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Banbridge Aeromodelling Club
Welcome to the Banbridge Aeromodellers Club Website.
Matthew just txted me the following great news: IMAC Freestlye: 1st Matthew, 5th Simon Funfly, 2nd: Matthew, 3rd Simon Great weekend, good weather, good craic.. Just received some nice pics from John Pearce (BMFA Press officer), thanks John!
Rest of the picutures here
Sean handed me a disk of video-clips. Let's see if I can get them to work here.. First I'll do it the easy way, YouTube. it.
Does not look to bad. For the benefit of all the visitors, Paul is trying to encourage the YS, while Kees pretends to be helping.. By the time Sean started shooting, we'd been trying for a few minutes to get the YS to cooperate. (It was the usual problem, sticky membrane.) Congratulations Simon, I hear you are a happily married man now, and a great time was had by all celebrating the event. To prove it, someone sent me this picture. It certainly looks like you're in heaven! Futaba is exchanging 6EX's, check here for more details. I'm sure you recognize this fellow. Found this story on Avicrafts website. Guess we've all done it and got away with it. The last weekend of June was my Dad and I's second trip over to an IMAC competition for 2008. The venue was RAF Tholthorpe near York which is the home club of our good friend Barry James a loyal and keen IMACer. You can read the rest of the story here. Banbridge Aeromodelling Club welcomes you to our field for the NIAA Funfly Championships 2008. Details are in the flyer. Everyone is welcome, all ages & abilities will have a great day, it's called Funfly for a reason! The Funfly results: Sunday came and went, and what a great day it was!
Go have a look here (webmaster: I passed all the heli questions but failed miserably on the others.. Tells you something!) A big well done to Alwyn Clarke of Ballymoney Model Flying Club on his big win at the 3DX Ireland Heli Competition in Tipperary at the weekend. Alwyn placed highest out of the competitors in this very well run and exciting event!! Alwyn's flying was a cut above the rest of the field and his practise paid off, his last freestyle was very technical and deservedly made him the winner. (a bit of practise: It was also a successful weekend for a few other BMFC pilots, Clifford Wallace made the cut for the final round and placed 5th, David Drummond (honorary BMFC member for the weekend) narrowly missed out on the cut and placed 6th and David Walker placed 10th. It's great to see these 4 men stepping up to the plate and actually competing, it takes guts to fly in front of world class judges and not just talk a good show, they proved why they are among the best heli pilots in the North & indeed Ireland and are great credit to BMFC. Phelim and myself travelled down and were treated to some awesome flying not only from competitors but also the world class judges, pilots such as Lukas Riva, Steven Gerrard, Duncan Osbourne and our very good friend David Nolan put on some great demo's (if you have never heard of these guys, google or you tube their names, you will see they are among the world's top heli pilots). Young Lukas Riva for my money showed Number One in the world levels of skill, his flying was both controlled but utterly stunning (and that's putting it mildly), the control of the Align Trex 700 he was flying was mind blowing you could not fail to be impressed. I did a demo with my little electric extra, I'm sure boredom set in for the crowd, but I enjoyed it! Matthew Big Yaks, small Yaks, Yaks are everywhere.. (notice the sunshine?)
(Sean, Kees and Paul.) Saturday 24th May 2008 saw the test flight off our brand new Carden Extra 300. This plane has been on my dad's building board for 6 months and has been a new experience in building for him. After visiting Tucson in 2007 we decided that our current 40% Extra 260 which flys brilliantly, could be improved on. Tucson is a harsh environment for model aeroplanes especially large scale performance ones, the combination of high temperatures and high altitude mean that planes need to be light and very powerful to fly the very demanding and power hungry IMAC schedules. A typical 40% model will weigh between 38 & 42lbs (17-18kg) if built "normally". Our 260 came out at 39lbs which was a great achievement, as it was the first large model of it's type in Northern Ireland and no one had experience of building one. In Tucson a lot of the guys were flying models at 35lbs on setups similar to ours, so they had the same power but 4lbs less to haul around, that was my dad's goal 35 -36lbs. He set about building the plane on a diet!! Vacuum bagging all the balsa sheeting to the foam cores, thinning balsa down, lightening holes were all used but the structural strength of the model was considered at all times and never comprimised. We had hoped to use a new DA170 in the model but they have yet to become available, so a DA150 was installed, we might change to a 170 in the winter. After many hours the new 300 came out at 36lbs on the money, not to be out done, we have ordered a lightweight Truturn spinner and a Carbon Fibre wingtube, this should save us 7oz more, bringing the model into the 35.5lbs area, great!!
Some Specs
We did a few initial tests with the DX7 and Powerbox system in a large high wing model, with great results, so installed it into the new plane, using the Spektrum Data logger which monitors each Remote Receiver performance we were able to optimise the placement of the Rx's within the airframe. The data logger is a great piece of kit, I will write an article on my findings with it, look out for that. With more than acceptable values on the ground, we decided it was time to take to the air. The first flight with any new plane is always exciting, this was no different, in a 20mph crosswind I decided to test fly (i never did take any notice of the wind!). Our routine for large scale test flight is fairly simple, 1st flight, smooth circuits, a few basic aerobatics manoeuvres and don't stress the airframe or the engine out too much, after all it's all new equipment. So after 5Min's I landed, we checked everything over, nothing had come loose, we tightened up the prop nuts (that's' standard after the 1st flight), checked the values with the data logger they were all below the various parameters that it gives you, so we were happy. The Powerbox Royal also has a Receiver switch function, if one receiver goes down it will switch to the other in milliseconds, we checked this also and no switches, the powerbox is primarly used to distribute the power to servos, meaning the small Rx's don't have to supply the servos with huge amounts of current, the powerbox showed that 600mah had been taken out of each battery and a maximum peak burst of 7.7amp had gone through the system, it can handle 40amps continuous! When you see values like that, you can see why we like to keep the servo power away from the Rx's.
We fuelled up and flew two more times, checking the plane over and using the data logger to check the Rx's, all was perfect. I flew a basic aerobatic schedule and the model felt good, the power was very good for a new engine and I seemed to have a lot more lift in my vertical uplines, so the 3-4lbs less has helped. The conditions were less than ideal, but I feel it flys lighter than my 260, it accelerates out of a vertical upline snap which my 260 doesn't do! It's now a matter of trimming the model out properly over the next 20-30 flights and running the new engine in. I'm very happy with the 2.4Ghz system too, no worries about being accidentally shot down at the field or at a competition! Matthew ..cancelled... On Saturday the 17th of May we held our first Aerobatics competition of the year. The grass in the field still has not been cut so that somewhat dictated what models we flew. The grass acts like an arrester hook on an aircraft carrier and could cause damage if you land in it. This was to be a practice for the Northern Ireland Area Aerobatics Championships in a few weeks. Please read these BMFA recommendations, and say 'aye, I already know that!' Matthew, Sec. Matthew sent the following report. No doubt you've seen the sign for the eggs at the farm. Farmer Jim complains that we obviously can't read very well, so he let it be known (says Dennis) that we should take up their kind offer immediately! I am pleased to announce details/information for the newly formatted NIAA Aerobatics Championships for 2008. The competition will be jointly organized by the Banbridge & North West Clubs. We will have 2 rounds and the winner will be taken from combined scores of both competitions! There will also be 2 classes, Clubman and Intermediate. The Clubman is aimed at club flyers who want to enjoy a friendly fun competition, it has basic aerobatics manoeuvres and is a good place to start with aerobatic competitions. The intermediate schedule is aimed at the more experienced pilots and will be a good challenge without being too technical as to put people off! I have attached a flyer and the schedules, please have a look at these and pass them onto your clubmates. The dates to remember are:
Great News from the Ballymoney Club. We have been given special permission to fly before 1pm on the day of the Competition. Anyone wishing to have a trimming flight will be allowed to fly off the peg before the pilots brief, after the pilots brief the transmitters will be pounded for safety reasons (trimming flights may still be granted at the competition directors discretion, thats me by the way!!) We must thank all members of the Ballymoney Club for this kind gesture it really is a great help. As way of an update we have 11 pilots already registered for the competition. (Let me know if you want to be number 12!) A big thanks to the Ballymoney Club for the use of their excellent facility, it promises to be a great day!
The GBR/CAA (Great Britain Radio Control Aerobatic Association) have some very good information on there website and they have produced some sample videos for the sequences. Clubman sample video If you are interested in competing please drop me an email on matthew.poots@btinternet.com so I can gauge numbers before hand. Many thanks, Matthew The world famous Emmerdale Extravaganza comes to The Ulster Folk and Transport Museum, Hollywood, Northern Ireland on Saturday 7th June 2008 Following the enormous success of this mammoth fundraising event, originating in Aberdeen some seven years ago, the famous Emmerdale Extravaganza will be coming to Northern Ireland for the largest event yet. With a unique approach this amazing extravaganza brings the public together with celebrities of the popular television world for the largest fundraising event of its kind. Full of family entertainment for everyone, visitors are given the chance to meet the stars from Emmerdale, join them and take part in various activities such as the Emmerdale Go Loopy Aircraft Challenge involving participants being given the chance to fly in the Extra 300 aircraft (the flying equivalent of a Formula 1 Ferrari) and be challenged to fly daring aerobatics themselves under the professional guidance of ex members of the Red Arrows! Food, shopping, entertainments and displays, aerobatic shows, fashion show, Strongman World Record attempt, all the fun of the fair and much more besides as well as all the magnificent family attractions found at the museum already. The NIAA have been asked by the event organizers to set up a static display of model aircraft, also an area has been set aside for the display of control line flying, light foam models and electric heli's. Some of the cast members from the TV series Emmerdale will be visiting the display during the day to start up a few Jet turbines and to fly a foam model. Club members from Dungannon, Langford, Banbridge, BMFC, NIMSA, Ballymoney and display pilots such as Dave Nolan, Richard Boyd, Matthew Poots, Ian Robb and Maurice Doyle will all be in attendance to answer questions on all aspects of Aero modelling. If any clubs or NIAA members require further information on the event,go to www.georgewalkerevents.co.uk or e-mail john@netstretch.com Regards John Pearson (PRO, N.I.A.A) All of you will be familiar with the BMFA certification schemes, primarily the A certificate which we all require to fly solo at the club. Speaking from personal experience I have considered doing my B certificate several times & even practiced a bit. But I never quite got around to taking the test, now I have no excuse!
Iain. What a day, sight seeing with the German Team in the morning, watched some of the best F3P-B and A flying i've ever seen and the Aeromusical!!! Boy what can I say about that!!! The best model control from Don and Gernot I have ever witnessed!!! There was also an air race and pylon race to boot, that was a lot of fun!! We also had lunch with the German Team and Dinner with, Juergen, Martin, Stephanie and the rest of the German Team, Gernot and the Austrian Crew and the Big Man Donatas and Ricardos!!! A great night with a few beers and lovely prague food!!! The hilight of the day was Donatas allowing Richard and I to fly one of his competition Sultimates after the competition today!!! Wah!! What a model, so light, so quick, so true, the best i have ever flown!!! What a honour for us two, the envy of everyone in that hall!!! A big thanks to Jurgan and the German Team and Donatas, they have been very kind to us and it has made the weekend!! Role on tomorrow!!! Have a look at Don's website for more pics.
(Latest developments here. The first F3P competition in Ireland,
and results..
We're now looking forward to the next one, organized by Dungannon, on the 2nd of March. I don't think I've ever seen such an improvement in flying capabilities in such a short time, by so many pilots. It's awesome.
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