2025 may well be remembered as the summer of heat waves and by the time the club’s annual Free Flight Scale Fly-in came along we were well into our third.  The day before temperatures had reached a sweltering 32C in the afternoon so the early morning starts to our competition seemed like a good one, even so we decided to start an extra hour early at 8:30 so we could finish at 12pm and be off the meadow before the higher heat of the afternoon.

 

The plan seemed to work well with competitors arriving early to take advantage of the cool calm air to get their flights in. The normal 10:30 curfew on IC engines was also relaxed so those of the oily hand brigade could make the most of the conditions as well. CD Gary Law also had plenty of water on hand, a Gazebo for shade with chairs to sit on and was able to ferry people back to the car park at the end of the day which all made it much more pleasant.

Despite the predicted heat the meeting was fairly well attended with some fun flyers with both scale and sport models and spectators, which was great to see

There’s a video here showing many of the flights of the day. Thanks to Pete  Fardell and Charlie Jeffreys for the extra filming

FLYING ONLY 

The Flying Only Class saw the largest entry with 11 models . The rules allow up to 2 models per entry so Mike Staurt, Pete Fardell and Chris Brainwood all took advantage of the extra flying time and had a couple of entries. Bill Dennis was the CD, with the help of Trish Dennis, they ran the class in the smooth and relaxed style we are coming expect from an OMFC Scale event

 

The flying conditions were often quite tricky as the morning warmed up with some quite bumpy air to contend with. Finding a calm patch definitely made all the difference , not so easy to do those with IC engines as once you have started your diesel you generally just go with it.

 

 Both Mike Smith and Chris Brainwood fielded DH biplanes with very similar results . Both were IC powered and both had flights where they turned quite tightly and both found out how hard the meadow is after 3 heat waves. Mike’s Tiger Moth unfortunately had a hard arrival under power and breaking the rear fuselage off at the tail leaving him with a model I would have put straight back in the car. Undeterred Mike got out the Cyano and set about sticking it all back together. Much to his credit and skill it flew again several times flying well enough for a reasonable score in the conditions. Fairing only slightly better and just 25 points ahead was Chris Brainwood’s DH 60 Moth. Chris’s first flight the fuel level was miss judged and it ran out just after launch, the resultant stall and dive broke off the fin and despite also hitting the cyano bottle it never really got its usual trim back after that with a nice climb but a bit of a spiral dive on the glide.

Both models with superglue repairs

 

Mike did much better with his rubber powered Aeronca Defender to gain 9^th place. Charlie Jeffreys had his Rumpler flying nicely looking very much the part as it flew in lovely large circuits over the meadow. Charlie has clearly finessed the trimmimg from last year and was rewarded with  8 th place just behind the equal 7^th of Pete Fardell’s Stinson Sentinel and David King’s BAT Monoplane. David’s Bat Monoplane looked very impressive in the air, very slow flying with its broad chord wings.

 

Mike Stuart’s Bristol Superfreighter looked and sounded superb but the early flights the model was down on power no doubt due it having been last flown at the Indoor Nationals. With the power increased it was climbing much better but the more turbulent air meant it bounced about a bit more than was scale and it was unable to repeat it’s winning success of last year.

 

One model that always seems to confound the conditions and produce a high scoring flight is Pete Fardell’s Bleriot XI. This rubber powered model oozes the character and charm of an Edwardian aircraft and even has a model of Louis Bleriot himself flying it. The Bleriot also fly indoors as well even using the same rubber motor, which is extraordinary as often indoor models need more power to fly in the less than perfect conditions we have outside, as Mike’s Bristol proved. Pete’s Bleriot managed 5^th place  just five points behind Andy Blackburn’s 4^th place Miles Magister.

 

The Miles is built from the Aerographics design and was looking very smooth in the air, it was also entered in the Rubber Duration Class proving you need a car full of models to enter the Scale comps. 2nd and 3rd were also separated by just 5 points. Mike Stuart’s Consolidated Fleetster looked very convincing as it circled above our heads but lost out to the now well sorted Cessna 170 of Chris Brainwood.

 

Out in front though by an impressive 25 points was Ivan Taylor’s Gloster Meteor. The model is twin edf and like most of Ivan’s models to his own design. The flight was truly impressive and captured on video by Charlie Jeffrey’s ( checkout the link to youtube)  It looked to all intents and purposes like a real meteor over the meadow and flight won him the class and the John Blagg Trophy

Name	Model	Power	Best Flight
Ivan Taylor	Gloster Meteor	electric	880	1
Chris Brainwood	Cessna 170	I/C	855	2
Mike Stuart	Consolidated Fleetster	rubber	850	3
Andy Blackburn	Miles Magister	rubber	785	4
Pete Fardell	Bleriot XI	rubber	780	5
Mike Stuart	Bristol Superfreighter	electric	775	6
Pete Fardell	Stinson Sentinel	rubber	730	=7
David King	BAT Monoplane	rubber	730	=7
Charlie Jeffreys	Rumpler Taube	I/C	700	8
Mike Smith	Aeronca Defender	rubber	685	9
Chris Brainwood	DH 60 Moth	I/C	655	10
Mike Smith	DH 82 Tiger Moth	I/C	630	11

I will be adding to this report over the next few days, with more detail on the other classes but in the meantime here are the final results for the other classes

Scale Glider Duration

 

Name	Model	Flight 1	Flight 2	flight 3	Total
Bill Dennis	Schweizer TG-2	14	12	12	38	1
David King	Zlin 24	13	13	–	26	2
Chris Brainwood	Slingsby Eagle	10	–	–	10	3
Colin Sharman	Slingsby Prefect	–	–	–
Mike Stuart	Schweizer SG2-22	–	–	–
Pete Fardell	DH Sparrow	–	–	–

Rubber Scale Duration

Name	Model	Bonus	Flight 1	Flight 2	Flight 3	Total
Andy Blackburn	Miles Magister	45	60 max	60 max	60 max	225	1
Ivan Taylor	Auster	20	60 max	60 max	60 max	200	2
Pete Fardell	Stinsen Sentinel	45	44	33	33	155	3
David King	BAT Monoplane	20	39	35	60 max	154	4
Mike Stuart	Beech Bonanza	75	18	37	14	144	5
Mike Smith	Aeronca Defender	30	–	–	–

FROG Senior

 

Name	Model	Flight 1	Flight 2	Flight 3	total	Position
Andy Blackburn	Linnet	43	37	45	125	1
David King	Redwing	25	32	38	95	2
Gary Law	Linnet	11	25	—–	36	3