When a well-composed, nicely laid-out newsletter makes an appearance, hardly anyone troubles to comment. One might suppose that a missing issue would go unnoticed. Wrong! Calls and personally-delivered comments have proven that you folks do eagerly await -- and voraciously devour -- each issue. The non-issuance of the March issue turned out to be quite an issue, for which I issue deepest apology.
March itself was not cancelled, though the continuing unfriendly weather kept gyroheads mostly on the ground. Joe did carry out initial flights with Peter's new Tandem Bandit; we're watching the performance of his new redrive with keen interest; it appears to meet every expectation: quiet and smooth; I can hardly wait to get mine.
Saturday 24th brought a gathering of Chapter 5 folks to the Hiller Museum at San Carlos to watch a demo of the Groen Brothers flying machine. We took the opportunity to ogle the exhibits, which included a variety of experimental aircraft, most of which were rotary-wing machines. We'll try to arrange a future chapter excursion to the museum.
Even without the formal newsletter announcement, the Chapter 5 monthly meeting took place at Nut Tree the following day.
Finally, Mark and George saw the month out with a cross country flight to Willows for a gourmet breakfast at Nancy's Cafe. The winds aloft were a bit stiff, but the weather was warm enough for flying without snowmobile suit, or even jacket. It felt that summer had finally arrived, even if it was only for the one day.
"All you have to do to fly is throw yourself at the ground and miss."
-- Douglas Adams
Plans are firming up for the Black Rock Desert encampment. Someone at the March meeting pointed out the importance of avoiding the word "annual" in any of our public representations of this event, even though we were there last year, are planning for this year, and are thinking in terms of a yearly affair. It will simply be our club camp-out, and not an advertised commercial event that requires permits from BLM, insurance coverage, and other unnecessary hassle.
As suggested at the March Chapter Meeting, the porta-potty reservation for
that weekend has been upgraded to a his-and-hers pair mounted on a single trailer,
to be picked up in Reno on Thursday and returned on Sunday at a cost of $120.
But he himself continued to study possibilities of building and flying experimental aircraft. Although his ornithopter ideas had no chance of successful scale-up to human passenger capability, he might in time have succeeded with his attempts at confining "light air" in a vessel that would support lift. But an authority even more implacable than the FAA put a stop to his research. To beat the heat, Bacon wrote his famous disclaimer:
PRA Chapter 5 Newsletters are also available on-line at:
http://www.quiknet.com/~twitham/gyro/pra5/