Control Line: Navy Carrier-Scale
THE CL SCALE event was, as usual, one of the big crowd pleasers at the NATS, drawing a large number of spectators on Thursday afternoon. The Scale judging cage drew on-lookers throughout the week and helped generate interest in the flying end of the competition. There were a total of 12 aircraft submitted for static judging: three in Junior, four in Senior, and five in the Open age category. Most of the names were familiar, many of the modelers having competed in previous NATS. Last year's winner, Ernie Violett, brought out his beautiful DeHavilland Comet 88 once again. The three members of the 1974 CL Scale team (Mike Gretz, Bill Harney, and Mike Stott) were also there, with Ralph Burnstine filling out the ranks and making the fifth Open contestant.
Control Line: Navy Carrier
THE NATS is behind us for another year, the flying season in the northern states is drawing to a close, and it is time to start thinking about building new ships for next year. Before you start, however, take time to ensure that your engines will be ready to go next spring when you are. With castor oil rather expensive and mixing rather poorly with larger amounts of nitromethane, many commercial fuels use synthetic oil. While the synthetics do quite well at their assigned job, lubrication, some of them are very poor at a second function which we all expect from oil-rust prevention. Many of the synthetics lose any rust-preventive qualities they might have had when exposed to the air for a week or two. To be safe, put a good rust-inhibiting oil in your engines before wrapping them up for the winter.
Control Line: Navy Carrier
I DID NOT make it to the Canadian Nationals because of my job and my trip to the U.S. NATS, but Harry Higley did attend and sent along the following report of the Navy Carrier activities there: "For reasons of geography, this year's Canadian Nats provided a serious, intense, yet enjoyable competition for those Navy Carrier fliers who could attend. The part of the U.S. with the most interest in Carrier is much closer to London, Ont., the site of the Canadian Nats, than it is to Lake Charles, where the U.S. Nats was held. Hence, for many of our fliers, Canada was within reach while the U.S. Nats was a bit too far, though we all would like to have been present at the Louisiana gathering.
Control Line: Navy Carrier
BACK IN THE October issue, I mentioned the utility and simplicity of suction fuel systems. This month I will discuss pressure systems and related speed control methods. The primary advantage that most modelers think of when they consider pressure fuel systems is that pressure means more power. This is true because a pressure fuel system allows the use of a larger air intake on the engine. The power increase possible with a pressure system is, however, small when compared to a large suction type of intake, and intake area is just a small part of total engine performance. An additional advantage of pressure fuel systems for Carrier models is that they are insensitive to acceleration forces and aircraft attitude. Fuel tank placement is not critical, and this can be important in the rather cramped fuselages of some scale Carrier ships.
Control Line: Navy Carrier
I'VE BEEN receiving quite a few letters and phone calls about the new scoring system for Navy Carrier. Some were questions on how the points would be computed; others were comments on the scoring system, itself. One modeler was concerned that Carrier would not survive until the scoring could be changed back to the old system in two years. Many others are happy to see some reduction in the emphasis on high speed in Carrier. One pattern that emerged from the letters is that more people are going to be flying Carrier next year. The big reason for this seems to be a general feeling that since the new rules have reduced the emphasis on high speed, Carrier modelers can now compete effectively without going bankrupt buying super-hot engines.
