-The October Meeting-

    The October meeting was held on Tuesday October 2, at 7:00PM. Only seven members attended  (Where was everybody else??). We started the meeting in room B-115, then realized that some other members were in a different room down the hall because the sign in the lobby directed them there. We=ll have to be careful in the future.

  George Gurney reported that the portable toilet at the field will be removed soon. We already got more time than we paid for in the rental agreement.

  There was essentially no business to conduct, so the meeting was short and sweet!

   We were reminded that election of club officers for 2002 is coming up in December. The nominating committee will meet and conscript a slate of officers and present their names at the December meeting. At that time the floor will be open for additional nominations, then we will vote. If you have aspirations for a position of power and prestige, please let Mark Wharton know at the November meeting or sooner.

  Curt Buergin won a whopping five dollars in the 50-50 raffle at the end of the meeting!

-Show and Tell-

  Will Coder brought and demonstrated his Robart incidence meter. This valuable tool is used to show the incidence angles of wings and horizontal stabilizers on models. Almost nothing screws up the flying qualities of a good model like having the wing and/or tail incidence angles wrong, or having a warped wing . The incidence meter can help you find a problem like this in the shop rather than in the air (not pretty!). It simply slides onto the leading and trailing edges of a wing or tail and shows the angle of tilt relative to horizontal. Most planes require a slight angular difference (called decalage) between wing and tail for stability. That is, the wing is slightly up and/or the tail is slightly down. Many aerobatic ships use a zero-zero setup, which, along with a symmetrical airfoil make the plane equally stable flying upright or inverted. If these angles are wrong, your plane may not fly as well as it should.

  A warped wing can be spotted by comparing the incidence angles of both wing tips. They should be the same. If not, then one tip will stall before the other and the plane will roll sharply very quickly! This can be especially bad on a landing approach, leading to a runway cartwheel and some major repairs!

   The incidence meter eliminates errors and guesswork on this critical factor. Thanks for showing it, Will!

  Curt Buergin brought a Barnstormer biplane to show. Curt bought several sheets of the material that Aircore uses for their models and built this one from the kit plans. The material is called Cloroplast, and is widely used for making signs. I forgot where Curt got this material. You=ll have to ask him.

  The Barnstormer bipe is done up in blue and yellow like a Stearman PT-17. Curt scanned the large star emblems into his computer and printed them out, then applied them to the wings. Looks good! Power for this plane comes from an O.S. 70 four stroke, which should take it straight up! Curt even made a very realistic dummy radial engine from Cloroplast and balsa, which adds a lot of character to the model. Nice job, Curt!

Buzzard Field Fun Fly

   I attended the Buzzard Field Fall Fun Fly on September 30. It was windy, and there were not many pilots there, but my planes survived several flights, and it was fun, as always! I enjoy going there each year to see many old R/C modeling friends from the Lock Haven area. I've know some of those guys for nearly thirty years (gosh, I'm getting old!).

   Reminder - This is your newsletter, not mine. I appreciate receiving any info to put in here each month. Do you have useful information to share? Questions about building or flying? Comments about a kit you have built? Please share them with the club.  Thanks.

 Happy landings!

Sam Stitzer 814-364-9530

 samstitz@yahoo.com