Saturday 21 February 2015

Varying Fortunes at Ditchling Beacon Saturday 21st Feb

Hi all,
This morning we decided to go to Ditchling Beacon and walk East until we could find some good lift from the NW wind. When we arrived at the car park, it was shrouded in low cloud and there was no flying to be had.
Paul, Les and I decided to hike East in the expectation that we would find some lift and the cloud would dissipate (hopefully), or we'd just have a nice walk in the cold and wet !
When we got to our destination the wind was about right - straight on the hill, but we couldn't see the bottom of the hill (Sussex !) but overhead it looked like the cloud might be thinning.
Paul launched his Zulu in the marginal lift and it flew pretty well (when we could see it) and as time went by we noticed that Sussex appeared and then Surrey, etc.... came into view accompanied by some lovely sunshine and a reasonable wind.
Les launched his Middle Phase and it flew very well indeed gaining some good height and performing quite a few good landings.
Paul had moved to his Traceur which was a bit light for the conditions (or something), so the flying was marginal, but he got the best out of it given the odd conditions.
I flew my Vagabond which I was trying to set up properly, having never really got it going decently, and after a number of changes to the setup I got it flying straight and quite well only to have it nose-dive in the marginal lift and lost the front-end and 1 servo (oh well can't wait for my Traceur to arrive !).
Les tried a maiden flight of his newly-built Jet Provost which looked very nice indeed and which flew straight and level for about 35 seconds then suffered from lack of lift and hit the ground dislodging the left elevator.
Paul was then flying his Zulu close to the hill (VTPR style) and the ground came up at him removing the tail-fin.
So 5 models, and only 2 survived intact.
Thank goodness I didn't try my 'new' carbon fibre Mini Blade !!
However, the positive aspects are that we made the effort to go, we had a great laugh together, we all had our cobwebs blown away and nothing was completely written-off.
In Summary - another great day Slope Soaring in Sussex .
See you soon
Rob

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