Went out to Hampshire, SOAR's North field and by the time I got there
McCarthy had already declared it an electric day. He was flying an
electric Organic, maybe the 2.5m version and was having fun in the wind,
and playing out the treeline. TK had his electric Escape out, this thing
is impressive. I don't know all the stats on it, but it has some huge
brushless motor that pulls this 104oz molded hot rod into the sky with
ease. TK was doing some nice high speed screaming passes with ship and
pull out an hit the motor and away she goes! He had about a 45 min flight
I saw and still had motor left. Charley was out bungee launching his
Artemis, it was a bit too windy to fly the Blade CP electric heli, so I
built my favorite ICON light and joined Charley out at the bungee.
The air was very active today, and windy. If it was a contest day I
probably wouldn't like it much, (or maybe I would), but I was ripping
consistently bad launchs off the bungee and running back to a tree line and
working it. TK decided he wanted to fly big red, his red ICON and brought
out the winch. We didn't lay out a lot of line, there was a stiff wind and
we didn't need much. I ripped off a 534' launch with a nice ZOOM on the
first try and went back to play in the violent air. The thermals that were
passing through were travelling fast, and were very strong. Most of the
time TK and I were thermaling at almost an 80 degree bank angle, the model
almost turning on itself, just to keep the model cutting around the core
with speed. Bill Christian put his Tragi up for a flight, but eventually
TK and I were left to this field by our selves. We flew one last flight
and it must have been over 40 mins, just working this fast moving air that
was bouncing all over the Hampshire tree lines. At one point I heard TK's
picolario say he was over 1900', and he got that high very quickly. I
think he would have gone higher but it was going downwind too
fast. Eventually we both had to land, not for the lack of air but we both
had to be on our way. Most guys wouldn't fly in wind like we did today,
but wind with strong active thermals can be a lot of fun, you really have
to keep your model moving around the sky to capitalize on everything that
is happening.
I got home, had a bbq with Rae, and the wind had settled down to a calm. I
finished the day of flying by draining two 1320 LiPO's in my Blade CP
helicopter in the front yard. Too much fun!
I hope you guys got some flying in with your friends today.
Jim
Downers Grove, IL
Member of the Chicago SOAR club, and Team JR
AMA 592537 LSF 7560 Level IV R/C Soaring blog at www.jimbacus.net
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