C/LCombat N
ow that the flying season is pretty much over in most of the country there’s time to do some thinking. I recently came across an article by Igor Trifonov (by way of Henning For- bech, I think) about how to train for Combat. He gives a pretty complete course of sugges- tions. Individually, they are all things that make you say “Well, of course”, but it has more impact when it’s all pulled together.
Translate.google.com gave me its usual mish mash translation, but the basic con- cepts are clear. Perhaps the first one is most important. If you have new flyers, or new-to- Combat pilots and they want to learn to fly Combat there is one place to start. Make sure they don’t pick up any bad habits that would interfere. If they are already a good flyer, try and lead them into learning some new, correct habits and dropping their old ones. The place to start is with the handle and controls. Most purchased planes use a 50mm bellcrank and have a leadout travel of 45mm or so for full control. This is impor- tant so that all models can be set up to have a consistent “feel” with full hand movement. Now take a look at your protege’s hand. Measure what size handle will give 40–50 mm of travel at the line attach point using full wrist movement. Usually this works out to about 90mm (3.5 inches). Folks with big hands may need to build their own handles. Kids can use an adult size handle; they just have to hold it in the middle. The area where the fingers rest should have a slight curve so pilots can easily ad- just their grip to match the exact trim of the handle. Inevitably one line will be a few mil- limeters long or short, so it is very helpful to be able to compensate simply by letting the handle rotate slightly in your grip. When setting up the planes/handle/lines make sure the axis of the grip is parallel to the axis of the model. I know many people like to set the handle with a slight forward angle, like a pistol grip. Unfortunately that style of handle automatically builds a bias into the
by phil cartier You can reach Phil Cartierat 34 Sweet Arrow Dr, Hummelstown, Pennsylvania 17036, or via e-mail at
philcartier@earthlink.net
PHOTOGRAPHY: PHIL CARTIER
Craig Campbell flew at Brodak's contest with an ancient SpiderSlow Combat and a Fox Mk IV. His grandson Josh Boak and Roy Glenn help.
controls. Learning to fly with the handle axis parallel to the plane axis gives a more even, consistent response to up and down. Obviously, maybe, the handle should be a
“hard point” handle with the lines attached directly to the handle, not to cables built into the handle. Adjustment cables on the handle just give the controls a sloppy feel. The han- dle can have some sort of limited adjustment for neutral. Plus or minus 5–6mm (1⁄4 in.) should be enough. You just have to learn how to make (or buy) lines with good length control. The other way is to sort lines by length, match up identical lengths as closely as possible.
If you make your own lines a jig is a must so it can be done indoors for consistency. Make up one line outside as close to 15.92 meters (52 feet, 2.75 inches) as possible. I can get a run of 25 feet or so in the base- ment. I mounted a large pulley, and old line
reel, on the wall. String the line from a hook on the edge of the bench around the pulley and back to the bench. Put another large pulley on the bench, run the line around it and put a couple pounds of pull on it. Mark the location of the loop.
To make up a set of lines, make up one end. Run it out around the pulley and back to the bench. Use a large bulldog clip or maybe a small Vise grip pliers to grip the line and pull on it a couple of pounds. Mark the location of the loop and terminate the line so the mark ends upright in the middle of the loop. Making a dozen lines this way will still end up with a variation of a couple of millimeters, so sort the lines into pairs as close as possible in length. The biggest vari- able is pretensioning the line. Every time you pull on the line the length will vary a couple of millimeters.
Now to the first training. A Combat plane
Everett Shoemake brought out a nice Voo Doo with an Enya 35 (at left) for Vintage Combat at Huntersville, NC in the fall. Vintage fliers build nice planes, fly careful matches just for fun. Roy Glenn (above) shows how to use a sleeve launcher to get his Half A up for a test flight. Extra foam from the wing cores is taped up into a sleeve that fits the wing snugly, and mounted on a tool box. Works well for planes up to 46–48 inch span for Speed Limit and F2D. If you want to launch a big Fast ship, get a helper for safety.
40 DECEMBER 2012
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