5 day flight log!

Lazy bones I am...forgot to record flights  for five days of flying!  I flew Fri, Sat, Sun, Mon, and today Tuesday.  Today i flew the Bravata again, twice, at Dallas.  The DLE-30 ran well with the 1/8 turn of the high needle inwards to lean it.  Ran strong without the slight missing.  It also proved to be perfect for the idle and mid engine speeds with little to no missing that i can recall.  Yesterday I flew the Ministar four times and the Shoestring 60 twice.  The fix to the tank of the Shoe did the trick for obtaining full engine runs again.  On the weekend I flew the Goblin 500 about five times each day at the Keizer field with a couple flights of the X5 too on Saturday.  Both weekend days I also flew the Aerostar 40F five times.  And last Friday I flew the Intruder at Dallas for one flight, plus the SNAFU several times.  Hey, pretty good recollection after all!

Big Beautiful Bravata

Yay, the Bravata took to the air again!  It ran okay, not great, but never died in the air, so i was content.  Needs a lil leaning on high and low needles, but still flew nice.  The new Jtec muffler seems to still be attached securely.  Now that i think of it, the new muffler has a much skinnier can than the previous one from Valley View RC, so that likely caused the change in tuning.  I got in three nice long flights with the Bravata, with many loops, rolls, stall turns, low circles, and flap descents and landings.  Very fun flying plane, and i will take it to Dallas again soon so that Don can see it fly.

Yesterday before the grandkids came over, i went to krca to fly.  Got in five flights on the Aerostar 40F and two on the Starstream... all good!  The 40F is just a pussycat to fly.  Mowed the runway afterwards.

Flight Log: 08/17/2017

Mowed the field first, then flew the SNAFU twice in winds near 10mph.  Kinda rusty landing that thing but all went well.  Tuned the OS52FS on it a little bit.  Nobody else there in such conditions.

Where does the time go!

Geez i flew saturday and forgot to post.  I kinda recall taking two flights of the G500, two of the X5, then five with the Aerostar 40F.  On a couple Aerostar flights, Dave flew my old Aerostar 40 at the same time...cool to see both in the air together!  I flew again this morning before the kids came over for babysitting.  Today i got in five flights of the Aerostar 40F and four of the Ministar.  For both planes, I am dialing in some down elevator to reduce tucking to the canopy in knife edge.  For the Aerostar 40F, I also am mixing in aileron to reduce rollout when top rudder is applied for knife edge.  Just trying to make knife, four point tolls, and slow rolls look a little better, but high wing planes just dont knife edge well naturally.  All done for fun and some performance improvement.

Flight log: 08/10/2017

Flew at the Dallas field today, getting to know the field and guys better.  It's a good combo!  Took the RV-8 up twice, getting the Saito 82 dialed in closer and closer.  I have been richening the high needle to get a decent smoke trail without dropping off power, and then leaning or closing the low end to get a good idle and transition from low to full throttle.  I never really understood too much of tuning these four stroke engines, but I am improving slowly.  Flew the new Aerostar 40F four times today.  Nice plane, getting lots of fun with it, but kinda hate the caster tail wheel.  It is not positive and therefore not as safe in my opinion.  Too lazy to make a mod at this time.

Flight log: 08/09/2017

Went to the Dallas club this morning and had a nice time.  Only Doug T was there, later replaced by Joe.  I got in two flights on the RV-8 as i tuned in the Saito 82a on it better.  At least it stayed running in the air, but it sounded like it was hunting, and there was no smoke trail.  Concluded the high needle is too lean so i richened the high and screwed in the low needle.  The saito ran better the second flight but still hunted a wee bit and left no smoke trail.  So i opened the high needle another couple clicks, and turned in the low needle.  Ran fine on the bench and I taxied around for a few minutes.  The engine did not load up and die, and seemed to have a little bit of smoke trail, so I will see next time if it is dialed in or not.

The Aerostar 40F is growing more and more on me!  I think the right thrust issue is not bad now, so i am going to do some mixing of rudder and aileron/elevator to improve knife edge.

Catchup catchup catchup!

Been a lazy man and haven't been posting my flight days.  So many days have gone by that I cannot recount exactly, but this will have to serve as a catchup to fill the time between July 14 and today, August 8!  I have been flying lots.  Cousin Ron visited July 21-31 and I was flying helis lots in prep for that visit.  Then he came and we flew for 8 out of the 9 mornings available to us for flying.  Up at dawn, out at the field by 7:15 every day!  Kinda grueling at first but then just lots of fun, lol!  Then after he left, I was in the habit of getting out there so early and here we are over a week later, and I have gone to fly probably everyday but two since he left.  Been doing much with helis, flying all of my heli fleet while Ron visited.  Typically I flew about 5 or 6 heli flights everyday, and then another few plane flights.  Tad came out two days of Ron's visit, Jer two too, and Quang also two, but not all the same two days for each of them, except once.  Those days when the boys played with us, we flew Battle Wings like crazy and just had a ball.  Many midairs were experienced, and some videoed by Jer!  Nothing was damaged beyond repair.

Before Ron came, I bought another Aerostar 40 from Dick, this one with flaps.  Very cool plane.  I let Jer fly it and for some reason the plane became unresponsive on final about 30' high.  It just nosed over into a dive and crunched resoundingly.  The motor nose housing area completely came off the fuselage, and the structure between there and the forward wing bulkhead was obliterated.  Jer and Ron retrieved the plane and brought back every piece of wood they could find.  I did my forensic post crash analyses and guessed that there were elements of a perfect storm that caused the crash.
1.  Plane head on to pilot where receiver was blocked by large airborne battery pack.
2.  Large sprinkler system down runway edge, the one on wheels, running from pilot to past the plane.
3.  Steel fence posts and rails running in front of pilot towards the plane.
4.  Pilot holds xmitter with arms hanging low and xmitter pointing down and out.
Altogether, this led to blackout to the receiver.   Jer said there was full control of every surface and the motor at the crash site.

After a few days I decided to start repairs and see if I finished or just would give up on the plane.  I got her done, and it looks better than new, lol!  And today I flew it with the same receiver because I figured the same four conditions would not ever occur again, mostly because I don't hold my xmitter low like Jer.  As added precaution, I relocated the receiver up higher in the fuselage.  Due to one or both changes, there was no issue today with reception.  The plane flew fine...actually better because during the repair, I added a couple washers under the right side of the engine mount to reduce the right thrust built into the firewall by Dick.  It was too much, causing right turns under power.  Glad to have the new Aerostar 40 repaired and flyable again because it is a beauty and flies well.

For planes during the delinquent period, I flew the Battlewing, Aerostar 40F (flaps), Mini Aerostar, StarStream, Star, RV-8, Toledo Special, maybe something else!  And finally, I sold the Aerostar 40 to new guy at the field who could use it.  I don't need it now with the new Aerostar 40F in the fleet.

That will have to do as catchup for the several weeks of failing to report the flight log!