F3F Winter League 2 17 December. Ballageich Hill

After a fall on the ice last week which left me with sore ribs and back I had given up any hope of flying this weekend because the forecast was for north westerly winds which usually means the long walk to West Lomond and I wasn't up to a long walk. However, I wasn’t the only person not fancying the walk and Peter suggested we try Ballageith Hill near Eaglesham. This is a hill Dave Watson, Robert Carson and David Loomes use in nw winds and although it meant a longer drive the prospect of a shorter walk at the other end appealed!

To save on fuel I met up with Peter and we travelled through together; thanks to Peter for once again doing all the driving. We managed to take the wrong turn in Eaglesham and were last to arrive but the rest of the gang gave us a round of applause when we finally got there :o)

I hadn’t anticipated 4 inches of snow on the ground which made the initial steep climb a challenge and I managed to fall on my face but my skiboard bag and contents broke my fall! My poor ribs. Mike was unlucky and also fell but landed on his assembled Extreme and damaged a flap and wing trailing edge and had to go back to the car to get his Ascot. I had a chat to Mike about his Extreme and it will be heading my way soon for repair and a new home.

The walk over the moor was longer than I expected and was made hard going with the snow and the very soggy, boggy moorland but we made it to the slope after about 25 minutes trudging across the moor. The walk back seemed much longer! When we got to the slope the views over the reservoirs towards Glasgow, Campsie Fells, Arran, Firth of Clyde and Ailsa Craig were stunning.



I flew first and after a shaky first round got my Vikos going quite well. Peter was unlucky in round two to have the wind drop completely and he had no choice but to land out. The trudge down the hill and over even soggier moorland looked a challenge.

Despite his new leather cowboy hat Mike never seemed to get in the groove with his Ascot. Ola!!





Dave Kelly's Miraj was going well and it is a pity he had to leave early and didn’t get a proper result. Peter had to switch to his Cyril and Dave Watson and David Loomes also flew Cyrils and they were going well. David Loomes made the same error I did in one round when in better air he pulled too tight and lost all speed in the final turn! A good time ruined!

David had his live results system working and live feed to the internet seemed to work well. Ian Stewart sent me a text just after I landed after rounds 1 and 2 congratulating me on FTD and for having 2000 points. This position did not last once the others flew!

A great day out in nice winter weather.

Thanks again to Peter for doing the driving.

Northern Winter League round 2

The forecast for the second Northern winter league event was very encouraging with a promise of strong westerly winds and sunshine although also a promise of low temperatures.

Peter suggested a later start this month so I had an extra half hour in bed before getting to his house for 4:30 and we headed off to collect Mike on the way. Dave Watson was already in north Yorkshire although Dave was committed to flying his Cyril having left his Vikos wing joiner at home! A quick stop at the Purdy Lodge for an overpriced cup of tea and egg roll sustained us until we got to the baker's shop in Sleights for some pies and cake. We arrived at Horcum just in time to head up the hill to the Levisham slope. The climb certainly put a heat in us!

Although cold initially is soon warmed up a little and turned out to be a pretty good day out. My new Aldi salopettes were very effective in keeping me cozy!



I loaded all the ballast in my Vikos for the first round and I’m sure I changed the amount for all subsequent rounds! Round four I flew with only wing ballast and was back to full load by the final round! I could do with devising a faster way to change ballast.



I had a really good day and although I only finished in 14th place I was quite happy. I cut in round two and flew safe (long) for the rest of the day. Just before the final round I was speaking to Ronnie Lampe and saying I never liked flying last because at the end of the day the last flight of the competition is always rubbish. Ronnie was unconvinced and rightly so because my final flight saw some good air and my Vikos kicked up its heels and I was second in the last round!

A Festive burger at Mickey D’s just north of the Tyne Tunnel kept us sustained and I was home just after 10 and in time for a wee drink with SWMBO. :o)

Thanks once more to Peter for doing all the driving.
Dave took some great pictures.

Practice session East Lomond 1 December

With the next round of the Northern winter league on Saturday I decided that more practice would not be a bad thing especially when the forecast for East Lomond was quite promising.

The wind was blowing well round to the south west with a touch more west than ideal but a good 25mph so pretty good for East Lomond. I had taken my Vikos and it was going well and I intend sticking to it and keeping my Skorp as back-up. Peter joined me just as I was getting ready to launch and we had a good hour on the slope. Peter’s P3 was grooving round the turns as well as ever.

Encouraged by how much ballast Peter had in the P3 I filled up my Vikos completely. I should learn to fly heavy cos it was going really well!!

Some light rain blew through from time to time and the effect of raindrops on my goggles and the low winter sun made turns on the left a wee bit hard to see and rather scarey. I accidentally flew through the sun once which got my attention. I should concentrate on the flying and not gabbing to Peter!! Bishop Hill in the distance was in cloud and occasionally the cloudbase over East Lomond was not much above the slope.

I headed home via work to collect my extra warm winter gear which I keep in my locker. It was really cold today with 3 deg C and ice and frost on the ground up the hill. Can’t imagine Horcum being very warm!

Wednesday 30 November

A week off work decorating was getting to me so I headed up to Kilspindie for a break. The wind was 25mph sw and pretty well straight on the slope. Less windy than forecast but pretty good.

I took my repaired ex Dave Watson Spark out for a test flight and it was going well. A dive test showed a tendency to tuck under but easily manageable and no doubt due to weight added to rear of tailboom where the main repair was. Double layer of 2 oz carbon cloth over an old war wound seems very strong.

New front fuselage keel and glass fibre nose and elevators came from Robert Carson and made the repairs much easier. Thanks Robert. Without those parts my Spark may have been left in the corner of the shed for a while longer!

I spent a bit of time tuning in the butterfly elevator compensation and landings are now less frantic.

I flew the Spark with my Futaba TM8 2.4 GHz transmitter module and FrSky FASST compatible receiver and had no problems with it at all. Oddly when the sun disappeared and the cloud cover rolled it the air got quite thermally and I deliberately flew my Spark way out from the slope and it got high (very!) at times. No probs with range even when I deliberately turned my back on the model and put my body between the tx and model.


One interesting thing I notice with the Spark is the weight of those glassed blue foam wings does mean that rolls are slowish to start and stop compared to a hollow moulded model. The roll rate is fine but it is a wee bit sluggish and feels ever so slightly ponderous at times. Still a good hack model though :o)
Grand day out

F3F Winter League 1 Sat 19 November

The first F3F Winter was flown in some great weather considering it was the 19th of November. Twelve degrees Centigrade and light southerly winds which increased a little around the middle of the day and saw everyone adding ballast. Times in the early rounds were pedestrian (70 seconds) but steadily decreased as the conditions improved. Peter flew well and won the competition and also had FTD with his P3. Peter is really to grips with his P3 and it looked fast all day. Well done to him :o)









Dave Watson managed to cut four times but still finished in second place.









Mike flew his Ascot to good effect and even hand caught his model when landing towards the end of the day. I took pictures of his model all the way down to land but didn’t realise his intention and missed the catch :o(

I had a rubbish day and never got my Skorpion going and flew consistently long :o(






Better get some sleep before the next competition!


Tea and cake at the Pillars on the way home rounded off a great day out.

I took some mediocre pictures which can be seen here.

Kilspindie. Low cloud.

The wind direction looked changeable all day Saturday so I put off going out flying until today. An easterly was forecast with mist first thing but clearing mid morning. Well, the wind direction was correct with 15-20mph easterly straight on the slope but the visibility was hopeless and never got better than 20 metres horizontally and 10 metres vertically. That is the slope edge in the above photograph looking south along the edge.

Being an eternal optimist I took my Skorpion up to the east slope but it hid in the bag all day and could not be coaxed out. My Weasel Evo got some airtime though and I had fun keeping it in sight. I flew several flights but they were limited to scooting back and forward low along the slope edge and turning before I lost sight of it. There was enough visibility to squeeze in a roll before a turn was required. Trying two consecutive rolls was nearly my undoing when it got to the point where I could barely see it! Loops saw it disappear at the top before diving out of the low cloud again. Had an interesting flight when practicing low inverted and the fin fell off and blew back behind the slope and took a few minutes to find. The Weasel flies ok in level flight without a fin but a more than 30 deg bank sees it heading for the deck sideways. Managed to land it ok though:o)

Mad, quite mad!

Saturday 5 Nov. Northern Winter League 1

The forecast for the first Northern Winter League F3F event at the Hole of Horcum had looked dodgy all week but things were looking more promising by Friday until early evening when it looked less encouraging. Jon Edison sent out a cautious “On” email suggesting it may not be wise for competitors to travel a long way in case the competition didn’t happen. I called Peter and after thinking about it for a while Peter thought it worth the journey and with Mike equally keen the three of us agreed to give it a go.

I was at Peter’s house for 4am and we headed off to collect Mike on the way. Yawn!

A stop at Purdy Lodge for breakfast (egg roll for me) and we arrived at Horcum to see low cloud and poor visibility. Oh oh! Richard Bago and Paul Middleton were confident that it would clear. After half an hour of chat and banter the weather indeed seemed to be improving and we all headed for the trudge to the north-west slope. Course set-up, more banter, and the locals were proved correct and we were able to fly. We had to stop for 15 minutes after the first round when the low cloud made a re-appearance but after that we flew another uninterrupted 8 rounds.

The wind was blowing about 20-25mph, crossed from the right, and lift was very variable. Getting ten laps of good air required some luck. Skill helped too and the best guys were very lucky as usual and finished at the top!

Peter was flying his Predator 3 and coped with the conditions very well finishing in fourth position. The rarity of the P3 caused much interest and discussion. The unusual colour scheme received many words of approval. I thought the predominantly white model stood out exceptionaly well in the misty low cloud. NOT!











Mike left his Ascot in the car and only flew his Extreme and finished in eighth position. I finished in eleventh, I never managed to get my Vikos below 50 seconds all day:(

Interesting to see three Skopions being flown today, finishing second, sixth and ninth.. Next time I may try mine!

Mark Redsell flew his Freestyler 3 consistently quickly all day and was a convincing winner.

Paul Garnett had his hastily put together “bitsa” Skorpion going well too after his return from foreign climes and took second place. Paul got some fantastic air at one point and it looked like a very fast time til he cut! His Skorpion was ballistic!

Paul Middleton flew his Vikos very accurately and ended up in third place

Full results:-

1 Mark Redsell
2 Paul Garnett
3 Paul Middleton
4 Peter Gunning
5 Keith Wood
6 Paul Foster
7 Richard Bago
8 Mike MacCracken
9 Dave Wright
10 Ronnie Lampe
11 George Young
12 Jon Edison
13 Mark Treble
14 Egon Lewin

Thanks to Jon and his helpers for a great day out.

Scores and write up should be available on NYMRSC website.

Scottish Winter League starts in two weeks. Yippee