It is now a total wreck

What are the chances ? Today another mid-air collision.

The remains



The other plane

No chance of a repair, although the engine, receiver and 3 out of 4 servos seem intact. I spent the rest of the afternoon doing more tiling.

Thursday I did place an order for a new aerobatic model so hopefully I should be flying again next week-end.

Hmmm .....

I wonder if my tutor 40 committed suicide knowing that it was about to be replaced.

*&^*&^*^%$££$"$£" Tiling

The DVD never mentioned what to do when they fall of the wall, it didn't mention that while it will take evening after evening and leave one's hands and nails caked with tiling cement.

No the DVD showed a sterile room with tiles that fall apart along the "cut mark" and then almost stick themselves to the wall.

Mid-air

I got a real rush from flying on Saturday ...

I felt relaxed enough to try acrobatics I had never tried before and then felt brave enough to add the video camera to the plane for some aerial video photography. This time I was expecting an unstable plane and managed to re-trim the model. The result - some somewhat interesting footage. I'm currently fighting my computer and am unable to convert the mpeg-2 stream from the camera into something suitable for upload to youtube to that will have to wait.

The day did end in disaster however. On the last flight of an otherwise perfect day, I ran out of fuel, called "dead stick" and glided in for my final approach, lined up dead centre of the runway about 40 metres high when another model flew straight through me, the model that is. The model in two pieces, a tail piece - cruelly severed 4 fifths of the way down the fuselage and the rest, plummeted into the ground. The damage was pretty bad - broken tail, fuselage, engine mounts, propeller, wing servo and wing leading edge.

Later on Saturday night, after everyone had gone to bed, I looked over the damage and started gluing, replacing and improvising fixes such that by 4:15am I went to bed with some hope that it may possibly fly again.

Sunday it did fly, like a wounded phoenix it limped skyward held together with tape, a healthy dollop of glue and all the will I could muster. After landing and making a few adjustments it was flying similar to how it had before the crash. I say "similar" because knowing what it has been though I can't get rid of the feeling that it is going to fall apart in the air and come crashing to the ground again.

Fighting insanity

My olfactory hallucinations are back ...

They started about 7 years ago on a trip to San Francisco. I could smell this smell that can best be described as "almost but not quite like coffee". They returned on a handful of occasions since then and most recently returned two days ago and are still with me.

The smell is not unpleasant, or worrying, just weird.

I can't really explain it any better than "coffee" although it is more of a sensation of smelling coffee. When I smell real coffee it doesn't compare very well. I have done smell tests on my skin, my clothes, at home and at work, no one else smells it - am I going insane ? Perhaps the part of my brain responsible for smell is slowly decaying.

Oh well, there must be worse way to go than along with the smell of coffee.

This weekend I ......

1. Terrified myself by flying a video camera in my airplane. The model was out of trim and required all my skill to get it down in one piece. The video makes me airsick to watch. I will try again next weekend as I think I know now what went wrong.

2. Finally signed up to facebook. It was fear that if I didn't I'll be ostracized and placed on an ice-flow to die a slow and lonely death.

3. Resisted spending any money, despite incredible temptation, at a model air show I went to today.

4. Did some work on my bike to ensure it was ready for next week. I noticed that my tyres are very worn, checked my cycle computer and estimate that I have ridden about 3700 km in the last 18 months.

5. Washed the car

6. Got the car dirty again by driving it in dirt.

Michelangelo

I can empathise with Michelangelo during the painting of the Sistine Chapel as I am busy on a project of my own - the loft ceiling.

I am aiming for this effect



only in pure, solid white.

I fear for my eye-sight due to the dripping paint.

Ramadan

A work colleague is fasting for Ramadan. Today he was downright obnoxious. I suspect low blood sugar levels - either that or he is a jerk.

To bad Ramadan doesn't fall in the middle of winter as there would only be 4 hours of sunlight.

Time will tell if it gets better or worse over the course of the next month.

Aerial Photography

I managed to mount the video camera inside the fuselage, right on the centre of gravity. It does add 300g to the weight. This is 16% weight increase. My rudimentry knowledge of aerodynamics tells me I need a 4% increase in speed to compensate.

Either I'm correct or I'll be fishing a soggy plane, with video camera on board out of the Mole river.

Flight exam

Today I passed by 'A' test. One month and one one day after my first flight. Now I can rack up much more flight time. I spent my immediate freedom from supervision by doing some loops and rolls - at least thats what I called them - purests would probabily disagree.

Next up

a) Master some simple, clean aerobatics
b) Do some aerial photography - I need to experiment with methods of mounting the video camera underneath the aircraft

Pink (Salmon) Mobile Phone

This week saw me hand over my pink mobile phone to Annalise. She prefers it and I didn't think I felt strongly about it either way.

Now I miss this phone. Many was the time when at work, around the drinks machine, someone would come up to me and say something along the lines of "Is that a PINK phone?". To which I might respond "Aggggh, oh my gosh your're right" and drop it or "No it is actually Salmon". Such are the moments in which new acquaintances or forged or of the realisation that some people are just not worth the effort of trying to get to know any further.

I can remember the first cell phone I owned in Durban, South Africa. I carried it along with a pager because the battery would often be flat and it made me a prime mugging target when called into work at 3am in the morning. These, cell phone facilitated, early morning trips to the downtown office was also made more interesting by the prostitutes who never believed that I was also there for work purposes. Soon the freedom provided by being able to travel more while on call was exceeded by the ability to be called when-ever and where -ever. I remember the dread and the stress associated with the ring tone. Good news was never delivered via the cell phone.

In the US it was the same although spotty GSM coverage in our area meant that there were islands of "refuge".

Nowadays the mobile is just for texting and calling family and for the odd picture unless it is PINK and can act as an ice breaker.

Weekend activities

Today we went climbing in Portland, Dorset.

We've climbed there frequently, it is mostly (perhaps all) sport climbing on short 20-30 meter cliffs with the waves crashing below. Not much of an adrenaline rush, more "soak up the sun" kind of climbing. The worst the kids can do is fall in the sea while they are not climbing.

The rest of the pictures from today are here

On Saturday I went flying. There was some really good discuss launch gliders being flown - similar to these. I was kindly given a Zagi flying wing which I hope to use for slope flying although it needs additional harware and some work before it is ready.

Regarding the the powered flying I added another 2 flights to my flight log, practising dead-stick landings and figure 8's. I hope I'll be able to take the "A" test soon and so be able to fly without needing some-one watching over my shoulder.