Bullsheet - February 2003

"Going, Going, Gone! - Sold!"

As the sound of our annual auction fades away (for this year, at least) we can look back on another successful auction.

Now we get to turn our attention towards the business at hand for the club.

Boy, do we have a lot of things planned for this year. As always, all of these events and functions need club members to volunteer and help out. There's plenty to do!.

Let's see, we have a Weight-Lift contest in July (and I hear the Flying Tiger's Club is planning a club entry or two), we have a Sailplane contest in June run by John Hayes, we have a Turkey Fun-Fly planned for November run by Kip (Can Turkey's Really Fly? I think we should leave that one alone!), we have a Club hosted Bar-B-Que on August 2nd to which we've invited the Flying Tiger's to join us for a day of food and flying. The Tiger's have responded by inviting us to a reciprocal event on July 12th. Now we need something for September and October! Some thought we should have another Construction Derby. What do you think? And do you want to help?

Although this is never a popular subject, we as a club need to start thinking and working on reducing the sound our airplanes make. We all love the sound our engines make and even within our club we have differences of opinion as to what is acceptable and what is not. The general public has other ideas on it as well.

How many of you know, without looking it up, what the club's sound rules are?

When was the last time you saw someone at the field testing or verifying the sound level their plane makes to see if it conforms to the club rules?

How many of your planes have been tested?

I know, when the sound meter comes out, the planes leave the field. Now, before everyone starts looking up the impeachment procedures, let's take a step back and relax a moment. Sound is an important and complex issue. There are going to be some hard decisions to be made, some people may feel picked on, or that we're trying to drive them out of the hobby. That just isn't so. We're trying to help resolve the sound issue and keep everyone flying and happy and keep our field. Tall order, and we may not be able to achieve it. But it is a goal we can all work towards as a club. The officers have discussed this at length and have identified that the best bang for the buck in quieting an airplane is to reduce your throttle setting (we know that for some of you , this is out of the question), tying everything down inside your airplane (no lose wires or control cables etc), followed by using a better (quieter) prop, and last but not least by using a better muffler. Testing with different props can get to be very expensive if you don't hit the right prop in the first try or two. So to help out here, the officers are proposing to have the club purchase a "representative sample" of props "For Testing Purposes Only". These props will be clearly marked in Orange (and re-balanced) and will be kept at the field. Every club member is invited to try different props on their airplane, test the sound levels, and flight test their airplane with the new prop, then put it back in the shed with the other props. These props are for everyone and are not give-aways, which reminds me, if you break a club prop, you'll need to replace it. That's only fair, and it's on the honor system. When you find something that works, share that information. Through education, testing, and sharing of ideas we can achieve our goal.

Now, where are those impeachment procedures?