Progress in the Garage/Workshop at last

I have spent the last couple of days wasting the glorious weather we have been having here in beautiful South Wales toiling away in the garage trying to transform it into a usable space as my workshop.
I have built a bench, added a few more shelves and also created a large hot-box for curing paint, resin or glue on those cold Spring, Winter, Autumn (and Summer) evenings.
I used three 50w halogen downlights on the door which also folds up to be my bench lighting while working.
I am yet to tidy up properly, but here are some pics from my mobile phone that show the progress.

Now I am off to the beach, to enjoy the rest of this great weather with the wife and kids!

BMFA league 5 2012 video by Tom Foreman

I can't imagine how excited the guys must have been to be on the hill for this event! I am soooooo jealous that I wasn't there. Check out the action filmed by Tom and his wife Mandy.

Can't wait to get back 'stuck in' to F3F!

2012 BMFA Rd5 Bishops Hill Scotland from Tom Foreman on Vimeo.

SLOPEGLIDE 2012

The following in italics is a post from BARCS forum outlining the format for the annual (hopefully) SLOPEGLIDE competition.
I've entered, woooooohooo!!, and my wonderful wife (she reads this occasionally) has agreed to look after the kids for the weekend while I go and play with my toys. I am super excited to be finally getting out on the slopes again for some competition and to catch up with friends I have not seen for a while.

The itinerary for SlopeGlide will be as follows:

· Saturday 4^th August meet 8:30am at the Ice Cream car park.

· Set up F3F course with aim to get flying started as soon as possible. Last round in progress on the first day will 3:30pm. (This will be dependent on how many enter for slope aerobatic contest)

· After the last round is completed we will run a Slope Aerobatics competition.

· Sunday 5^th August meet 9:00am with the aim to get flying started as soon as possible. Last round in progress at 5:00pm, this will be assessed based on conditions.

· Presentations

Aerobatic contest: I know there have been many competitions over the years, this is very new to me, so if you feel guidance is required after you read the following please PM or email me .

My main aim is to get the manoeuvres out there for you to practice.
Example of some aerobatics:

The contest will consist of one round per pilot:

Compulsory Manoeuvres as follows:

· One inside loop K = 5

· One roll K = 5

· Split S K = 5

· Immelman turn K = 6

· Additional four manoeuvres, selected from the following list —

Optional manoeuvres.

· Stall turn K = 6
· Rectangular approach K = 6
· Straight inverted K = 7
· Two inside loops K = 8
· Two rolls K = 8
· Three turn spin K = 8
· Double Immelman K = 9
· Three inside loops K = 10
· Cuban eight K = 10
· Vertical eight K = 10
· Slow roll K = 11
· Horizontal eight K = 12
· Three outside loops K = 12
· Inverted eight K = 12
· Figure-M K = 12
· Three rolls K = 13
· Four-point roll K = 14

Each manoeuvre will be marked out of 10 and multiplied by its K number, therefore the more difficult the manoeuvre the better chance of a higher score, but be careful if you get it wrong, you could end up way down the order.

Here is also a link to a site with the manoeuvres, as mentioned this is my first time of running a slope aerobatic competition, so I will look at the rules to simplify to uses as an introductory event.

http://www.southernsoaringclub.org.za/MGA-rules-10-aerobat.PDF
I can't wait for the SLOPEGLIDE weekend to arrive, so excited!!

Better get out in the garage and do some repairs. I'd like to have two Skorps up and running for the event, but definitely NEED at least one. Better get glassing!!

BMFA Nationals 2012

Congratulations to Paul Upton, the 2012 BMFA Nationals Champion!
Needle 124's in the first three places.

Extended version including crash

My First Rolling Circle!!!

The footage is particularly POOR but I managed to catch my first rolling circuit on video today. It wouldn't win any aerobatic competitions or anything, but I'm pretty pleased with myself!!
No Music, just wind noise!




It was great to see Chris, Ron and Mark also flying today. They were all making the most of the beautiful Mickey's lift with assorted foam, fibreglass and carbon models.

A couple of photos

I did manage to crash the Wasabi today (which I also got on video). I got disorientated just flying! I managed to do the hard bit and stay orientated! But couldn't manage to just fly without getting confused and befuddled!! Silly Git.
Anyway, due to the ever-increasing amount of glass and filler applied to the Wasabi, the only casualty was the radio tray.

I'll see how I'm feeling about putting the 'how not to land a Wasabi' video clip on the tube.

I also did a rush-job of getting the Gulp DS ready for a test flight, which it failed.

It was fantastic to get out onto a hill again.

Wrecker without Wrecking!

It's been 6 months since I last fiddled with the sticks and I managed to get up to the Wrecker this morning for a quick flight.

What a relief! 

I took a couple of photos when I got there and popped the video camera on my head, pressed the go button and launched the Wasabi over the edge of the Wrecker.

The breeze was very light with thermals giving excellent energy as they rolled through. After about 5 minutes of wobbly flight (it's been a while!) the camera made the tell-tale noise that let me know that I hadn't started recording because it turned itself off.
Bummer.
I had promised Roger that the next time I put a video of the Wasabi on the internet, it would be painted. Lucky then that the video didn't work.
After 15 minutes my fingers and face were getting a bit chilly (NE wind-chill) so I decided to land. As I was making my way to the road to cross over, the lift just died. Woohoo! that meant I could land at my feet and not have to hike up the hill!
One successful launch, one successful flight and one successful landing. What more could you possibly ask for (except for a whole day of flying)?

Here are a couple of photos, just to prove that I didn't imagine the whole thing.