Radio Control: Slope Soaring
THIS MONTH I am going to dedicate my entire column to an interview with Joe Wurts. Even if you are not a slope racing fan, I think you'll find some interesting ideas that just may be pertinent to your style of flying. Then stay tuned for my next column when I will return to scale, aerobatics, funflying, and a whole lot more. Now put in some ballast, and let's go fast.
Radio Control: Slope Soaring
TURNIN' AND BURNIN': That's what slope racing is all about; tumin' hard and fast, and then burnin' down the straights to the next pylon. It is what many consider the pinnacle of RC soaring; models often travel well in excess of 100 mph during their commencement dive for the start/finish gate. Also, these sleek race models will fly wing tip to wing tip while averaging better than 70 mph for the duration of a race. In addition, what other form of modeling tasks the race models with penetrating into winds that exceed 40 mph while carrying five pounds of lead in their wings? None; there is simply nothing like Unlimited Slope Racing in all of model aviation! Only the best soaring pilots participate, and only the best come out winners; the rest just go real fast and love every minute of it! Now news comes our way that the 1993 slope soaring season is promising racers some big-time racing from clubs like the California Slope Racers and the new Pro-Am Slope Racers Unlimited. These clubs are hosting major events. The California Slope Racers is promising racers the International Slope Races.
Radio Control: Slope Soaring
RC MODELING is unquestionably an international hobby/sport. One could liken it to math, the internationally understood language. So too is RC soaring, with participants celebrating its greatness all around the world. This month we will begin by sharing some pictures with you from just such an international modeler. He is Mr. John Jelinek, an RC soaring enthusiast who is currently stationed in Germany.
Radio Control: Slope Soaring
GET READY: The Tri-City Soarers' International Scale Soaring Fun-Fly is certainly not the 25th Olympiad of RC soaring. In fact, it is not even a competition! It is, however, the largest and the most enthusiastically attended RC scale soaring event in the U.S. today. This history of this biennial event is short-dating back only to 1988. That year scale soaring took a monumental step in the U.S. It was the first chance for U.S. soaring enthusiasts to be part of a new, organized movement.
Radio Control: Slope Soaring
GOOD building aids are worth their weight in cyanoacrylate. So when I received a CAD drawing of just such an aid, I knew Model Aviation readers would like to know about it. The building aid is a fuselage jig. It is the creation of my good friend Mr. Mike Mellor of Eugene, Oregon. Mike's jig provides a platform for holding a fuselage. What's more important, the jig offers a mechanism to accurately reference and attach parts to the fuselage while it is being supported. This jig is a simple but very effective tool for establishing proper decalage between the wing and elevator. It also provides a super way to accurately measure stations along the fuselage. And it is a tool that helps hold the fuselage while other operations are being performed on it.
