Post by thevon on Nov 1, 2008 18:04:04 GMT 10
Well that was exciting! Crazy wind at Woody Point.
I spent an hour and a half fiddling with my Ricochet and programming it into my old Optic 6 Tx, to try to feed my moldie addiction. My real moldies have 2 flap servos so I can't use them on the Optic 6 but the Rico has only one flap servo. Good chance to dust it off again. I was looking forward to being risky and flying it at Shorncliffe.
But the wind shifted from NE to SE by 1pm or so, making it no good for flying fragile planes at SC. No problems, it's a really really low tide this arvo, making it perfect for beach landings at Woody Point, only a coupla blocks away for me. But ... the wind also got much much stronger. The house was rumbling at times.
I decided to have a go anyway, and went down at about 4:30pm. I knew it was no good for the Rico when the van was shaking in the wind when I stopped. I just about got blown over when I walked out from behind it! It was hard to slide the door open, there was so much wind force on it. The ocean looked angry, the sea and sky a steely grey.
So I pulled out the Reaper - the best plane I have for heavy conditions. As I walked to the lip of the slope the wind ripped it out of my hands and pranged it back on the footpath! No damage. Finally got a launch and it was away, but as I fiddled with the (faulty) trim buttons and hung around close by, I didn't count on the speed of the downwind speed - didn't turn tight enough and it caught a branch lightly but tumbled to the deck upside down and quite hard, crumpling the Reaper’s nice stiff tailfin. Dang.
After the initial wave of shame and humiliation had passed I thought oh well, I’m here to fly … so I stuck a bit of cellotape over the edge of the fin, patted it into shape (it looked comically skew-wiff, like a new Akubra that’s been stood on) and threw it off again.
It was exciting flying. Really wild, with turbulence in strange places. Woody Point is a low slope so it never gets strong lift, but enough to fly and this arvo it was enough to have the Reaper in its element. I was able to loop and roll whereas last week at SC it just didn’t have the energy for it. Way over to the right, in front of the big trees there was a huge column of lift. Crab across - suddenly the plane would shudder in turbulence and then when you got the spot, up she’d shoot. Higher than I’ve seen at that spot before. Weird. But great for some massive halfpipes. The Reaper was rockin'.
The landings were no drama. I never had to go down the beach to land. It just plopped into the grass nicely each time.
It’s great the way you can fall in love with a plane again. Like Sean with his Skua, I sort of lost interest in the Reaper, except for DS warmups. But the lack of a Tx and a damaged Nemesis meant trying different things. I wouldn’t normally think of flying the Reaper at SC or WP, but it’s been fun, and it’s forced me to tweak the setup to extract better performance on the frontside. Such an amazing plane – handles bad conditions so well, steady as a rock to fly. Everybody should have one. It was a great little session in wild conditions. Seabreeze shows 30 - 33 kts here at that time. Only 20 or 30 minutes flying, but an intense buzz.
P.S. - and that was my Reaper with NO ballast! You can imagine what it can handle with 540gm of ballast! Last Christmas I flew it in 40 - 50 knots at Bald Knob.
I spent an hour and a half fiddling with my Ricochet and programming it into my old Optic 6 Tx, to try to feed my moldie addiction. My real moldies have 2 flap servos so I can't use them on the Optic 6 but the Rico has only one flap servo. Good chance to dust it off again. I was looking forward to being risky and flying it at Shorncliffe.
But the wind shifted from NE to SE by 1pm or so, making it no good for flying fragile planes at SC. No problems, it's a really really low tide this arvo, making it perfect for beach landings at Woody Point, only a coupla blocks away for me. But ... the wind also got much much stronger. The house was rumbling at times.
I decided to have a go anyway, and went down at about 4:30pm. I knew it was no good for the Rico when the van was shaking in the wind when I stopped. I just about got blown over when I walked out from behind it! It was hard to slide the door open, there was so much wind force on it. The ocean looked angry, the sea and sky a steely grey.
So I pulled out the Reaper - the best plane I have for heavy conditions. As I walked to the lip of the slope the wind ripped it out of my hands and pranged it back on the footpath! No damage. Finally got a launch and it was away, but as I fiddled with the (faulty) trim buttons and hung around close by, I didn't count on the speed of the downwind speed - didn't turn tight enough and it caught a branch lightly but tumbled to the deck upside down and quite hard, crumpling the Reaper’s nice stiff tailfin. Dang.
After the initial wave of shame and humiliation had passed I thought oh well, I’m here to fly … so I stuck a bit of cellotape over the edge of the fin, patted it into shape (it looked comically skew-wiff, like a new Akubra that’s been stood on) and threw it off again.
It was exciting flying. Really wild, with turbulence in strange places. Woody Point is a low slope so it never gets strong lift, but enough to fly and this arvo it was enough to have the Reaper in its element. I was able to loop and roll whereas last week at SC it just didn’t have the energy for it. Way over to the right, in front of the big trees there was a huge column of lift. Crab across - suddenly the plane would shudder in turbulence and then when you got the spot, up she’d shoot. Higher than I’ve seen at that spot before. Weird. But great for some massive halfpipes. The Reaper was rockin'.
The landings were no drama. I never had to go down the beach to land. It just plopped into the grass nicely each time.
It’s great the way you can fall in love with a plane again. Like Sean with his Skua, I sort of lost interest in the Reaper, except for DS warmups. But the lack of a Tx and a damaged Nemesis meant trying different things. I wouldn’t normally think of flying the Reaper at SC or WP, but it’s been fun, and it’s forced me to tweak the setup to extract better performance on the frontside. Such an amazing plane – handles bad conditions so well, steady as a rock to fly. Everybody should have one. It was a great little session in wild conditions. Seabreeze shows 30 - 33 kts here at that time. Only 20 or 30 minutes flying, but an intense buzz.
P.S. - and that was my Reaper with NO ballast! You can imagine what it can handle with 540gm of ballast! Last Christmas I flew it in 40 - 50 knots at Bald Knob.
The tail was nowhere to be seen, just like it dessintegrated. Damage was not as bad as it looked. A bit of goop, tape, covering, tlc, and a new tail, she'll be going again. Unfortunately once Kane landed his plane we had a look and the impact had broken both spars on one of the wingpanels. Sorry mate. 
You can have a free shot next time we combat together. Also happy to repair it for you.
