Challenger Launch
On the way home this afternoon from doing some shopping with my youngest daughter, she said “Dad, there’s a sailplane flying over at the LOFT field.” I looked through the windshield and, sure enough, I caught sight of an oversized bird circling around the IVY Tech campus.
“That’s Ray’s Challenger. It’s a big one. Twelve foot wingspan.”
Approach
Erin made appreciative noises and kept heading for home. As soon as she put the car into park in the driveway, though, I told her “Give me the keys. I’m going flying.”
I threw four planes, three transmitters, and my camera into the car (I even remembered to grab my sunglasses) and then hot-footed out to the field to cadge a ride up Ray’s winch line for my Dove.
The lift was spotty at best and the temperatures weren’t very friendly, but the sun was warm and the winds were light.
Ray launched several more times after I arrived. Each time the chute spiraled down practically on itself, leaving the winch line in little spirals on the ground. The Challenger sure is smooth in the air and seems to linger in ground effect forever on approach. Pretty bird.
I managed to balance the Dove a little better on one flight, although it doesn’t seem to like rudder turns and will drop its nose into a stall when I try. I borked it a bit on landing and separated the fin skin from the bellcrank, so back to the shop to fix that.
I also managed flights on my Flipper (re-motored with a 2850 brushless and 1800 mAh LiPo pack, and a folding prop), my Push-E Cat V5 (fitted with a folding prop), and my new design flat-foam Positron II delta wing. Neither of the folding props folded, which annoys me. There seems to be an issue with enabling the brake circuits on both speed controls or something. Ergo, neither one behaved like a proper sailplane. The Positron II actually flew an entire flight. The launch was a hairy affair and I figured out that I had the rudder reversed, but I actually got this sorted out until the very end when I lost orientation in the sun and “flopped” it into the grass with minimal damage. I’m calling it a good first flight.
I didn’t take any pictures of my stuff, but I got several of Ray’s Challenger. I’ve posted the link on the gallery page as usual.
