Radio Control: Soaring
AERIAL PHOTOGRAPHY From Sailplanes: Sailplanes with wing spans of 100 inches or more can easily carry a camera payload. With no engine vibration to spoil sharpness or burned fuel residue to foul a camera lens, they are superior in some ways to engine-powered RC airplanes as an airborne camera platform. Big sailplanes can be flown slowly and smoothly, contributing to camera steadiness needed to produce aerial photographs with crisp detail. On Nostalgia day at the 1996 Nats I flew a camera-carrying Pierce Aero Paragon and recorded some of the event from altitude. Since then, several people have asked how to set up a sailplane for aerial photography work, and I'm happy to explain it - it's fun to fly with a mission in mind. The Camera Airplane: I've flown the Paragon for about five years. It's a 120-inch-span two-channel (rudder and elevator) polyhedral floater. It makes an excellent training sailplane, because it offers forgiving flight characteristics. It generates plenty of lift to easily carry the camera gear.
Radio Control: Soaring
YOUNG SAILPLANE FLIERS I've met at the Nationals show remarkable intensity in their pursuit of the hobby. This column presents interviews with three youthful soaring pilots, and describes one young flier's early experiences with sailplanes. Thomas Akers (Thousand Oaks, California): He was eleven when he started flying, was 12 when he flew in his first contest, and is now 18. In recent months he has flown and worked with the US F3B Team. He presently flies an Obechi Blackhawk, a Two-Meter Super-V, and his own-design HLG called the Havoc.
Radio Control: Soaring
F3J HAND TOW SOARING can be thought of as a British Import. I first saw F3J at the 1984 World Soaring Jamboree in Pasco, Washington and there were as many teams from England and Canada as from the US. F3J is an international event, often flown in the United Kingdom and Europe, and it is now gradually entering the American soaring scene. Rich Burnowski pointed out that handtowing is not entirely new, noting that in 1978 and before, F3B (multitask) launched by hand-tow instead of winches. Terry Edmonds mentioned that "hand-towing" is not an entirely accurate nickname for the event, which is more properly called "Thermal Duration Gliders" as in the FAI rules. It's an interesting and promising event, and deserves a more descriptive name.
Radio Control: Soaring
FEAR REDUCTION FOAM has come to thermal soaring. Two big scary impediments new soaring pilots face are fear of breaking the airplane, and its twin: fear of long hours at the bench repairing the model. I'm happy to report that a new construction material has come on the scene that will move fast and far to tame these fears. It will do more to help new pilots learn to fly than anything else I've seen in ten years of RC soaring. It's not often that we have a true breakthrough in model materials and design, but we've got one here: expanded polypropylene (EPP) foam. EPP looks a lot like white closed-cell StyrofoamTM, and it weighs about the same - but that's where the resemblance ends.
Radio Control: Soaring
THE JOY of Simple Sailplanes: Ten years ago, my young son and I built and flew a pair of House of Balsa 2 × 4 sailplanes. When I ordered a second pair of kits (Carl Goldberg Gentle Ladys), the X-Generation soaring pilot asked what I was so excited about: "Because taking a pile of balsa and a roll of covering and building a motorless flying machine that defies gravity seems like magic to me." Lou replied simply, "Oh." I concluded at the time that people born after man walked on the Moon are harder to impress with technology than those born before that time.
