Radio Control: Helicopters
THE FIRST ANNUAL West Coast Radio Control Helicopter Fly-In was held on October 22-23, in Merced, CA. This was one of the best chopper get-togethers I've ever attended. On Saturday, an open fun-fly was scheduled, and on Sunday the manufacturers and their representatives took to the air to demonstrate their individual machines. I know there are various ways to judge the success of an event, but any way you look at this Fly-In, it was a winner. Chuck Winter acted as CD and had members of the Merced County Radio Control Club on hand to keep everything running smoothly. There have been no large Helicopter contests in California for several years. The WCRCHFI could be the start of a great annual regional contest and, of course, fun-fly.
Radio Control: Helicopters
LET'S TALK about Star-Ranger, the new kid on the block. If you have never read foreign publications or have little interest in RC Helicopters on the international front you may not have heard of the machine called Star-Ranger or its creator, Ewald Heim. I remember the first time I heard mention of this dynamic duo, back in 1978. I was in Dave Nieman's shop outside London and happened to see the name Star-Ranger in an English model magazine. A fellow in the shop informed me that the Star-Ranger was a specially-modified Kavan Jet Ranger and that its builder, Heim, was a talented German flier. As time passed, I read more passages referring to Heim and his machine, usually in the results section of European contests.
Radio Control: Helicopters
SURPRISE! Part of the fun of being a monthly columnist is reading each new issue of Model Aviation and discovering the various mistakes that show up in your column! You must understand that when you get your copy of the magazine, nearly three months have passed since the initial writing of the material. (Sometimes I have trouble remembering what happened last week, let along three months ago!) Anyway, in my column on safety, the first line reads something like: "Never use locknuts that have nylon seals." What I thought I wrote was: "Always use Locktite on nuts that don't have nylon seals."
Radio Control: Helicopters
SUPERIOR. When someone markets a product and gives it that kind of name, you know that they must be pretty sure of themselves-and their product. Thinking about it, this really isn't too much of a boast from someone like Dieter Schluter, who first gave us Radio Control Helicopters and then went on to produce such classic machines as the Helibaby and Heliboy. The Superior is Dieter's latest design and may end up being his masterpiece. If you were to just scratch the surface, you would see that it is a highly-refined, competition aerobatic Radio Controlled Helicopter.
10th Electric Championships
WITH ALL THE articles and magazine coverage electric-powered flight has received recently, one would assume that it is something new. Only just recently has the average sport flier discovered the benefits of electric power, but for close to 11 years there have been dedicated modelers in Southern California experimenting and perfecting the various applications of electric motors for flight. February 4 and 5, 1984 marked the tenth anniversary of the Electric Championships. Not only has this Electric competition run consecutively for 10 years, no small achievement in itself, but it has grown to the point of being the premier gathering for Electric enthusiasts.
