The July Chapter 5 meeting was held on the 26th at the Nut Tree Airport at Vacaville. As I approached on highway 80 from the east, I spotted Gary's RAF 2000 in the air. For some strange reason, I tend to get a goofy grin on my face when I first see a gyro flying. Maybe this will go away when I start flying one myself. No, then I'll be grinning from the pilot's seat instead from the ground!
I drove to the airport, parked, and watched the RAF do a touch and go. On downwind, it sounded like the engine had quit; an eerie silence from where I was standing. The gyro quickly turned towards the runway and landed. Then the engine roared back to life and it took off again. As it was climbing out above the runway, the engine went silent once more! The gyro transitioned quickly from a climb to a descent and landed one more time, power off towards the end of the runway.
I figured someone must be getting some engine out simulation practice. Sure enough, Troy was taking a lesson with Gary. Looked to me like he was handling those engine out landings pretty well. George had also taken a lesson with Gary before the meeting. Keep up the good work in your gyro flight training guys!
The project update portion of the meeting is always interesting. There sure is a lot going on; here's just a sampling. Eric is building a Barnett J4B-2. Dave is working on his trailer and gyro, a classic Bensen. Carl has done some work on his engine and Bob Lewis on his rotorhead and alternator. And Mark is about ready to paint the tail feathers on his "Predator" gyro. Gary hasn't done any work on his gyros, he must be too busy instructing. Oh, and I passed my PP-ASEL checkride on the 7th!
Troy's Bandit is completely finished and flying and Joe had the honor of flying George's new Bandit on its' first flight July 12th. Joe is now working on an ultralight Bandit which will have lightweight Rotax 503 power. This should enable more people to get in the air under FAR part 103 rules. Meanwhile, Bob Aspegren wants to go the opposite direction: a Continental powered Bandit! Joe will also work on this configuration and they expect to get "quite adequate" performance from the stronger aircraft engine.
Georgi told us about Ralph Taggert's new electric prerotator system for the Gyrobee. It has electric motors and propellers on the hub bar. To avoid the problems with transferring current through a commutator, batteries are also located on the hub bar. You reach up and activate a timer, give the blades a quick push or two and take your seat. 60 seconds after activation, the timer starts the motors and they spin the blades up to speed. An interesting way to prerotate with no torque against the mast.
We were privileged to have several new guest visitors at the meeting this month. One of them, Regie from Fairfield, has ordered a Pitbull gyro. He will keep us informed of how this project progresses. There were at least six other visitors and we welcome them all to come back to more meetings.
In arranging our 1999 Nevada fly-in, Jim Digaetano was going to be our resident liaison. Due to the very unfortunate loss of Jim and the lack of major fly-in experience within the club, we may need to scale back our fly-in plans. The club will still hold the fly-in, but as more of a local event rather than a major national fly-in. This event will be held the first week of October in Jean, Nevada in 1999. We will still need everyone's help to put it on. If you have experience in this area, or just want to help, please volunteer!
Officer elections were held at this meeting. All members received a ballot and after they were counted, the results were:
The next meeting of P.R.A. Chapter 5 will be August 23, 1998 at 1 pm, Yuba County Airport, Marysville. See you there!