What did you do aeroplane wise today?

[Squirrelnet]

Finally got round to finishing my GM120 repair with the tank fitting being reglued with 24hr epoxy. I had taken this off as the internal pipe had gone inside the cylinder head fitting. As the pipe is flared it was easier to remove the tank fitting which isn't flared to fit the seal.

Some small bits of bamboo will stop the glue blocking the pipes and the threads have been taped

Hopefully that will work

[TheLurker]

Prep for Saturday's Trinity and finally got around to making up a couple of 75 thou. motors for my Moorhouse Comper Swift. 

[Squirrelnet]

The epoxy has now well and truly set on the tank fitting for the GM120 so I reassembled the tank and tried some gas in it. Very pleased to say there are no leaks and the motor runs very well. It had a head leak between inlet pipe and head fitting which a new seal had to made so huge thanks to GM for the help and advice and the seals . I gave it a new piston O ring and cylinder O ring as well while it was apart


The motor is destined for a future project I've been wanting to do for sometime but could never find a kit or plan to build from...until now. The Aerographics Avro 504K by Dave Causer

Hoping to do G-ABAA the aircraft that Eddie Riding flew in and until recently was at the Manchester air Museum. I hear it's now at Stow Maries an original WW1 airfield near Chelmsford so a run out there to take some photos is now on the cards


 

[Lastwoodsman]

What did you do airplane wise today?

Sun March 15 2026

The 30 inch Beaver wing gets glued back together after repairs and modifications.

     Well,  ...  after all of that repair,  I finally got things test fitted and lined up.   I just glued in the three new spars , and I glued up both Leading Edges of the wing panels,  to the center section Leading Edges.   There are plenty of more things to add,  but this is a good start.   I'll update all of that in my Beaver thread.

     Weather wise,  there have been no flying days,  yet,  that I could have flown in,  so no worries,  and there is no rush yet,  either,  weather wise.

Pic #1     1966
Pic #2     1967

Lastwoodsman
Richard

[OZPAF]

A warm reasonably calm afternoon on Sunday had me visiting the local oval for a bit of catapult gliding and DLG flying, only to find a cricket match underway. It is their oval but the hide of them .

After watching until they finished - I noticed that the breeze was coming from a Westerly direction - leading to launches almost straight into the sun  - not good for DLG, so started with the CLG's.

A couple of trimming flights on the first of my Swallows followed by some decent flights close to a minute in the warm buoyant air with the low drift keeping it inside the oval.

The wind changed direction after around half an hour and so onto the DLG. It's a well battered Stilleto which I have been learning on for ahem a couple of years and today both the glider and the pilot were in tune and I had some reasonable flights - also around the minute mark.

Very enjoyable and rare evening for the year so far.

John


A

[Lastwoodsman]

What did you do airplanewise today? 

Sun March 15 2026

    Hi John!  That sounds like a lot of fun!  Do you have any pics you could perchance share with us -  maybe a pic of the planes,  and perhaps action pictures of an inflight pic or two? 

    Also,  how about a pic of your flying field Cricket Field.  I'm really curious about the dimensions.

    Anyways,  I hope your camera is in working order.      A pic is worth a thousand words .... 

Happy Catapult Launch Gliding and Towline gliding.

Lastwoodsman
Richard

[OZPAF]

G'DAy Richard - no worries.

The Stiletto DLG of 1200mm span, was originally designed to train young Russian enthusiasts around 4-5 years ago. I received mine about 3 yrs ago and it has had a hard life so far - 3 tail boom and one nose area repair. it weighed around 195gms new ready to fly with battery, and the repairs have taken it to 207gms.

The Stiletto is of full carbon composite construction - typical of DLG's. Although an old design now - it still has surprising performance for such a light model.

I feel I may just be coming to grips with it.

Unfortunately I don't have any videos of it flying.

The CLG's are the Swallow I designed for kids and here is a video link to an early flight of the prototype at Lackey Park

There is a build thread for the Swallow here
https://hpa.aeromodelling.gr/index.php?topic=208.0

Lackey Park is at
34°32'26.99" S 150°22'26.43" E
and is roughly 180x200 metres so is relatively large.

The CLG's were flying roughly EAST - West in the 180m direction and traveling around 100m.

John

[OZPAF]

Whoops!!   brain fade - the CLG's are Sparrows not Swallows!

John

[Lastwoodsman]

What did you do airplanewise today? 

Mon March 16 2026

Hi John.  Thanks for the pic and info and video.  Your Stiletto 1200mm  is  47".    The little DLG sparrows are much smaller.   

    That is a big Lackey Park 200M X 180M.  My Cricket Field is a slight oval 110M x 130m .

    I looked up your flying field John.  It is very big,  and looks like a perfect place to fly.    Are there any special rules to fly there?  How often are the Cricket leagues playing there?

Pic #1      OZPAF JOHN 1 LACKEY PARK  180M X 200M
Pic #2      OZPAF JOHN 2 LACKEY PARK  180M X 200M
Pic #3      OZPAF JOHN 3 LACKEY PARK  180M X 200M
Piv #4      STILETTO 47 INCHES AND SMALLER SPARROWS

Lastwoodsman
Richard

[OZPAF]

Are there any special rules to fly there?

Surprisingly the area is hardly used - this was the first time in 8 yrs that I have seen cricket played there, and as such the local council pays little attention to the area.

There are the occasional dog walkers and kids playing but late in the day - it is usually empty.

Yes it is large - there are actually 2 hard cricket pitches on the field, but I have lost a couple of CLG's in thermals and a supercap powered FF model there, and the missing thermal activity is the main reason I fly late in the day .

The CLG's will easily cover 100m plus in a light breeze as they were doing on this occasion.

John

[OZPAF]

Yesterday presented another short spell of calm conditions and I decided to give my 300mm WS Christen Eagle a fly in a close park.

It is becoming difficult as annoyingly the council have planted a line of small trees adjacent to my runway - er, footpath.

The model is very light - around 30gms and thus it is only pleasant to fly in very calm conditions.

https://rc.kyosho.com/en/discontinued/dis-rcplane/minium.html

it has a moulded Polystyrene fuselage and the wings seem to be of a heavier grade, with a efficient thin, cambered airfoil with a surprisingly thin TE.

It is quite old - around 18yrs, but is still airworthy after many repairs - second motor, and a replacement Spektrum RCVR, servo, ESC brick.

Here is a video of a flight a year ago.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PfD8YoYK6C4

John

[Squirrelnet]

Very nice park for small RC John. Rewilding seems to be thing here now so many National Trust sites that were great for small models now have thickets of thorn bushes and scrub instead

One site that is still flyable is Pinkneys Green nr Maidenhead where some OMFC meet up occasionally. I popped over this morning for my first outdoor flying of 2026

[g_kandylakis]

looks a bit windy?

[OZPAF]

That's a nice flat large area Chris. You fellows obviously don't let wind bother you - although that was probably only a mild Zephyr!

What is the first model being flown Chris - very pretty little thing.

John

[Jmk89]

I decided to upgrade my tools for grading balsa.  Up to now I've used the nomograph in Nomographs for AeroModellers, but I decided I could write a formula in Excel so all I had to do is put in the dimensions and weight and up pops the density.
My problem is that I work (& think) in mixed units.  The dimensions of the balsa are inches and fractions, weight is grams, and density is lbs/cubic foot (of course, engine displacement is in cc!) In my defence that was how a lot of articles in AeroModeller were written in the 70s and 80s).
So conversion factors needed to be built in to get weight in grams to come out as lbs/ cubic foot.
I think it works.
If you want to play with it, pm me with an email address and I'll share it with you ( I don't seem to be able to attach an excel file to this post - but that may just be my incompetence!