150 MODEL AVIATION
Proclamation by mayor Lionel Rivera
declaring Colorado Springs, Colorado,
“Indoor Free Flight Town USA.”
2007 season openers in Colorado and Ohio
Free Flight Indoor John Kagan
[[email protected]]
Also included in this column:
• Update on record-setting
three-views
• Electric-powered Indoor FF
Bill Gowen with his site record-setting
Glider fliers at the Magnificent Mountain Men’s Pikes Peak Ceiling Climb. Standard and Unlimited Catapult Gliders.
A great view of the Colorado Springs flying site.
THE 2007 INDOOR FF season is
underway, and I’ve been fortunate enough
to participate in season-opener competitions
in Colorado and Ohio. First up was the
Pikes Peak Ceiling Climb run by the
renowned Magnificent Mountain Men
(MMM) FF club in Colorado.
These guys sure know how to put on a
show. This year, in addition to their
regularly scheduled competition, they added
an F1D Team Selection Regional, National
Cup events, a new Colorado Cup grand
champion trophy, and even expanded the
schedule to two days.
You may have seen me refer to Colorado
Springs as “Indoor Free Flight Town USA.”
Public relations master Don DeLoach
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July 2007 151
Rob Romash, left, and Jim Buxton show off their national record-setting Hand-
Launched Gliders, with the Kent State Field House in Ohio in the background.
A detail shot of Ray’s adjustable-pitch
propeller hub. Harlan photo.
John Krouse’s fun-fly Indoor electric-
Ray Harlan’s National Champion electric-powered Indoor FF model. Harlan photo. powered FF airplane.
coined this moniker based on the growing
concentration of top Indoorists and great
flying sites. It’s a bit of lighthearted conceit
that is perfect for rewarding the efforts of
local participants and leaders and catching
the attention of outsiders.
In case you thought it might be just fluff,
look at the accompanying proclamation
signed by Colorado Springs Mayor Lionel
Rivera, thanks to the efforts of MMM
member Jerry Murphy. How cool is that?
This goes to show how positively people
perceive our activity and how much can be
done with a bit of work. This piece of public
relations magic has generated a healthy
amount of media coverage and resulted in
more than a few new visitors to the contest.
Great work, guys!
This elevated status carried over to the
flying, resulting in no less than six site
records set—not including the multiple
times each mark was surpassed during the
course of the day. The competition was
friendly but tough, with many challenges
called out and met.
The F1D regional featured three local
fliers and two imports. The top three
qualified for the finals, and each broke the
site record by a significant margin.
Some organizer advisors worried that the
site was not tall or significant enough to
warrant a regional contest. With 37 feet of
ceiling height and more than 6,000 feet of
altitude, it is unlikely that any national
records will be set here.
However, the challenges of flying in
Colorado Springs are formidable and unique
enough to provide a great learning
opportunity. Much F1D success involves
quickly adapting to given conditions, and
this site is a good test. This is exactly the
type of flying I’ve neglected in recent years,
and I thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to
tune up some skills.
Bill Gowen flew out from Atlanta,
Georgia, to challenge the locals in a variety
of events, with an emphasis on nonpowered
flight. He took two of the three Glider
events, winning by a margin of more than
six seconds in Standard Catapult Glider and
an amazing 13 seconds in Unlimited
Catapult Glider (both site records).
Bill also won A6, took second in Hand-
Launched Glider (HLG), and finished third
in Limited Pennyplane and F1L, making
him the apparent hands-down winner of the
new Colorado Cup grand champion trophy.
But hold the presses! Local flier Rob
Romash wasn’t about to let that happen on
his home turf. After a review of all the
events, it turns out that Bill and Rob tied for
first place. With no method of tie-breaking
defined yet, the inaugural Colorado Cup
will have two names on the first plate.
Rob also set a site record in F1L with a
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two-flight total of 22:28, topping secondplace
finisher Tom Sova by 24 seconds. As
the contest was winding down, Rob ribbed
Tom (who was trailing in MiniStick too)
by saying “Hey, are you going to beat me
in anything?”
That was not a good move, as it turns
out. Tom promptly put up a flight that
topped Rob’s MiniStick contest time and
beat his site record by one second! Nice
comeback, Tom. The last site record went
to Bill Leppard in Intermediate Stick,
flying uncontested in the meet, with a time
of 16:52.
This was a great event in a beautiful
town. The contest is turning into a real
battlefield, with solid support from the
local organizers. Try it next year!
The annual contest at the Kent State
Field House in Ohio was held the
following weekend. Boy, what a difference
6,000 feet of altitude and 13 feet of ceiling
height makes. National records fell like
dominoes; no less than seven records were
set!
By popular demand this year’s session
was extended until 8 p.m., giving
participants (especially those traveling
from afar) a full 12 hours of flying time in
one of the premier Category II sites in the
area.
Local Indoor specialist Don Slusarczyk
joined forces with previous CD Michael
Zand to run a great contest/record trials,
generously forfeiting a significant amount
of his flying time to keep things running
smoothly. Don’s new Cabin model looked
certain to set a record until a freak torque
meter failure crushed the fuselage. The rest
of the airplane survived and will surely
return next year.
The Glider events took the traditional
morning spot, and an epic battle between
HLG stars Jim Buxton and Rob Romash
quickly developed. Jim set the national
record at this site last year with two flights
of approximately 51 seconds. (HLG uses a
two-flight total.)
Jim’s model was a fairly significant
departure from previous Category II
designs. It was a nonflapper with a high
aspect ratio and a large span. Rob
campaigned a similar version this year and
soon upped the bar with a matching pair of
57.0s (quite a jump!), earning him a
national record—for roughly an hour.
Jim responded with his own matching
pair of 57.8s, just squeaking past for a new
record. He wrote:
“This was quite a battle. Rob is
probably too tough to admit it, but I am in
a fair amount of pain still. It was the most
intense day of HLG I have been involved
in in 20 years.
“When you throw a pair of identical
times as your best, it is a pretty good
indication that you are getting everything
you can out of a Glider, and it doesn’t
occur often. To see it happen to two fliers
on the same day is really rare. To see two
fliers so far over the existing record, and
so close to each other in time, is once in a
lifetime perhaps.”
Rob set another record in MiniStick with
11:04, and that one held. He had hoped to
best Stan Chilton’s previous mark of 11:00
by a more significant margin but ran out of
time. There was plenty of rafter banging,
and you can only get so lucky with these
tiny models. Many flights resulted in hangups.
Previous Junior F1D team member Nick
Ray also set a MiniStick record—in the
Senior category—with 8:58.
Jim Richmond took ceiling scrubbing to
an extreme in Limited Pennyplane, making
first contact in less than a minute and
bouncing around for a good part of his
12:53 flight. Bill Gowen used a different
approach with a much bigger motor and
slower climb. He almost topped the
previous 12:28 mark too but came up just
eight seconds shy.
Jim took a safer no-touch approach in
EZB with his ridiculously light .3-gram
model, launching just three minutes before
the end of the contest and landing 23
minutes and 19 seconds later. He topped the
previous record by more than two minutes.
I followed Jim’s lead and set a record in
F1D doing 28:49, also without touching the
ceiling. I had 300 turns left, and the time is
still nowhere near the 33:42 world record
Hungarian Dezso Orsovai set, so there is
plenty left to work on for next year.
The Kent contest keeps getting better.
Come join us next year for some of the best
Category II flying around!
Record Three-Views: There has been an
ongoing project for several years to make
the three-view drawings submitted with
Indoor FF record applications readily
available to those who are interested. Early
efforts revealed a copyright liability that
needed to be cleaned up, and AMA lawyers
were rousted to produce the appropriate
verbiage.
It has taken awhile, but I’m happy to
report that the latest record applications
now include a release page for those
applicants who are inclined to share their
designs. It will probably take a bit more
time to get Web site access set up, but you
should at least be able to call or mail in
drawing requests once again.
If you would like to see what the seven
Kent record-setting designs look like,
contact the AMA Competitions Department
and request your copy. These beautiful
drawings (well, most of them anyway) are
perfect for framing in the workshop or, it is
hoped, providing the basis for your own
record-setting model. Your interest will
help justify future efforts to make this
information easier to access.
Electric Indoor FF: Reader John Kruse
sent me the following and a picture of his
new fun-fly model.
“Thought you might be interested in my
latest FF indoor model—it’s electric
powered.
“The somewhat unique wing is
fabricated from a single piece of carbonfiber
rod, secured at the central crossover
point with cyanoacrylate glue and covered
with grocery store Reynolds Wrap.
“A pair of 1/16 inch square balsa ribs at
midspan create an airfoil (for lift), and a
piece of thread stretched between the tips
provides dihedral (for stability). The foam
tail surfaces are attached to a tubular
fuselage.
“Thrust comes from a 6mm diameter
pager motor, coupled to a 9:1 reduction
gear, turning a 6-inch-diameter carbon-fiber
prop. Flight duration/maximum altitude are
controlled by a manually adjustable
(prelaunch) electronic timer, connected to a
rechargeable Lithium-Polymer battery.
“I tried to use a fairly large diameter,
slowly rotating propeller to capture the look
of a typical Indoor rubber-powered model.
Better yet, it even flies like one!”
Looks great, John!
I’m intrigued by the amazing
advancements in electric-powered flight,
but I don’t have much personal experience
with it so I asked multitime national record
holder Ray Harlan to share some of his
knowledge with the competition end of
these new electric models. He said:
“Getting started in electric Free Flight is
challenging and fun. These models are very
different from rubber-powered models
because of the way the batteries behave.
“There is no very strong peak that can
be used to control altitude, as with rubber.
Instead, the only practical control is to
adjust prop pitch until the model just barely
climbs on a full charge. Very small changes
in pitch can have dramatic effects on climb,
so a good pitch gauge is a must.
“There are no commercial adjustablepitch
props, so you are on your own to
build one. The photo shows mine, which
consists of a plastic hub and tiny 00-90
brass screws attached to the prop spars
(.030 carbon-fiber rods).
“They thread into the hub and are
locked in place with nuts. The blades are
carbon fiber, molded over a form then cut
to shape. Balsa also could be used, but
some reinforcing with tissue covering is
recommended.
“The motor of choice seems to be the
Mabuchi M20 (low voltage), sold as the
KP-00 by several vendors. It can be
purchased alone or with a small gearbox of
2.67:1 ratio. A larger ratio is better. Bob
Selman [www.bsdmicrorc.com] sells a
4.2:1. An even higher ratio is desirable, but
you will have to build your own.
“A shaft support can be epoxied to the top
of the motor, and gears are available from
Selman and others [www.homefly.com,
www.smarttoolsinc.com]. Smart Tools has
nine- and 81-tooth gears that will provide a
9:1 ratio. Careful construction is required to
get accurate shaft spacing.
“There is another curious difference
from Rubber models. If your model
doesn’t climb, the prop pitch must be
increased to make the motor work harder,
not decreased to make the prop spin
faster. Tweak the pitch up a little at a time
until the model climbs a little. Be careful,
though, because it could be through the
roof in 10 minutes.
“The two 50 mAh cells allowed can be
run in series or parallel. If your model is
on the heavy side, use series; otherwise
parallel should give longer flight times.
“The model is standard Indoor
construction but has plenty of boron on
the spars and struts. If it crashes, it’s
going to break. Be prepared for numerous
repairs.
“The model should have a wing area
between 200 and 300 square inches. Mine
has the motor behind the wing to make
steering easier. The model will pivot on a
wingtip if the balloon string catches it.
These models fly a bit faster than
Pennyplanes, so steering is tricky.
“While it sounds as though this is a
highly technical event, getting started
isn’t that difficult. Don’t worry too much
about building the lightest model (20-35
grams should be okay) or a perfect
gearbox. Do pay attention to the prop,
however. Then give it a try.”
That’s it for this issue. I hope to see
some of you at the next big meet. T