GM 2009 REPORT

 

 

It was a PERFECT day and the official flight was followed by at least 10 other (MUCH better) flights till 9:30 PM! Sadly, there were NO takers to fly the mini-Cloud Tramp that I had built for the event - not high tech enough for the German community in my area.

Peter Brecker

Sorry to be late sending this. I had to go away just after the "Glorious first Saturday" and coming home 10 days later had all sorts of problems to settle -like a leak on my water heater. However, I flew at the Newton Aycliffe clubsite at Rushyford again within a few seconds of the magic 5pm. Weather clear with a light wind gusting to 6 to 8 mph but about 4 to 5 when launched. No noticeable lift but did 49 seconds. Glide was steeper angle than the climb as freewheel acted up. Now corrected. I had all the year trouble getting a consistent power pattern. So turned the motor stick upside down and put wing and tail on top. That is giving it a low thrust line. Hope I still qualify! One of the US photos shows a similar mod I think.
Hope results are still rolling in.

Tom Chambers.


This year the McCook Field Squadron of FAC flew the CT mass launch from----- yes, McCook Field, Dayton, Ohio! McCook Field, named after Major Daniel McCook and nine sons who all served as officers in the Civil War, was formed in 1917 as a temporary site for aircraft experimental and engineering purposes in WW I. McCook Field closed in 1927 with activities moving to Wright Field-- now Wright-Patterson AFB. The location of the former McCook Field is partially occupied by Kettering Park where we flew. We are proud to use the name of this early field -- one of the first military airfields in the U.S., and predecessor to Wright-Patterson AFB, in Dayton, Ohio.
The weather was fine with some wind from the South. Five flew in the launch-- left to right, Stu Cummins, Tom Ersted, Dick Meixell, Jim Bair, and Val Dahlem. McCook Ave, one of the remaining items with the McCook name, runs roughly where the original runway was. The photo on McCook Ave shows L to R, Jim Bair, Stu Cummins, Tom Ersted, Val Dahlem, Carl Belville, and Dick Meixell. Yes, we enjoyed the GRANTMIMLOCT and our visit to McCook Field. We thank Pete and Mike for their efforts in running this unique event.

Stu Cummins

Walsall MAC did its annual Mimloct mass launch at 5 O’clock on Saturday at our usual flying ground at Sutton Park. Unfortunately our members have depleted over the last few years as the march of time has taken its toll, so there were only 4 of us intrepid aeronuts. Incidentally, Sutton Park is reportedly the site of the very first model aeroplane contest in the world held by Birmingham MAC in 1909, and here we are with them celebrating their centenary with their member Pete Watson winning the world F1C Champs, Brilliant! Here Saturday weather was doing its regular (for this summer) stuff, raining! But around 4.30 the sky started to clear, and was brightening up and the rain had stopped when I arrived at the site. I noticed a couple of our members were cheating by carrying out some test flights, my model had not been out in the fresh air since last years Mimloct. I sorted out the motor (5 strands of 1/8) and installed it ready for the action.

At the correct time the mass? launch took place, and the results are shown below

1st. Mike Turner 1min 01sec

2nd Tony Hall 0min 45sec

3rd Steve Philpot 0min 35sec

4th Keith Horry 0min 03sec

We don’t know for sure what went wrong with Keith’s model, as he was one of the flyers who was doing some sneaky practice when I arrived, and when he tried it out again after the comp, it performed faultlessly.

Tony Hall


Another fun session with our Peanut Scale Cloud Tramp this morning at our small local school athletic field. Our son Ken and granddaughter Caitlin Hannan did the honors this time with the attached results. Weather was flat calm, about 77 degrees F, with only slight concern about a
couple of leashless canines cavorting nearby. Happily, their owners soon moved them away...

Note in one photo the 100th Anniversary Paris Air Show chapeau, sent from France by our good friend and fellow model builder Jojo Chaulet.

Bill and Joan Hannan

MIMLOCT was celebrated in Newquay, Cornwall by me, David Hughes and Tony Blagden of ModelPro, Falmouth.

We had run a successful Activities Week for students from my school, Newquay Tretherras, which included students building and decorating 16 Cloud Tramps. Unfortunately MIMLOCT falls in the first week of the school's summer holiday and none of the students were available to fly! The day was bright and clear but rather windy carrying our CTs long distances in very short times on very few winds of the motors, so no long flight times to report. Nevertheless, Cloud Tramp building is strong here in the UK's South West.

David Hughes

Weather at 18:00 local time was wonderful. Sunny, temperature 28 degree Celsius, wind something about 2 m/s from south-east. This year I was alone (my nephew is on holiday), my father was with me just as technical support and photograph. Thanks.

I took two CT’s (the first flight ever for both of them), two oldtimers: „Akron Favorite"/ 1939 and „Letna" /1942 (my new plane, today’s third first flight). As far as I can say, Cloud Tramp is perfect construction. It was wonderful flight. And something about „Akron Favorite" and „Letna"? What can I say… „Akron’s" worst flight was 124 secs and „Letna" looks like supersonic fighter (Mr. Koutny said about this construction that it looks like pregnant fish). It was amazing day,

Adam Jakes

At 1800 hrs (local time), nine members from our model club in Nyköping, Sweden, send our Cloud Tramps up in the air. It was a beautiful Swedish summer evening and we had a real good time knowing that we were together with hundreds of flyers all around the world.

Kent Josefsson

The weather all this week in Milton Keynes has been pretty unflyable but I was prepared to give it a go at 5.00pm today, Saturday 1st August. The only thing was that one of my favourite films 'Field of Dreams' was on tv so I left it to 10 minutes before the appointed hour before I jumped in the car and drove round to the local playing field. I hadn't flown here before, mainly because it is surrounded by trees on 3 sides and the canal is at the far end. I was amazed to find that it was flat calm! I quickly wound my CT checked the time and launched only to have the model come in from the right. I had one more go and then the first spots of rain fell followed by an absolute deluge. The time was 5.02pm! I ran for the shelter of the pavilion and phoned my mate Ray Millard to compare notes.

Bryan Lea

We launched right on time. A bit windy here at Hereford Texas but otherwise a beautiful day and Darrell Leachman drove from Amarillo to partake in this event. Launching at 11:00 CDT we then adjourned to the house for a fine Mexican Lunch and talked of many things, including model airplanes. Darrell and I are the sole representatives on the high plains and truly miss the lost members of Good ol' SAM 105, but we still enjoy the moment. The straight up climb of my CT to about a minute and a half flight let the wind carry it quite a distance but easily retrieved. Sandra took the picture.

Gerald Martin

Well, the forecast was for rain spreading across the country by mid afternoon, and although we're well to the East, things didn't look too good.

Anyway, we took the Tramps down to our friend's farm and after a couple of 150 turn flights to check the trim, we waited for the Church clock..........

However, the wind dropped to a light breeze and the clouds thinned to let the sun through.

Wendy and I flew on the stroke of five and so you have 2 more tramps that took part in the mass launch. Weather, Bright with gentle breeze. Long live the Cloud Tramp!!

Ray Millard

 

There were 6 of us at the Grassy Knoll this morning to do the annual Cloud Tramp Mass Launch. The weather was cool at 70 F, muggy at maybe 60% humidity--unusual for Los Angeles. Very little drift and a grey overcast. The "little feller" to my left, Bud Matthews posted the best time in the Cloud Tramp postal rounds we had after the mass launch.

Several of these put up flights in the postal contest in the hour after the mass launch. In contrast to previous years where lift abounded in that hour, today was sort of mediocre for lift. Guys were struggling to get 50 second individual flights, although one guy did put up a 65 second flight. By contrast, three years ago most of us were posting scores in the minute and 45 second to the two and a half minute range. One flight that morning was three minutes and forty seconds. We need some of that good hot air to get the good flight times. Didn't have it today.

Mike Myers

The 2nd annual Tucson Free Flight Club’s (TFFC) participation in the 15th annual Charles Hampson Grant Memorial International Launch Of Cloud Tramps (MIMLOCT) occurred on schedule, 9AM local time. I arrived at the Marana field shortly after 8AM and already present was Jean Andrews, Ed Augst and his wife, Patty, who was present to make sure we got a real
"action" shot this time. Although not quite as hot as last year, that’s a relative observation down here in the Sonoran Desert. It was already bordering on 90 Fahrenheit as I was unpacking. Winds were generally calm but, every now and then, a stiff gust would come by to shake things
up.

Jean and Ed had planes already trimmed and were putting in some nice flights as I was getting things sorted. I, true to form, had stayed up late the night before and really didn’t declare my plane "done" until very early this morning. Learning a thing or two from last year, though,
I had a model that flew "right off the building table." I was particular happy with a tiny Delrin nose block that I had machined, which made side thrust adjustments very easy to dial in while cutting down on nose weight. The test flight on mine, with about 400 turns on the motor, indicated that I really didn’t have to do much more adjusting. Ed chose to build his wing mounting block in the style of Pat Seale . . .
http://www.mikedparker.karoo.net/saddle.htm . . . and I’m going to do the same on my next Cloud Tramp, as the flat panel wing mounting at the root is what was gave me fits while building late the previous evening. Jean still had his model from last year and felt it was still a better flier than his more recently assembled one.

As it was, I came rather close to missing the appointed 9AM mark, as I was in the process of retrieving my model from the field after what was certainly my best flight of the morning. Running back in for a quick wind, I uncoupled the plane from my homemade winding stooge and hurried over to join up with Jean and Ed with about one minute to spare. My portable radio tuned to the local NPR station, once again, provided the same accurate time cue as last year. The breeze had picked up a little as the models launched and this, I think, worked to both Jean and Ed’s advantage. They both got great climb-outs and marvellous flights. In my haste to wind for the 9AM deadline, I didn’t check my model as thoroughly as I should of and something was out of adjustment. I got a rather odd tight circle with no appreciable altitude this time and a
rather graceless nose-in for a landing. The important thing, though, is that we all launched at the appointed time.

I never duplicated my best flight from earlier that day and ended up cracking one of the wing panels on a subsequent flight due to a hard landing. Now I have an excuse to make that new wing like Ed’s. My Delrin nose block, though, proved its worth. Jean’s 2008 plane was starting
to show signs of wear on the nose hanger assembly that he had adapted from an old North Pacific Sleek Streak. Other than that, his model was still flyable. Ed’s plane survived the morning relatively unscathed.

Temperatures by 9:30AM were staring to get the best of us and we were all packed up to leave by then. Other models in the air that morning included Jean’s CO2 powered Curtiss Jenny and my 1945 Comet Mosquito toss glider. Late summer flying in our desert locale is rather rare
but it seems that a few of us are willing to brave the heat long enough each year to get our Cloud Tramps airborne on schedule with the rest of the world.

Photo descriptions: Our "action" shot has (from left to right) Ed and I just about to release our planes while Jean has just gotten his model off to a good start. No computer-generated imagery was employed on this photo. :-)

The "static" group shot is (again from left to right) Jean, myself and Ed. The rather interesting mountainscape in the background is Picaho Peak, a fossilized volcano 30 miles to the north of us and the site of the western-most battle of the US Civil War in 1862.

Ben Nead

The weather was hot and humid with a light, but noticeable breeze rolling in the tops of the trees. The school playgrounds were closed for summer maintenance (bumz!)but the Sammi De parking lot was empty so what the Hell! I arrived a little early to test hop the CT, It hadn't seen air since last year and the rubber looked a little rough. Sure Enough after two test flights, it snapped and Zero Hour was approaching. Thank God for the Spare Motor!

With only minutes to spare, I changed the motor and cranked her up about three hundred turns, not wanting to overdo it. At 1:00 pm AST up she went. She didn't climb much but around in circles she went. When she landed: ouch!

The old girl is getting war weary but is still ready for battle. She'll do Jim M's postal or die trying.

 

Jim Norfolk

 

 

We are the participants in the Grant MIMLOCT 2009 from the west of Germany on Saturday, August 1st, 2009:

The children Nora and Aaron and her dad Willi Schmitz. Venue was the flying field of our local model club MC Heinsberg-Karken 1972 e.V. The little town of Heinsberg is in the most western part of Germany very close to the Dutch border about 80 KM west of Cologne. The flying field is only 800 m away from the Netherlands. Depending on wind direction and duration of the models the freeflighters sometimes do international flights and land in our neighbour country.

At exactly 18.00 h Middle European Summer Time three Cloud Tramps were launched. But while 2 of them headed for the blue sky the Cloud Tramp of Nora decided not to climb but to go down to earth and hit hard at terra firma. It was Nora's fault because she didn't launch it properly and the torque of the prop pulled her Cloud Tramp down to earth. Her flight only lasted for 2 seconds and on impact the propeller broke. That was the only damage to the Cloud Tramp.

The flight of my own Cloud Tramp lasted for 28 seconds and Aaron's CT made a very nice flight with 46 seconds!

We are very proud that we could participate in this worldwide occasion of Grant MIMLOCT 2009.

I have attached 3 pictures which were taken by our flying buddy Dieter Baues.

Willi Schmitz

We had the Cloud Tramp Mass Launch today at Fentress Auxiliary Landing Field located in Chesapeake, VA, USA, (1988 NATS site), today. The launch was at 12 noon on the dot. I counted 18 people actual launching a Cloud Tramp. I am compiling a list for you (some people did not sign up on the list).

Steve Fehr placed a video of the mass launch on youtube.com. The link is below: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1ZMC4E-I18

There was one mishap with Willis Swindell getting his nose cut from the result of a mid-air by Bill Sequira’s and Jimmy Welch’s models. Other than that, everything went fine. Marjorie Mathison had to bandage up Willis’s nose. Willis is the one in the red shirt located on the right side of the video.

John Tate

I found a couple of Cloud Tramps on top of a cupboard, been there since Joan & I retired to Moncton in 2005! Anyway some fresh lubed rubber & a test flight last week so we were all ready to go today. The weather has been stormy the last couple of days but cleared up today with blue sky, clouds & a stiff breeze. I flew from a piece of waste land in Moncton, New Brunswick,
Canada which is covered in places with high weeds (none of that mythical long grass unfortunately!). I had a test flight on 200 turns & thought I had lost it! Fortunately the thermal passed quickly so I was ready again for launch time here - 11pm local time, 250 turns to be rewarded with a nice flight which cleared all of the puddles & landed in the weeds. Score
ONE for New Brunswick!

Tom Wilson

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