2004 NEAT Fair, and it’s scheduled for
September 17-19. I’m sure some people
will be unhappy about this; several wanted
a day added to the event, and one wanted it
to be a week-long affair!
You can get more info about the 2003
NEAT Fair at www.neatfair.org. Later you
will be able to preregister for the 2004
NEAT Fair at the same site. I also
encourage you to check out other modeling
magazines and Web sites such as
www.ezonemag.com for additional and
varied NEAT Fair coverage. And I’m told
that by the time you read this, you should
be able to watch much of the 2003 NEAT
Fair on a video by SKS Video Productions.
Check out the www.sksvideo.com site.
See you at the 2004 NEAT Fair. If it will
be a first for you, do go prepared to be
awed. If you’re a NEAT Fair regular, do
go prepared to be awed—again! MA
Bob Kopski
25 West End Dr.
Lansdale PA 19446
