Bullsheet - September 2001

Vol. 01 No. 09 - September 2001

President's Message

I don't know where to begin, A lot of things have happened since this noise issue of flying over wetlands & too close to houses has surfaced .

Let me give you a recap of what has happened. Early July we were visited at the field by a resident of Pilgrim Drive who was not very happy to say the least. His complaint was the noise pollution and flying too close to homes. I spoke with him on the telephone two days after his visit to the field. I assured him that we would take measures to alleviate his concerns.

Since then, we have monitored noise levels on planes and have told club members to fly a tighter pattern.

On July 29th, we had a fun fly. I received an e-mail from the same resident and was asked why the planes were flying over the wetlands behind Mayflower and Pilgrim Drives and creating unpleasant noise pollution, especially on weekends.

The club really needed to do something. Richard Kelley, Ray Breton and I went to meet him face to face. We had discussions on the noise issue and flying over homes. We assured him we would look at our noise levels and possibly look into building a new northerly runway.

Since that meeting we have been spot-checking the planes for noise levels and have found a few loud ones. We will continue to enforce our 97db level. This level requirement has always been a club rule, so please be aware. It is the responsible thing to do to be good neighbors.

We have also looked at our site, to try to come up with a northerly runway. We chose a new spot and mowed this runway three times to get it to the point where you could fly off of it. At best, it would just be a mediocre runway. I heard a few good things about this runway, but, I also heard a lot of negatives.
When you step back and look at our existing runway, we built on the prime piece of property on top of this hill. This secondary runway would always be secondary to the one we have now.

At the last meeting, there were many suggestions but the membership could not agree on anything. We ran out of light, and the mosquitoes were terrible. One vote was taken to stay on the existing field as is or to move to the secondary runway. The vote was split so we tabled everything to the next meeting. As the sunset at 8:30 PM, we adjourned. This meeting should have taken place inside the school where we could have discussed the issues and possible remedies for a longer time period.

The officers made the decision to move the flight lines to the west-side of the runway. This was an option brought up before, but there were so many negatives about it, it was dropped too quickly. The officers and a few members looked at it, measured it, got permission to park on the other side. If you come up to the site, you will find the field is turned around 180 degrees. We think this will work just fine. There is a lot of work left to make this happen. This action was taken in order to be a responsible club looking to be good neighbors.

Our family day was the first day flew with the field turned around. We lost one plane due to the fence that was across the way, but the fence has been removed and will be reinstalled on the opposite side in the near future. I contacted the resident after family day and he replied with an e-mail saying that our response has been great and he feels that the measures we have taken will succeed.

We feel the club needs to move on. We can have a great field again. It's just going to take some time. We felt we shouldn't drag our feet another month to take action that was needed immediately. I hope you will all support the officers with this decision.

-- Harry Peters Jr.

September SOAR is Coming!
On September 23rd the Southern New Hampshire Radio Control Club will be sponsoring its second glider contest for 2001.

The contest will be made up of three different types of gliders. The first type will be seven cell electric sailplanes. These will be allowed a one-minute motor run, followed by a specified max time. The Two-Meter (any glider up to 2 meters in wingspan) class sailplanes will be looking for the specified max time after release of the line. The Open class sailplanes (any sailplane over 100 in. wingspan) will also be looking for a specified max time after release of the line. All three class's will be looking for spot landing points as well.

  • Food will be available at noon time.
  • Registration begins at 8:00 and flying will begin at 9:00.
  • There will be a $5 per entry registration fee.

This will be the last glider event here at the club this season, so bring what you have got and let's have fun!

-- John Hayes

Web Site Update
As was reported at the last SNHRCC meeting, the club has obtained a new Internet domain name which is now www.snhrcc.org.
Typing that address into your web browser takes you directly to our new hosting location. The site is the same but the host is new.

Unfortunately the guy running our old website took exception with us not using them for "paid" web hosting and has TOTALLY eliminated a redirect page I had prepared and uploaded.

Personal emails and phone calls have been of no avail whatsoever. The guy basically told me if I want it back in there the club will have to PAY $40 to get it there.

It's a long story, but the upshot of it is the sources I used are less than HALF what NH.com charges, so I would NOT have used them even if he had offered, which he did not.

So I decided that we will wait on the new location to show up in the major search engines. I've personally asked the club's that have links to us to update their links to us.

We are already updated at a couple places like Tower Hobbies, Lycos.

This new solution will offer us roughly 40 times the web space we used to have.

-- Kip Bean

Glow Plugs (part 1)!

I went to the field the other day and watched a long time friend try to start his 4-stroke. It kept stopping, or losing RPM when he removed the glow driver. Finally he upped the throttle a bit to, in his words “warm up” the plug. Well, it stayed lit for a while at a much higher idle RPM - nice dead stick landing. Now when he tried to start it, the engine would not stay lit. He changed the glow plug and all was well, he did not even have to “warm up” the plug. Two flights later, same ugly scenario. When we looked at the plug, it was obvious something was wrong. The plug was discolored from heat, the coil was frosted, off center and was distorted. A new plug yielded good results, for two flights again!

Why you ask, justifiably?

GLOW PLUG BASICS
Glow plugs are usually made of 90% Platinum-10% Rhodium. The Rhodium is just along for the ride (it was made to be thermocouple wire). Our fuel is methanol based and when methanol (Methyl Alcohol) is in the presence of platinum and oxygen, it reacts or burns. The platinum is a catalyst or artificial aid in getting the burning process going. A fellow in the 495th R/C Squadron did an exhaustive metallurgical study on why glow plugs fail. George Werber’s report on glow plugs was published in Model Aviation in 1987.

George found that glow plug coils fail in two ways:

1. Mechanical (break, become unwelded, or bent);

2. Chemically. George found that over time, the platinum gets coated with carbon, thin enough to be crystal clear.

When the platinum is almost completely covered, the engine begins acting up. The engine will not keep running without a glow driver. What is not clear is the mechanism by which this coating happens or why some engines run for a hundred flights on one glow plug where others run only a few flights.

By the way, the glow driver heats up the platinum to accelerate the catalytic reaction thus making it very predictable on starting. Once the engine is running, the heat of combustion keeps the glow plug hot enough to quickly catalyze the ignition of the methanol. You can in fact start an engine with the correct methanol/air mixture in the combustion chamber without a glow driver. Beware; if you use WD-40 in your engines do not flip the prop. It may start. WD-40 is mostly methanol.

FAILURE MODE
As the coil gets coated with carbon it takes on a different look than the polished smooth metal it used to be. When coated, there is NO WAY we know of to remove the carbon chemically, and there is not enough metal value to try to remove the platinum and re-manufacture it. Solution, launch them as usual.

OK. So why did my friend’s glow plug fail in two flights when the rest of us get 100 flights for the same brand/number? In this case, his engine had too much compression and was running a little lean. The high compression combined with a lean condition caused slight denotation, or pre-mature combustion, the shock waves of which distorted the coil. The overheating from being too lean seems to have accelerated carbon deposition (a guess only, from the facts). The solution is now simple; put a couple more head gaskets in to reduce the compression and be absolutely sure the engine is NOT lean at full throttle.

To be continued next month.

Ed Note: Tom has supplied several articles of general interest and I will publish them as space permits. This article is long enough to span two issues. So look for further information in the next issue.

-- Tom Loose

TOUCH & GO!
Passed Away!
  • We regret to report the passing of club member Carl Kerns at the end of July 2001.
  • Peter Skentzos placed first in the Sportsman division of the Bush Pilots Classic Pattern Contest in Waterboro, ME on August 26th. Here is a photo of the winner with his new trophy and new two meter pattern ship. Congratulations Peter!

Newly Soloed!

  • Congratulations are also in order to Ferd Martin and Jeff Lavoie. Both recently soloed and now have their wings.

If you have any noteworthy items for the Bullsheet send them to me at bobj@rodchuck.com.

-- Bob Johnson

SWAP SHOP

NEW Hobby Shop!
Hello Members!

My name is Ted Zadlo and I recently became a member of the club.

As the owner of Pat O'Brien's Country Framer & Hobbies, I would like to extend an invitation to visit our quaint store. We specialize in aviation art, general hobbies and basic R/C supplies such as fuel, hardware, props, balsa, kits, etc. Soon we will be stocking motors and radios.

We carry SIG products, Balsa USA, Nelson paints and hardware, Graupner electric products, with more on the way. We are a dealer for Fiberclassics, Yellow Aircraft, Dare Hobbies, Clark Industries, Megatech, Tamiya, Irvine Engines, First Place Engines, B&B Mufflers and Quadra Engines.

We offer discounts to club members on all aviation art and custom framing. Special orders are never a problem.

  • Store Hours: M - F 11am to 9pm and Sat 9am to 5pm
  • We're convenient - Only 15 minutes from the field!
  • Location: 21 Litchfield Road, Londonderry
  • Phone: 434-5004
  • E-Mail: fokkerman@msn.com

We are looking forward to serving you!

-- Ted Zadlo