The hall itself was fine, and a decent size (though it seemed small compared to our last venue!) with a clean ceiling.
My Sparrowhawk, on its second outing, continued to behave and flew well, not attacking any walls. In fact it would have survived the day completely unscathed if the freewheel ramp on the Tern 6 inch prop had not self destructed just as I had wound for my last flight. A bit of a weakness in the design this, and in retrospect I should have cut it off and replaced it with a split washer when I fitted the thing. I have had a few strip on me over the years. Anyway, despite missing the last flight, I was very pleased to end up second in class behind Mike Hadland's lovely Waco SRE.
My rather battered Jungmeister was entered in the Peanut class, and managed a best flight of 36 seconds. Good enough for a mid table placing. It is about time I got the Fox Moth finished so I have got something new to enter.
Amongst the new models seen at the event was Chris Strachan's smart Pistachio Wittman Buster. As befits a racing aircraft, it flew fast, and circulated in style just under the ceiling. Best time was 35 seconds, and the model finished third in class.
Always nice to welcome a new face on the competition scene, and this attractive Kitfox Lite was the work of Laurence Marks. The model is electric powered, and flew nicely during the lunch interval. Unfortunately it refused to behave during the actual competition flights (isn't that often the way?)
Gordon Hannah brought along this new pistachio scale Demoiselle, complete with carved foam pilot. Excellent workmanship in evidence, and it flew really well. It looked so fragile, I would have been frightened to even pick it up .
Peter Smart had a new foam peanut scale Lysander with him. Immaculately finished as usual, the model featured a very nice carved pilot figure sat up high in the front of the greenhouse. Unfortunately this was another model that was not taking its flying responsibilities seriously, so Peter failed to post a flight score in the peanut class. I hope he perseveres with it though, because it looks great.
Peter also entered this new ASK 14 in the pistachio class, where it flew very well, with a best time of 53 seconds. Model is of all foam construction, and weighs about 2.5 grams. Finished second in class.
I could not resist another photo of Peter iliffe's 1/24 scale Albatros D.V, which won the CO2/electric class. Not the sharpest picture I have ever taken, but it shows the attractive colours nicely. Power is a Gasparin G63 CO2 motor.
Peter was also doing some more trimming flights with his new DFW B.1. As the photo shows, progress is being made, and I am sure it is only a matter of time before the model gets fully sorted.
Here are a couple of Mike Hadland's models, the winning rubber powered Waco SRE behind the peanut Bucker Jungmann. An action shot of the Waco is below.
Ray Johnson got his electric powered Curtiss Owl flying comfortably with the confines of the hall, despite its relatively large size.
Though not entered in the competition, Lindsey Smith was flying this nicely finished Messerschmitt 109 built from the old Veron Tru-Flite plan.
OK, I know this is not scale, but it made me smile. John Walden exercised a lot of ingenuity and considerable imagination to produce this splendid machine, apparently built of meccaco. I particularly liked the fake screw heads and nuts, all placed in the correct locations. Construction is really not steel plates, but Depron foam, which would explain why I saw it flying around the hall.