May PRESIDENT S CORNER Bill Towne

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1 May 2011 PRESIDENT S CORNER Bill Towne We have had some great flying weather the last month, activity at the field has really picked up. A lot of our pattern flyers have been practicing, getting out the kinks from the winter hiatus. This spring we have six new members; Bob Freas, Bill Hargreaves, Brian Williams, Mark Picard, Gary Valenzuela, and Steve Curry. Welcomed aboard, and I still owe some of you F.A.R.M. ball caps. I ll start bringing them to our events. A special thanks to Brian Williams who donated a nice new Flag for the field. At our April 26 th meeting we auctioned off six airframes from Ronald Steury s RC estate which his wife Jane donated to the club. Of course on the way over to her house I visualized it was going to be like finding a Ferrari that had been stored in an old barn for the last 50 years. It turned out to be more like finding a rusted out Model T in the field! Anyway these relics from the rafters were stored in the basement over a table saw that didn t have any dust control. So after I spent most of the day and, three rolls of paper towels, a bottle of Fantastic, a bottle of Windex, and a dirty bathtub, I was able to make the old airframes presentable, or at least I thought so! Of course they were just airframes, no engines or servos. Anyway I saved myself from staring down a shotgun barrel when I got home as I was able to unload them all. (I am definitely going to hide next time I see Anne Burhans, I think Nic ended up with three!) I was finally able to get in the maiden flight of the J-3 Cub I have been working on, after trying to get the old OS 70 Surpass to run right. I ended up learning a lot about disassembly and assembly of four stroke glow engines having to replace a broken exhaust valve spring and removing the timing gear and lifters that were pretty gummed up. Actually this brought me back to my misspent youth, when Chet the junk yard man from Jersey City would drop old Cadillac and Oldsmobile V-8s off the back of his pickup onto a pile of old tires on my buddy s front yard. I d get out the Gunk and kerosene, completely disassemble the engines, clean them up, new bearings, gaskets, paint, and if we had some money that week, bore them out, put in high

2 compression pistons, and high lift cams. Definitely needed a Quadrajet 4 barrel. Put back into a 50 ford coupe.we could leave a lot of rubber on the asphalt!! (Also transmission parts until Chet found us some Cadillac/LaSalle ambulance or hearse transmissions which were bullet proof.) But I digress. For a mechanical engineer working on these little engines it was a lot of fun, I even made up a special valve spring compressor that allows you to remove those tiny, tiny valve spring collets with just two hands instead of four! Back to the maiden flight, thanks to the engine fine tuning skills of Charlie Koustenis and flight trimming skills of Dave Rothberg and Dan Jones, I put in four flights, finally getting somewhat of a handle on takeoffs and landings with this short coupled tail dragger. I ll continue to fly several more times until happy with the engine set up and my takeoff and landings before I put on the rest of the scale items: cowl, struts, decals and markings. After their Spring Break, Congress will be reconvening to try to get the House and Senate FAA re-authorization bills reconciled. The Senate bill had the exemption for model aviation but the House bill did not. Hopefully the reconciled bill will include the exemption, but if not we hope the AMA Standards workgroup will get their points across with the FAA Unmanned Aircraft Program office that will be responsible for any new rules affecting model aviation if the exemption isn t incorporated. Actually there will be a discussion at Joe Nall this week between the AMA and the FAA regarding any new rules. Keep up to date by monitoring the government regulations section in the AMA web site. Speaking of new rules, our gas and gas cans have been disappearing from the F.A.R.M. hanger over the last several weeks without our permission and have not been returned. I asked Don our landlord about this, he said he didn t borrow them and was upset to hear they were missing. We are now locking up the gas and the mower keys, and you may want to be more careful about leaving anything valuable at the field. If you want to see some real precision flying be sure to come out to the F.A.R.M. Pattern contest on May 27 th, 28 th and 29 th. Our area pattern flyers are nationally known and can put on quite a show! It s not too early to start thinking about getting your aircraft ready for the June 25 th F.A.R.M. Float Fly and Picnic at Lake Ritchie. Get those floats built and planes ready for another great event! That reminds me we have to organize a rescue boat painting day! OK, See you all at the field, remember to sign in, think about what you are doing, help others, be safe and fly safe Cheers EDITOR S NOTES Bill Towne Upcoming Events: 1. Monthly Club Meeting, at Warrenton Community Center, 7 PM, 5/24/ Spring FARM Pattern Contest, at the field, all day, 5/28-29/ Fun Fly #3, at the field, 1:30 PM, 6/12/ Club Picnic & Float Lake Ritchie, 9:00 AM, 6/25/2011 (FARM field closed to 72mhz; open to 2.4ghz) SECRETARY S REPORT The April monthly meeting was held on April 26 at the Warrenton Community Center. There were no visitors or guests. Besides 5 board members, 11 others were present.

3 Officer Reports The secretary had nothing to report. I will dig out the 1997 Chipley Canard Papers for upcoming issues of the newsletter. (Today s is from January 1997.) Nic Burhans gave us a treasurer s report. We now have 109 members, with 4 new members since the last meeting. We now have $6,136 in the bank. Nic has posted AMA rules at the field. Seven members need check flights. For the budget, we are in the mid-year doldrums but still should be ahead by the end of the year. Vice President Ralph Graul noted that there are still some flyers who are not signing the book when they fly. The Safety Officer note that we seem to be having a lot of crashes lately. So check your plane over thoroughly when bringing it out from a winter of non-flying. Fly safe, and don t hurt anyone s property. Old Business Larry Kauffman reported on the upcoming pattern contest. Everything is about ready. Awards are on the way. Friday will be clean up time, and grass will be cut. Scoring helpers are needed for Saturday. Bill Towne and Les Broaddus plan to help on Sunday. Doug Cash will advertise the event on RC Group, and other sites. The field was worked with fertilizer and rolling last Monday (took about 5 hours). Weed killer was applied 2 weeks ago. This fall we should aerate and re-seed the field. Les Broaddus gave us some insight on winter weather effects to seed and aeration. We received a new flag from Brian Williams. Thanks, Brian! We are still selling shirts and hats. They were available at the meeting. Show and Tell Les Broaddus Tiger 60, 4c OS 110. Added triangle stock to strengthen. Monokote covered. Nice job Les! Doug Cash Great Planes P size electric motor, using 3s LiPo battery monokote was dulled to take the shine out of it. Wheels left off. Another nice one! Charlie Koustenis Tell 2100mah 3s LiPo batteries have interesting uses. A few in series drive electric starter and cranks a G-62 just fine. One similar 3s battery runs an electric compressor. 50/50 Drawings Nic Burhans won the money. Bill White won the fuel (thanks Hobby Hangar!) Board Meeting Nic Burhans wants to get 2012 dues in by 12/31. (He will be away in January.) We have papers for the first float fly in June. Papers for second float fly have been sent. Nic Burhans got bearings for the club trainer (.60 size motor.) The Barnstormers will have a buddy box day with Culpepper school kids on 6/18. We can handle 50 kids max. Water and soft drinks will be provided. We talked about future events at this field and touched on having an IMAC event or a war bird show. New Business We have lost 5 gallon gas can and a 2 gallon gas can lately. Looks like we will need to lock these up. Ron Stury estate sale model items were auctioned off by Bill Towne. Glory Days Vintage Fly-in will be held in Julia, NC on 5/21. There is a fly-in at Charlottesville on 5/ Wind speed meter needs to be 10 meters off the ground to give a good reading (this is hard to do). John Hunton showing off one of his creations.

4 TREASURER S REPORT Nic Burhans Nic s report for April is below. FARM Inc. Treasurer's Report as of 30 Apr Apr 11 $ 6, INCOME # 2011 New Member Dues & Fees (3) 18 Apr $ April Fun Fly (11) - cash 18 Apr $ New Member Dues & Fees (1) 29 Apr $ April 50/50-cash 29 Apr $ Stury Estate Auction 29 Apr $ Total Income: $ Sum of Assets: $ 7, EXPENSES Field Masintenance - mower oil #1477 $ Field Rental - May,Jun,Jul #1478 $ Website - renewal for 2 years #1479 $ Field Maintenance - weed control #1480 $ Field Maintenance - Gas can #1480 $ 8.39 Field Maintenance - Gas #1480 $ Field Maintenance - TP #1480 $ Pattern Contest - Plaques #1481 $ Float Fly #2 - sanction & insurance #1482 $ Newsletter - Printing #1483 $ 9.24 Total Expenses: $ 1, Ending Account Balance: 30 Apr 11 $ 6, Charlie Koustenis displays his recently purchased Beast, and electric ready-to-fly model. Regular Members: 69 Senior Members: 31 Junior Members: 4 Associate Members: 2 Life Members: 3 Total Membership: New Members Needing Checkouts: James Harding Needs check flight James Bristle Needs check flight Mark Phillips Needs check flight Sam Farhat Needs check flight 2011 New Members: Gary Valenzuela Mark Picard Jeff Hill Brian Williams Bill Hargreaves Steven Curry Needs check flight Bob Freas More of John Hunton s excellent work. From an older photo, is this his Northrup Gamma?

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6 FARM OFFICERS for 2011 President Bill Towne Vice President Ralph Graul Secretary Treasurer Nic Burhans Field Marshall Bill McMullen Safety Officer Doug Cash Member at Large Dan Jones FARM Newsletter Staff Editor Printer: UPS Store Manassas, VA The FARM Newsletter is published monthly by the Fauquier Aero Recreation Modelers, AMA charter #1654. It is mailed to FARM members and to other clubs on an exchange basis. Articles related to all types of aviation are welcome. Opinions expressed in the newsletter are those of the individual author and do not necessarily reflect those of FARM Inc. Publishing deadline is the 2 nd Tuesday of the month. Please mail all input to: Woodmont Ct. jeffkillen@verizon.net Manassas, VA Our web site is: FAUQUIER AERO RECREATION MODELERS Woodmont Ct. Manassas, VA That s a pretty bipe, Gene Flynn!