{"id":8131,"date":"2021-08-05T09:39:44","date_gmt":"2021-08-05T13:39:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/volareproducts.com\/blog\/?p=8131"},"modified":"2021-08-05T09:39:44","modified_gmt":"2021-08-05T13:39:44","slug":"back-from-the-nats-ups-and-downs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/volareproducts.com\/new2024\/back-from-the-nats-ups-and-downs\/","title":{"rendered":"Back from the Nats – Ups and Downs"},"content":{"rendered":"

IMPORTANT NEWS BELOW THE NATS REPORTS<\/strong><\/p>\n

Wow – it’s been a week since I returned from two weeks of Nats flying; first the AMA Indoor Nats in Pontiac, MI and then the AMA Outdoor Nats\u00a0 in Muncie, IN.\u00a0 Apparently, I’m no spring chicken as I was exhausted upon my return – ha!\u00a0 To be fair, I returned home every night from Pontiac as I elected to take the daily 135 mile drive – that was about 1,000 miles that week!\u00a0 Muncie was a 3 hour drive one way and I spent those days on the field with Pat Murray in his RV.<\/p>\n

Forgive me if this report is shorter than you might expect; my memory has never been the best and I tend to “live in the moment” and events fade as time passes.\u00a0 The Indoor Nats had 40-50 contestants, maybe more if you include all the Science Olympiad students that were there for a day or two.\u00a0 Most of those flyers were for the AMA events and only a few showed up for the FAC events.\u00a0 This was a little disappointing for me as this was a great opportunity to fly in a wonderful facility.<\/p>\n

I had been prepping for these Indoor Nats all winter since they were held on my “home field”.\u00a0 We Cloudbusters have been flying indoors at this site for maybe five years and while I still suffer from collisions with the girders, I felt I had a bit of an advantage.\u00a0 All of my indoor models were trimmed over time to fly within the confines of the facility and only other Cloudbusters would share that small advantage and I felt I needed any leg up as I still consider myself an Outdoor flyer flying Indoors.\u00a0 It turned out that I was the only Cloudbuster that showed up to fly.\u00a0 That minuscule advantage was all mine.<\/p>\n

My flying buddy, Winn Moore, showed up every day.\u00a0 He didn’t register to fly and ended up helping me throughout the contest.\u00a0 His help was immeasurable and we increased my flying times for several models.\u00a0 But we still had to contend with George Nunez (FL) and his some Jonathan (CA).\u00a0 I met George when I went to the Indoor Nats at Rantoul a few years ago.\u00a0 George shows up with a car-load of exquisite models.\u00a0 And Jonathan designed the Yak-3 Peanut that I’ve been campaigning and kitting.\u00a0 All of their models fly very well.<\/p>\n

Wrapping up the Indoor portion of this missive, I did pretty good.\u00a0 Some events evaded me, but overall I came out on top, as you can see in this photo.<\/p>\n

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I had a couple days (Saturday and Sunday) to stay at home and do non-airplane things – in between hastily packing orders and the truck and trailer with models and sales goods.\u00a0 I got a few orders out the door and in the car for contest pick-up.\u00a0 I even got a couple of kits cut, but had some minor issues.<\/p>\n

I drove down to Muncie Monday morning so that I would have all day to test and trim various models.\u00a0 The weather was great!\u00a0 Sunny with only the slightest breeze and temperatures in the mid-80s.\u00a0 It stayed that way through Wednesday and Thursday promised rain and wind.\u00a0 The rain happened BEFORE and AFTER the contest, but not during and the wind on Thursday wasn’t terrible.\u00a0 The temps felt like high-80s, maybe 90s and without any wind, the sweat just poured off of me.\u00a0 The three of us in Pat’s RV went through nearly 3 cases (32 bottles per case) of bottled water over the four days.\u00a0 At least we were hydrated.<\/p>\n

I got my new Holy Ike OT Stick trimmed out on Monday.\u00a0 It climbs like a rocket and glides well.\u00a0 It looked really promising for OT Stick on Tuesday.\u00a0 I put up an easy max on the first flight, but had a brain fart<\/strong> on the second.\u00a0 I clearly remember winding to a specific torque, which was well below max torque.\u00a0 I launched and watched a mediocre flight that ended six seconds short of a max.\u00a0 Well, that ended my hopes of winning OT Stick.\u00a0 I think three, maybe four, other flyers maxed out and had a fly-off.\u00a0 I should have been in that group and this model is capable of so much.\u00a0 Oh well, now I know.\u00a0 I’ll do better at the FAC Outdoor Champs\/SAM Champs.<\/p>\n

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Holy Ike – 1941 Class C Stick<\/p><\/div>\n

Brain Fart #2<\/strong> occurred on Wednesday.\u00a0 The weather was perfect.\u00a0 virtually no wind and light thermals everywhere.\u00a0 On a whim, I had brought my INDOOR Stout 2-AT for the OUTDOOR contest.\u00a0 It is a good flyer and I thought it might do OK in Golden Age.\u00a0 Backstory: when I am preparing for events (I guess “seriously” preparing for events), I do a test flight, or several, until the model is where I need it to be for the event.\u00a0 For my OT Stick and Fuse, I always take at least one test flight to verify the model is where is needs to be and is behaving properly.\u00a0 Well, I guess i wasn’t “serious” about Golden Age.\u00a0 I pulled the Stout out of the box and wound it up – with its INDOOR motor and everything.\u00a0 Pat asked if I was testing and I said “no, let’s go with this”.\u00a0 85 seconds later I was picking up the model after a low altitude flight.\u00a0 85 seconds is not 120 seconds and I dropped that first flight.\u00a0 I wasn’t upset as I had no expectations for the model.\u00a0 But I wondered why it didn’t climb in the excellent air.\u00a0 I realized that for INDOOR, I was limiting climb with downthrust so the model didn’t get into the girders.\u00a0 I took about half a turn out of the Gizmo Geezer nose button and wound up the 1\/8″ INDOOR motor again.\u00a0 I did it again for an identical third flight.\u00a0 Both of these flights were over 3 minutes, with tons of soaring and landing not-to-far away.\u00a0 Had I tested before going official, maybe I could have maxed out.\u00a0 Here is a video of one of them.<\/p>\n