AMA Expo West is moving

Transcription

1 AMA Expo West is moving New venue is the Pomona Fairplex Nov. 2-4, 2018 Yes, that was the big news at this year s AMA Expo/Convention. They are leaving the Ontario Convention Center for a venue that will better suit the needs of we AMA members. This site has been used before to host modeling shows and it worked out quite well. However, there will be and expansion of the facilities to incorporate lots of outdoor flying. In the past at the LA County Fair there were horse races and other horse events held in the infield of the race track. There are no longer horse races at the Fair and the entire infield and track (six acres) will be available for flying. This will include drone racing, flying demonstrations and night flying where you bring your own model and fly. There are also RC cars and trucks for dirt track, drag racing and street racing. There is a 4500 square-foot boat pond for all kinds of RC boats. A giant model train setup will also be there and, to top it off, full-scale flyovers are scheduled. The AMA is already working to procure more booths for the show this November as there were fewer this January than in the past. They also said the show this soon after the holiday shopping season in the middle of winter discourages much buying. They are hoping that a more active Expo will entice more people to attend, get involved and have fun and as they say: Get the Bug. As a side note, you will note that in the December meeting minutes two individuals from a RC drag racing organization showed up to look into the possibility of using our runway from time to time for drag racing. It will not harm the runway at all and would be done in short periods of time generally in the evening. They said they would join the club and the AMA. At the AMA District 10 meeting some clubs said they had built an RC car track on their field property and it was a big hit. One club said their membership had doubled because of it. Something to think about. RRCC CLUB OFFICERS President: Jeff Szueber Vice-President: Bob Baker Secretary: Rob Evans Treasurer: Larry Roberts Safety Coordinator: Jim Bronowski Field Director: Dale Yaney Newsletter Editor: Jim Bronowski Turbine Flying Director: Berry Hou ALL OFFICERS MAY BE CONTACTED AT: NEXT MEETING SATURDAY Jan 20th 10:00 am crowley field

2 Call to Order: President Jeff Szueber called to order the regular meeting of the Riverside RC Club at 10:15 on December 16th, 2017 at Crowley Field. Minutes of the Previous Meeting: The minutes of the November, 2017 meeting were approved as written and published in the December Prop Talk newsletter by the members present. Old Business: Larry Roberts reported that the District 7 AMA Pattern Championships held at our field in October was very successful and there was considerable revenue for our club. New Business: Because there were no other candidates for any club officer and the current officers agreed to continue, those current officers were approved by the members present to maintain their positions for the 2018 year. It was announced that Saturday and Sunday, May 21 st and 22 nd, we will host our annual Quickie 500 race at our field. Friday, May 20 th, will be a day of practice and preparation for the race. The field will also be closed to general flying on that day. Todd and Tyler are RC drag racing members and they introduced their side of the hobby to us. They ve have been looking for a place to run their cars. They heat up the tires on a carpet and not the track sometimes spraying the tires with WD-40. They will only run electric vehicles on the track. Their track needs to be 132 feet long. The cars will go about 60 MPH. The truck is a modified Traxxis Slash short track truck. They re willing to work around the Club s schedule and assist at the club. They are willing to join the AMA and our club. If allowed they would only use the runway for short periods, primarily in the evening. The FAA is reinstating the old rules and you need to register with them. If you already have registered and not cancelled it, you are good to go. If you cancelled, register again. Program and Show and Tell: John DeFries showed a Walbro Carburetor and how to make adjustments to it. Paul Rinde brought a scratch built electric plane he designed and built himself. It was a design by Fred Reese back in He built a few of them back in 80 s and set them up for combat flying. They were too small to use for combat and eventually they were dismissed. Fast forward to current times. Paul s Dad bought him a micro conversion for his plane and Paul decided to reinvent the design of the original plane. It s a 6-channel airplane. Raffle: Three-cell Lipo, Bumble Bee Quad, 2.4 Mhz Receiver, Soldering Jig, Texan Airplane, Electric Ugly Stick and Glue Meeting Adjourned at 11:00 AM by Jeff Szueber Minutes Submitted by Robert Evans

3 Oscar s Observations By Oscar Weingart At the Field The highlight of this past month was a 3-day visit by my Bel Air grandchildren, Joshua Weingart, 16, and his sister Bridget, 14, during the holidays. Josh owns an E-Flite Apprentice trainer, which he keeps at my house and only gets to fly it when he is in Riverside. It probably has more weight of glue from repairs than weight of foam. But Josh often practices flying at home on a computer with Real Flite simulation software. He is both an RRCC and AMA member. Well, (and several of our retired flyers can attest) Josh flew up a storm. He has mastered landings, which had been giving him trouble, and several of the witnesses now feel that he lands better than most of us old guys. We went flying 3 days in a row, and Josh flew five different airplanes without any major mishaps. These were: the Apprentice, Kyosho Calmato Sport high wing version, Kyosho Calmato Sport low wing version, RocHobby V- Tail glider, and E-Flite Radian XL glider. Josh prefers the way the familiar Apprentice flies, and he was practicing loops, rolls, Immelmann turns, horizontal and vertical eights, takeoffs and landings. He was doing so well that I turned him loose for a ten-minute Apprentice flight completely by himself, while I assembled one of the other planes. When I thought to glance over my shoulder to see how he was doing, the little sucker was doing touch and goes! (He is anything but little, at well over 6 feet and still growing.) One of his questions was Grandpa, haven t you got anything faster? One of my bigger (and hopefully faster) planes that I hope Josh will fly is an electric VQ Spacewalker ARF that Tom Bingham gave me several years ago. This.40 size glow or electric tail dragger is a little squirrelly on takeoff, and I broke it a little, a few years ago, and fixed it up recently. It has a.46-size HP motor (G-46) and a 5S, 4500 mah, 30C, LiPo battery. Bob Jones flew a test flight for me, and I took the controls after he got it in the air. It was a bit sensitive in roll, with those fullspan ailerons, for my elderly tastes, so I will probably fly it on low rate, with plenty of exponential. In the Shop Also a number of years ago, Hobby People was having a sale on the VQ Semi- Scale P-51D.40 size gas or electric ARF. The one that I bought has the markings of Lady Alice, Dr. Ken Wagner s gorgeous Mustang, which he hangars at Chino Airport. Despite the fact that Hobby People, which sold a lot of their kits, is out of business, VQ is still alive, and you can buy their ARFs and accessories on line at their web site, Again, this might be the Faster model that Josh wants, so I took the big VQ box down from its shelf, dusted it off, and started assembling it. I planned another.46 size electric motor and 5S battery that I own for this airplane, but after seeing how heavy and massive the assembled model is, I may install an HP.91 size electric motor (G-91) instead. (I think that they mean a.91 4-stroke size). This is the same diameter as the.46 size electric motor, but longer Oscar s Lady Alice

4 and heavier. As you can see from the prop size chart below, the.91 size motor offers little advantage over the.46 size, except that you can go to a 6S battery and a 14-inch prop, hopefully for more power. And most of my models need nose ballast anyway. The electric motor mount supplied with the ARF is the type that uses four adjustable long bolts with nuts and washers, so mounting the longer motor will be a no-brainer. The P-51D model has a nice removable top hatch, with pre-installed magnetic hold-downs, for battery change-out. One of the accessories that VQ offers is a pair of electric retracting gear units with scaletype, spring loaded Oleo struts. They were relatively easy to install in the wheel wells already present in the ARF wing, but adjusting them to give the proper angles and strut lengths to make them work in this particular airplane can be a lifetime project. If you like to tinker, this is the accessory for you. The gears extend and retract quite rapidly, so I hope that I won t lose control when they are operating, due to high current draw from the 5 Amp BEC in the 80 Amp ESC. I only have two of these HP 80 Amp ESCs, and not many manufacturers make this size. No-one makes them for less than $100 each. So I hope that the one in the Spacewalker is OK. The last attempted takeoff had to be aborted when the motor stopped dead during the initial takeoff roll, and would not run again. But at home on the bench it worked OK!! The VQ P-51D also has operating flaps, so all six channels on my transmitter will be in use. A very beautiful and popular scale model is the Texan II that Bob Estrella and Bob Jones both own. Bob Jones model is in the colorful Australian color scheme, complete with the Kangaroo national insignia. We showed Bob Estrella s model, in USAF colors, in last month s Prop talk. Bob Estrella s model is glow-powered and Bob Jones is electric-powered. They both fly and look great. I hope that all had a happy and healthy Christmas, New Years and Hannukah holiday season. Oscar John DeFries and his Walbro carb Standard RC drag racer demonstrated

5 Top Picture: Paul Rinde showing his scratch built Fred Reese designed mini Ugly Stick. It has six channels and along with Paul s expert workmanship, it flies just great. Bottom Picture: To give you a better idea of the Ugly Stick s size, here it is parked next to another model. Actually, the bigger one is really, really big. This Loctite 60-Second Universal Glue is really good stuff. It glues most anything (including plastics), sets in 60 seconds and can be found at Home Depot. Try it in your workshop. It s that time again; time to send in our 2018 dues. Annual fees are due by the end of January. The annual dues are $50 for an Open membership and $10 for those under 18 years of age. Fill out the form above, cut it out and mail it with your dues to Larry s P.O. Box. A check is the preferred method of payment as it makes Larry s job so much easier. Again, if you have a hardship let Larry know. He can help you work out a payment option. Just to let you know, Larry doesn't usually cash the checks until he has number of them. Riverside Radio Control Club 2018 Dues Name: Address: AMA Number: Phone: Make checks payable to RRCC Mail Dues to: Larry Roberts P.O. Box 295 Homeland, CA Check One: $50 (Open) $10 (Junior)

6 RIVERSIDE RADIO CONTROL CLUB P.O. Box 295 Homeland, CA 92548