AMA Nationals - Day 5

Fighting the thermal gods

My old friend, Joe Clawson, from Florida was flying in this event today. As I walked up a hill to watch him fly, I saw him launch a very nice model that climbed like a rocket into the sky. As the engine quit, his plane transitioned smoothly into a glide without losing any altitude, and immediately caught a thermal that caused it to climb skyward. As the three minute time approached, Joe was happy about the flight. The plane was circling and climbing nicely in the thermal. Unfortunately, when the three minute time came, the dethermaizer did not work, and the plane continued its climb into the bright sunny sky. Those of us on the ground followed the flight until it had been up over 15 minutes, and it was so far away that seeing it with naked eye(s) was hard. I lost it about then, but a spotter with binoculars kept it in sight until around 25 minutes, still climbing into the sky.

Joe had started walking after the model shortly after he launched it. After about 30 minutes, I saw him climbing the hill toward me. He muttered something about being stupid, and grabbed his radio direction finding gear, then walked over to his van to go on a model hunt that took quite a long time to complete.

Towards the end of the meet, Joe came back with his airplane and flew his model two more times, maxing out both times. We were delighted that he found his model, and that he continued to fly so well. I hope he won something for his efforts.

Rubber Scale

One fun event involves rubber powered models that are scale models of real aircraft. Several of these flew very nicely, motoring through the sky in the light winds we had today

Rubber Nostalgia

Jim Coffin entered Rubber Powered Nostalgia event, where the models were designed before around 1950 or so. His model flew nicely, but had issues turning in a circle. As a result, it motored off in a straight line a few times before he was done trimming it out.

One Eye Adventures

As I have said before, Jim Coffin has been my inspiration as I moved toward losing my eye to cancer. Jim has lived most of his life with one eye, after losing his in high school when a clutch exploded in a car he was working on. Jim eventually got an artificial eye, and many folks do not know he lost that eye. I am going to explore the artificial eye possibility in September during my next visit to M. D. Anderson.

Jim and I talked about life with one eye several times during this week, and his comments have been very helpful as I adjust to this new lifestyle. There have also been a few amusing moments.

Jim was flying his rubber powered ship today, and I was helping hin get the motor wound up and in the airplane before the launch. What was funny was me trying to pick up a wire, or something he needed and trying to hand it to him. I have trouble with depth perception, so picking up things is a challenge. Jim was trying to reach out and grab the thing I was going to hand him, and he had the exact same problem.

So there we both were, standing there trying to hand something off between us, and neither of us was making contact. It was hilarious! Between us, we had two good eyes, and should have been able to figure this out. (We did manage to get it done, but not without a few smirks!)

Wrapping up

This was a nice break. I got to spend the week visiting with old friends, and relive a kind of adventure I really enjoyed back in my high school and college days. It was things like this that made me want to become an Aeronautical Engineer, and I am thankful for the help these folks gave me. Jim Coffin and Joe Clawson were my mentors back then, and spending time with them was priceless.

Tomorrow, I check out of the motel and head back to Dayton for a few more days exploring my past. I am sitting in my motel room now, resting from another adventurous day in the sun. Hopefully, I did not get burned!