Hi Everyone,
We decided to fly at Beeding Bowl this morning as the wind was forecast to be WSW - SW .
When I arrived David K was there already and we walked to the hill to find that the wind was pretty strong and right on the bowl. Just then Kevin M arrived with his grandson Riley. We all walked to the flying place and my intention was to give Riley some flying lessons (it was his first ever R/C flying) , but when I launched the club Wildthing I found the wind wasn't as consistent as I thought. We all had a Wildthing, Kevin also had his Lidl glider and David had a Great Planes Spirit. I had the Alula in the car and thought that I'd have to get that ready for Riley's 1st lesson, but the wind picked up enough to fly the Wildthings.
With the club buddy boxes I handed control to Riley after explaining the principles and he flew surprisingly well. He had quite a number of short sessions of flying interspersed with picking up everyone's gliders after they landed.
David had a lot of flights with his Wildthing and then he set up the Spirit which flew very well in the moderate conditions and he gained some impressive height. The spirit is a rudder/elevator model and very light but as the wind strengthened the slightly blustery weather didn't affect it at all.
Kevin tried his newly-reconfigured Lidl glider - he had removed the all-moving wings mechanism and replaced it with traditional aileron / elevator controls which proved to be a much better mechanism. It flew very well, was very easy to control and very stable. Unfortunately there was a heavy landing and the fuselage broke in 2 places making it impossible to carry on flying. Kevin then flew his Wildthing until the wind caught it behind the hill and it went out of sight over the carpark. He and Riley set off to recover the Wildthing which was eventually found in a neighbouring field behind the carpark.
At one point David and I packed up our stuff to go looking for Kevin and Riley but a quick phone call established that they were on their way back having found the Wildthing. We all continued flying for a further time until the cold got the better of us.
Riley had quite a few flights with the club Wildthing and he also got to launch everyone else's Wildthings too , so I hope he might be a new recruit to R/C flying.
A good day but pretty cold....
Rob
