Volume 7 Issue 2 Pages 6 AMA #530 District 11 www.eugenerc.com February 2011 Club Mailing Address: Eugene R/C Aeronauts, PO Box 26344, Eugene, OR. 97402 ERCA News and Information Next CLUB Meeting - February 22, 2011, 7:00 pm at Roaring Rapids Pizza Parlor in Glenwood. If you have a building project, bring it with you for "Show and Tell". At the January Meeting - There were 21 members in attendance. Discussion was held on fund raising, raffles and 50/50 Pot, Club Meeting speakers. Discussion held on raffling a $500 gift certificate. Fun Fly Dates were approved: Big Bird July 16th, Fun Fly August 13th, and labor Day Fly September 5th. DUES are DUE - Please have your current AMA card and your 2011 Dues payment for the treasurer at or before the Pizza meeting. Renewals must be completed by March 31st to keep from being dropped off the active club roster. There will be a 50/50 pot at the meeting. You can buy a ticket for $1.00 and at the end of the meeting the winner will get half of the pot and the club will get the other half. The raffle for a $500 gift certificate may start at the meeting as well. The March meeting will have a guest speaker. If you do not like the weather outside, see the indoor flying section. Pylon Racing will add an electric event. If enough pilots show interest, it could become a regular part of the Pylon season. Meeting minutes are ONLINE at: http://eugenerc.com/meetings.html 2011 Meeting Dates Meeting dates EWEB came up with that were available and closest to our requested dates: TUES, JAN 4 - EWEB TUES, FEB 22 - Pizza meeting WED, MAR 23 - EWEB WED, APR 20 - EWEB TUES, MAY 17 - EWEB - 3rd Tues TUES, JUN 28 - Field - 4th Tues TUES, JUL 26 - Field - 4th Tues TUES, AUG 23 - Field - 4th Tues WED, SEP 21 - EWEB WED, OCT 26 - EWEB WED, NOV 23 - EWEB DEC - No meeting Presidents Corner I made it; I have been out to the field twice in the last three weeks. On one Saturday the temp was in the 50's and there was no wind at all, it was a great day to fly. I'm getting back into my Heli's but still having tons of fun with my new fixed wing toys. Rod Madison gave me an old Hanger 9 Cherokee. I put a O.S. 46AX in it and some JR servos and had it up flying two weeks ago, thanks Rod Remember the February meeting is at Roaring Rapids Pizza and there will be a 50/50 pot at the meeting. You can buy a ticket for $1.00 and at the end of the meeting the winner will get half of the pot and the club will get the other half. So bring money and join in on the fun while helping the club. Also if anyone wants to help out with the cost of food, you can buy a pizza as a donation. I will be buying one large pizza for the meeting. Let Al know if you plan on buying a pizza for the meeting. If you have topics that you would like to talk about at the Feb. meeting, than email or call and I will put them on the agenda. One item already on the agenda will be a talk about RULES and making sure that all members under stand them, the same. The March meeting will have a guest speaker to talk about all things ELECTRIC so if you have questions get them ready. Jim Corbett has built an addition to the Freq. pin board with more 2.4 GHz pins. As stated in last months newsletter all 2.4 GHz users need to have a pin with your AMA or club card in the board. This is for AMA insurance reason so no exceptions. We will be selling raffle tickets for a $500.00 gift certificate to Trump's Hobby in Corvallis. Tickets will be $5.00 each, so start buying them now. We will be voting at the Feb. meeting for when to end the raffle; I hope to make it no later than May so the winner can use the funds for this flying season. If this raffle is over by May then we can do a second raffle this year. Hope to see you all at the field and at the February club meeting. Regards, Brad S. Werneth ERCA President 2011 Treasurers Corner We 44 members as of February 10. All membership renewals must be completed by March 31st to keep from being dropped off the active club roster. I would like to finalize the roster and send it to AMA headquarters along with our club charter renewal as early as possible. To those who have submitted their renewals, thank you and happy landings. AL Barrington Sec/Treas, ERCA Pylon Racing ERCA 2011 Pylon Race Season * April 30th Warm up * May 14th Race #1 and electric * June 11th Race #2 * July 9th Race #3 * Aug. 27th Race #4 Final Pylon - Contact:: Marty Wittman WITH THE WEEKDAY WARRIORS January - at last a Winter month that treated us correctly! Only 32.2% of its days were rainy and we got a mere 27% of the rain we were supposed to. This was a very un- Oregon January and the State Legislature will probably pass a resolution condemning it. You'd think that such weather would bring out the fliers and, to some extent, it did. The weekend guys had three or four really fine days and we weekday fliers did as well. I know I missed a few nice days, notably one when I sat sprawled in the dentist's chair, looking at a beautiful sunlit landscape outside. The appointment was for a time too early for me to go to the field first and too late to go after it was over. What follows is what I did get to see. Dwayne Graville took advantage of almost-calm air one day to do some test- flying on a teeny electric Stik meant for the indoors. It replaces his Ember which was in dire need of replacement. The Stik started off being rather too twitchy in pitch, but Dwayne was dealing with it. He has also bought a Skyraider from Kent Melville who has decided to go all-electric. This is a red one and you may remember Kent's yellow one which has an electric motor the equivalent of a glow .80. Speaking of electric, Mike Vaughan has a large P-51 with that sort of powerplant. It's styled as the air racer "Voodoo" which has a minuscule canopy and is very purple. Mike's has retracts and, in keeping with the Eugene R/C tradition, a 300-watt motor instead of the 100-watt-er that the model calls for. He says the plane is very fast (surprise, surprise), but that, with flaps down, it is quite docile on the approach. Wayne Wahrmund is also flying an electric WWII bird. His is a medium-size Grumman F4F, a Wildcat. It is molded foam, full- bodied, and in Butch O'Hare's markings. No landing gear, so it's hand-launch and skid it in on the belly. Seems very solid in the air. Roger Winz is now flying that new engine in his Skyraider and his son, Marc, down from Washington, had a big Yak 54 out for its first ventures into the air. It's from a Chinese company (are there any others these days?) called "The Aeroplane Works" and Marc has a DL55 for power. An elevator hinge worked loose on the second flight, but no disaster ensued. It was just loose and there were other hinges to take up the burden. Mickey Cohen has been busy in the workshop. Chuck Jenkins test-flew Mickey's new Ugly Stik (0.S. .46AX) as the breeze was freshening one day and all went well. Mickey, by the way, has donated a large Weber propane grill to the club - a much-needed replacement for the one we have had which was on its last legs. Doug McWha hauled the old one out of the shed and discovered that a family of mice had taken up residence therein. Doug's first count was five mice, but in the weeks since, with repeated telling of the tale, the count has risen to "six or seven". By the time you ask him about it, the number will probably be closer to a nice, round ten. Everybody seems to like the new grill, and, most important, Chef Barrington likes it, but do the mice? We urged him not to do it, but Chuck Jenkins has completed a re-build of Doug McWha's engine so that he can return his favorite model, "Doug's Disgrace", to the air. He had been flying his Super Stik, an aeroplane of thorough-ly respectable appearance, but now our aesthetic sensibil- ities will be offended by that dreadful relic of Short Mountain. I'm reading a book about the Caproni- Campini N.1, the first Italian jet aircraft. This was the bird that had a compressor fan cramming air into a combustion chamber into which fuel was sprayed and ignited. WITH THE WEEKDAY WARRIORS continued The resulting jet blast out the tailpipe propelled the plane. The difference was that the compressor fan was run by a piston engine instead of by a turbine at the rear of the combustion chamber, thus none- of the jet exhaust power was us-ed up in turning the turbine. You will sometimes see this plane described as a "ducted fan", but that is wrong. In fact, one of the first things in the book is a letter from Campini to an official of the Italian Air Ministry. The official had described Campini's pride and joy that way in an report and the designer was setting him straight, pointing out that, if you removed the combustion chamber, the plane would have been hard-put to taxi, let alone take off. That got me thinking and I cannot come up with a single full-size ducted fan plane. There have been several barrel-shaped birds, notably the Stipa of which Don Watson had a model, but the props were out at the front edge of the barrel. There have also been schemes for shrouded propellers; the prop turned in a short fairing rather like a ring cowl. The only one I can think of that met with even modest success was the Fantrainer, which was designed in Germany and built in slightly modified form in Thailand. Jim Smith used to fly a «A model of one down at Short Mountain. Anybody's memory better than mine? Now I'm off for two weeks and a bit, not to return until the 24th. I hope the pizza is good and that you can hear yourselves think and have a decent meeting. C. O'D. Indoor Flying Flying Schedule - Thursdays at 1:00 - at the National Guard Armory Gym. NOTE - Wednesday is NOT a Armory fly day until further notice. Projects New Flying Lawnmower I put the new Lawnmower kit together and it is ready to go !! 6 lbs.. The old one had been repaired SOOO many time it was 8 1/2 lbs!! Doesn't mean I can fly and land it any better, but it is fun anyway !! Marty Wittman What has been flying this year? --- That's All Folks - Eugene R/C Aeronauts Newsletter Editor 1618 Gilham Rd. Eugene, OR. 97401 February 2011 ®FirstLast¯ ®Street¯ ®CityStZip¯ ____________________________ Renewing Current Member ____________________________ INVOICE FOR 2011 MEMBERSHIP RENEWAL - EUGENE R/C AERONAUTS Please fill in the following information and send back with your Dues Remittance Member Name __________________________________________ Name Tag Clip ___ Pin ___ 2011 AMA Membership No. ________________________ I certify that I have paid my 2011 AMA Dues. Initial _________ Member Address ________________________________________________________________ Member Phone No. ____________________________ Cell: ____________________________ Member Email Address ___________________________________________________________ Newsletter Via: Email _____ Regular Mail _____ Do not need to receive newsletter _____ Please enclose your check for $ 60.00 as a current member renewing for 2011 and Mail to: Eugene R/C Aeronauts, PO Box 26344, Eugene, Or. 97402. Or bring this INVOICE and $60.00 to the Meeting Next CLUB Meeting - February 22, 2011 - 7:00 pm at Roaring Rapids Pizza. December 2009 2 February 2011 5