Mike K. flew in Mulvihill ( 9^th, 300 sec) and in Dawn Unlimited ( 3d, 222 sec) The Mini Eagle from Josh Finn that Mike flew in Mulvihill got caught in a tree 2.3 miles downwind on its first flight. Retrieval was successful but hard work! See Mike’s story below. (Mulvihill models are limited to 300 square inch wing, no other limits)

Mike planned to use the tree’d plane for Dawn Unlimited, but used his finally trimmed Bienenstien Avenger instead. Was a nice flight, reaching 3:42 minutes in dead air.

John L. got a First Place in F1J (579 sec). F1J  planes are piston motor powered, limited to 1 cc disp ( 0.061 cu. in.), 160 g min wt, 4 sec motor run, His Jetex powered plane hit a thermal and went OOS.

John S. (an Eagle from Beloit) was entered in P-30, but did not score. Friday afternoon flying was marred by a thunderstorm.

Mulvihill Plane before and after flight

Retrieval from tall tree

Problems at AMA NATS by Mike K.

Had two problems this year that were problematic.

First one was my Bienenstein Avenger, entered in the Nostalgia Large Stick event, that landed in the soybeans west of the main field. I had a good line on it, but for some reason, my GPS beacon was not functioning properly. I looked for it for an hour plus, wandering around looking at the signal strength indicator on my BMK Flexidisplay. I knew I was close, but just could not see the model.

Climbed a hilly spot near the peak signal spot, used my binoculars, still didn’t see anything. My guess was that the model itself had by that point settled into the beans and seeing the white rudder was likely the only way I would see it. I finally came up with a better plan. I grabbed my e-bike and ran it all around the edges of the field. I stood up on the bike and went slowly looking around inside and didn’t see it. I noticed an area that was mostly unplanted, like a long thick path, in between rows, in the middle of the field. Taking that path in the middle, I finally saw the white fin sticking up. None of the rest of the model was visible. It was not far from the hill, actually. What I realized was that the white fin was sticking up but I couldn’t see it due to it being on edge rather than flat to the eye. I changed to a different beacon and never had that issue again.

The next one was the same day, this one of the two J+H Mini Eagle Mulvihills I built for the NATS, and entered in the Mulvihill Competition. This was the second flight, easy 180 sec max, but the RDT didn’t seem to work. At 7 1/2 minutes, it was out of sight, but I still had great GPS signal. It never seemed to DT, even though I remembered lighting the fuse. Not sure what happened there. I hopped on my e-bike and began the chase. I went as far as I could west, then south. At one point I noticed the altimeter reading was at 559 meters. That is over 1800′. I got to a point where I couldn’t head any further west due to the freeway. I ended up heading back north, backtracking quite a ways here and there trying to figure out a way across. Ended up crossing back by the field, then heading back down, only to find myself in another area where I needed to go west but could not due to the next freeway. Again, back north, cross it, then back south. Finally found the plane in a tree 2.3 miles away from the launch site. By the time I got back to the flying field, not only was my battery just about dead, I had put almost 20 miles on the bike just for that trip. To make matters even more fun, I took a nail into one of my bike tires and had to have the innertube replaced. Good thing I was having fun! It took a couple of days, but a tree climber came out to grab it. The property owner was very kind to allow access. One thing about Muncie, I’ve not met any really unkind folks here. When I say “AMA” and model airplane, they may think I’m a bit kookie, but they all seem to enjoy being part of my story.