Flying Site Assistance
- Joe Beshar
Coordinator, Eastern Region, Districts I - VI 198 Merritt Dr. Oradell, NJ 07649 Tel.: (201) 261-1281 Fax: (201) 261-0223 E-mail: [email protected]
- Wes De Cou
Coordinator, Western Region, Districts VII - XI Voice: (480) 460-9466 Cell: (480) 296-9515 Fax: (480) 460-9434 202 W. Desert Flower Ln. Phoenix, AZ 85045 E-mail: [email protected]
Finding—Preserving—Maintaining
LEON'S SPIDER
Leon Shulman gave me an interesting accessory that I have found useful at the flying site and would like to share. It is an electrical adapter supplied completely assembled with high-quality banana plugs, molded leads, and an insulated junction sleeve to allow charging from virtually any battery plug.
The adapter comes with banana-type plugs for your charger output leads and includes plugs for Futaba, Airtronics, and Hitec transmitters and receivers, three spare leads, and a JST female lead. The list price is $24.95, but it is available at a special introductory price of $19.95 from Taisun.com, 1140 Citrus Oaks Run, Winter Springs, FL 32708; (800) 983-7050 or (407) 359-1020.
Fly Before You Buy
A recently opened hobby shop, Lighthouse Hobbies in Lockport, New York, offers a hands-on promotion program called "Fly Before You Buy" that is working extremely well to bring new members into two local clubs: the Lake Ontario RC Flyers and the Niagara County RC Flying Club (Balsa Busters). "Fly Before You Buy" is posted clearly at the shop; anyone who wants RC experience simply shows up at the field where the shop provides trainers and instruction.
One of the Balsa Busters' members is the father of Lockport's newest mayor, Mike Tucker. The mayor joined his father and learned to fly this season through the program, which helped create political connections in the area. Several city officials were contacted and were able to fly with the store trainers, learning how educational and important the hobby and sport really are.
Members of the local radio station, WLVL 1340 AM, agreed to come out and learn how to fly RC aircraft. Last year, 20 students from Medaille College came to fly the trainers; college officials liked it so much they agreed to bring more students this year.
Joe Bartholomew, owner and operator of Lighthouse Hobbies, states, "as long as we have the community on our side, we won't have to worry about losing our flying site."
Don Ross, an FSA volunteer, has long advocated developing model programs for veterans in government retirement institutions. Using indoor flying and the dramatic growth of micro modeling, Don demonstrated how such programs can be done and how well they are received and enjoyed.
A Win-Win Club Project
The second annual Teaneck Armory Wheelchair-Bound Veterans' Fly-in was a huge success. On October 15, the Metropolitan Sport Squadron hosted 16 wheelchair-bound veterans from the Paramus Veterans' Home. Our visitors enjoyed coffee and cake while watching demonstrations of Easy Bs, Peanut Scale, Indoor Scale, and electric RC.
The veterans were fascinated by the micro RC models taking off from a card table and usually landing right back there. The very light indoor models seemed to stay up forever and generated a lot of questions and interest. We assured our visitors they would be able to build and fly their own models.
The club originally received permission to fly in the armory from Tom White, who rents the space for his soccer league. He generously allowed us to fly on Wednesday mornings when the league was not playing.
Last year, Major Tom Pitersky helped organize the first annual fly-in. He put us in touch with Janet Dillon, who supervises armory rental and use. With the Major's help, we worked with Ms. Petrelli at the Paramus Veterans' Home to set up the event. Captain Mellen, who now runs the armory battalion, along with Charles Parsons, the Chief Armorer, provided logistic support and enthusiastic supervision.
During last year's fly-in we found that this kind of community service carries big rewards. Many of our members are veterans, and the pleasure we all found in showing our visitors a unique kind of good time gave us a glow that lasted all year. Some visitors had even flown in the ships that our scale models portrayed.
After coffee, we ran a half-hour building program using the Canarsie Canary, a model designed for events like this. The Canary is all sheet balsa, has only six glue joints, and sports an adjustable-wing pylon so balance and incidence can be changed along with rudder and left-aileron tabs to control turn.
The Canary was chosen as one of the Ten Best Models of 2003 by the National Free Flight Society and performs well in the hands of any beginner. Plans for the Canary appeared in the August 2001 issue of Model Aviation and are available from the AMA.
The other half of the win-win proposition is that we now have a fine flying site where we are treated as equal participants in the armory's community service program. I believe the same arrangement can be worked out with any indoor club that has access to an armory. Scout a local armory or other potential site.
Instead of wandering in and asking if you can fly there, prepare a presentation for the person in charge. You might bring a copy of this article (and another soon to be published in the National Guard newspaper), an Alan Abriss Silent Magic video that shows the Canary being built and flown by a group of youngsters, a sample AMA insurance certificate, and maybe a Minnow, Canary, or Butterfly model.
Offer the program as a community service idea and follow up with letters showing more pictures of indoor flying. Our club is trying to get some sort of national notice that can be shown to any armory commander. We will report on our progress in later months.
In the meantime, please send notes on any progress you make in getting flying sites, perhaps using some of the above information, so I can spread the word to other clubs. It's possible that some armories or other military installations have large outdoor areas they use for drilling; this could result in multiuse sites for all types of flying.
Silent Magic is available from Alan Abriss, 94-20 66 Ave., Forest Hills, NY 11374; E-mail: [email protected].
THE HEARTBEAT OF MODEL AVIATION
Recognizing the critical need to preserve and find flying sites, congratulations to the AMA members who have taken the initiative to register and join in addressing this important objective. These volunteers are the heartbeat of model aviation.
They form a network of people who serve as AMA's eyes and ears by being aware of activities in their area that could negatively impact existing flying sites. They recognize locations that have potential for future flying sites, and they advise the clubs and members in their area.
We invite and welcome all AMA members to get on board and join the team. Please contact one of the Flying Site Assistance Coordinators for registration details.
Transcribed from original scans by AI. Minor OCR errors may remain.
