Good Afternoon,  I hope all of you readers are safe and sound and practicing safe viral isolation.  The Mrs and I were house-bound from Wednesday last week until Wednesday this week (had doc appt and grocery curb-side pick-ups).  Our experiences of social distancing in the public sphere were not smooth, nor are we eager to try that again.  But that’s not the subject of my writings today.

What many in the country (and world) are experiencing now is not much different than my day-to-day since my retirement 3.5 years ago.  I stay at home, do my stuff, and only went out in the evening or weekend if the Mrs said “let’s go”.  So, this is nothing new to me.

Strangely, it feels new – and not just because she is teleworking every day now, but mentally and emotionally, it is different.  2020 has proven to be a trying year, and we are only through the first quarter.  I’ve had web-site issues that I had to battle, supplier issues, increased prices for materials and postage, drop in sales, my mother passed away, our sons opened a new coffee shop – which is now closed indefinitely, and this virus thing is affecting the world in a myriad of ways that we couldn’t image in late last year.

Our near-future flying is in doubt – our indoor sessions are cancelled indefinitely, and outdoor sessions will be uncertain, and this time not just because of the weather.  All you have to do is look at the chart of infections to realize that we haven’t come close to peaking on this yet.  Here in Michigan, we have been hit hard – the Detroit Metro area is taking a big hit (where most of our aging Cloudbusters live), and according to the numbers I saw this morning, the county where we fly outdoors has an inordinately high count.  AMA has not cancelled the Indoor Nats – yet – but who would be surprised if they did.  After all, according to statistics in the end of May, we will either be on the tail end of an overwhelming spiked curve, or we will be in the middle of the flattened curve.  This isn’t going away any time soon.

All of this is taking a toll on me.  I consider myself level-headed and not given to irrational fears or panic – and I am not panicking or fearful.  But I am being dragged down emotionally.  It is hard for me to stick to any of my projects:  I can draw for a little, but I’m not eager to create something new.  I can pack orders, but I get tired of that, especially if a tedious task pops up where I have to “do something” (make parts, cut boards, count out a large number of things).  I am even struggling to build anything.  I currently have three planes in process.  I am finishing one that I started yesterday (see below) but I just don’t have much motivation to build anything.  And, I am more irritable than normal (not that anyone notices – HAHA!)

Of course, we all go through slow patches.  But I truly feel this is different.  I just don’t feel like doing anything.  I get up and do some of the stuff I mentioned above, but I take many more breaks than before and I get sucked into social media.  It is easy to see that and say “don’t go there” but there is little elsewhere to go – it is still cold and wet outside, so I cannot go work outside or on a car or stuff like that.  I cannot responsibly go away from the house.

On the positive side, I can see all of this in me.  I know it is happening to me and, because I know, I can try to do what I can to improve my lot.  I know that when I DO feel inspired, I need to take advantage of it.  I know that I MUST get orders out, so knowing certain things are less pleasant than other things, I tackle the more difficult stuff when I am feeling a little bit better.  And I know that building models will come back, even if flying doesn’t right away.

I have started on the Mega Caudron C.640 (as seen a few weeks ago), but it is stalled.  I started another Indoor Embryo (Hobo), but set it aside while I worked on the Corona Home Front Combat 1/2 Sized NoCal event.  I’ll get back to the Hobo soon, but I probably won’t have anywhere to fly it.  But, I did build something simple (nearly – it’s not quite finished).

I started on a Sky Bunny for the McCook Squadron’s Bill Warner Memorial.  This will take place in June at Muncie (all things permitting).  This plane is so simple, you can build it in a day.  And it is durable – everything is at least 3/32″ square (except for the sheetwood – ribs and pylon – which are 1/16″ sheet).  I’ve got to make the motor stick and landing gear, but all of the surfaces are built and covered.

For the tail, I dug in my scrap tissue box (you DO have a scrap tissue box, right?) the black tissue is scrap black Esaki, the yellow rudder is left over airbrushed (from a Durham Air Limo, I think) and the wings are some “domestic” tissue that I saved.  This tissue came wrapped around a bottle of gin we brought back from the Hebrides last summer.  Because of this, I will be calling my model the “Isle of Skye Bunny“.  Technically, the distillery was on Harris, not Skye, but it’s close – both islands are in the Hebrides!

I’ll be giving the surfaces a coat of Future to seal them up.  And, yes, building this made me happy(er).

Whether you fly for competition or just for fun, what follows WILL help you.

Background:  When I came back into the Free Flight game in 2012, I had about 75 FAC kanones (competition wins).  My first kanone was in 1990 and the last before my time-out was in 1999.  When I started back up, I continued to do the things that I had done 10 years earlier – I just built and flew – and kept track of things in my head.  This included rubber size used in each model and how the plane flies.

Somewhere within the first couple of years back, I realized that I was older and could not keep track of everything in my head.  (I’ve been told of a theory that there is only so much room in your brain cells and, as you grow older and that space fills up, there is no more room for new information – haha!)  Anyway, I started doing something that all of the better modelers do:  keeping a notebook.  I have a Franklin Planner left over from my corporate days and I buy refills for it.  One refill is a calendar, so I record upcoming events, but more importantly, the other refill is for blank note pages.  I make a page for each model and record characteristics on each model.  See the photos.

Things you can see in the notes (besides my ever-worsening handwriting):

• The name of the model and size/event
• The weight of the model and propeller used
• Rubber Motor Used, Number of Turns, Torque at those turns, Results.

This type of note-taking is critical – not just for remembering, but for analysis and improvement.  Look at the notes for the B.A.T. Monoplane.  The first four entries are testing observations where I was working up to final contest-ready performance.   He same is shown on the Yankee IV page.  I worked up to the rubber size and torque setting until I got optimum results.  Other things to note:  the notes are a) inconsistent and b) incomplete.  There is a lot more that could and should be added and observed.  Keep track like this and your level of success will increase.

The second thing that I do is on the other end of modeling.  I do this during the design and build phase.  Some of the information is created during the drawing and some is applied later after flying.  Take a look (clicking the image will open it in a new tab and it will be bigger):

This is an Excel sheet in which I record every design I am building – or even thinking about building.  There are over 100 entries and this is just some of them.   As you can see, I categorize them according to FAC Event.  Why?  This puts similar models together so that I can compare and predict performance.

This spreadsheet’s primary purpose was to calculate CG Locations based on TVo calculations (thanks to Don DeLoach’s and William McCombs’ works).  Later, I added modifications to the formula for biplanes and also a different TVo formula for Endurance ships.  Finally, there are columns to record observed model weights and grams per square inch (erroneously labeled as g/CuIn!)

Why all of this work?  well, during the design phase, I can predict performance based on the TVo.  This also shows if the tail is too small (see those red and yellow indicators in the TVo column?) so I know when to enlarge the tail.  Through these calculations, I know where to place the CG indicator on the plan.  As you might understand, that much is for the eventual production product, for the customer.  But the notes regarding weight, propellers, rubber, etc – that is basically for me.  I can compare built models to new models and say “I think the new model is a lot like old model X and I can use a similar prop and rubber”.  All of this helps with consistency and such when it comes to flying your models.

(Curious about the other colors on the chart?  Green on the model name = Short Kit in production, Yellow on the model name means a potential Production item.  Over on the weight column, Green indicates actual measured weight of the built model.  no color in that column often indicates a projected weight or a guestimate.)

So what does this all mean?  Well, looking at this and looking back at my history, I just don’t know how I ever got those first 75 kanones!  I did very, very little of this type of analysis back then.  Switching over (due to the fact that my advanced 50+ years made it difficult to keep track of model specs) has made an impact – my current kanone total is 259.  If you want better performance, keep track of what you do.