Author:
Reproduced with kind permission of Jason and Model Helicopter World.
Descriptive:
It was the time of the year again for the Scottish Nationals to take place and most of the competitors coming from the south and central of England made the long journey on the Thursday, finally getting to the hotel in the early evening ready to meet all the other pilots competing in the competitions over the weekend.
Friday
Most pilots got to the flying site early to get their helicopters set up, ready for the competition on the Saturday. I had done this and was at the field for a prompt 9:00am start of general flying and practise. On site already was Dave Wilshere and all the Motors and Rotors gang unloading as always an array of models ranging from little foamies to large jets, it just seems that Dave’s van resembles Dr Who’s tardis.
Dave Fisher and Darren Hardy had set up a flight line at one end of the strip ready for the days practise, but there seemed to be too many fliers for this line so another was set up by myself and Campbell, one of the Scottish hosts. Now all pilots could go between the two, this also allowed the option of flying in the opposite wind directions. In between flights there were jets and electric models fritting about the sky, so really a good relaxing day once I had both of my FAI machines flying the way I like them, ready for the competition the following day.
Saturday
Today was the F3C and the Sportsman competitions, this began by looking a little overcast with a few threatening clouds, but the air temperature was warm and not too windy so a flight line was selected for the days flying.
At 09:30 prompt Ian Corse, the Competition Director for the weekend began the pilots briefing and the flight order for the day, which was listed allowing no frequency clashes, luckily there was none, so once we had collected our frequency peg from the board we could have our transmitters all day and no TX control was required.
F3C – Round 1
The judges for F3C were named, these were myself, Pete Christy, John Martin, Jamie Cole and Jason Huntley. Once we were seated and all scorecards distributed the competition could begin. There were six pilots in this discipline. The first pilot was Dave Wilshere, the first flight of the day seems to be the worst as everyone is watching, but Dave put in a good round even though he did not know which manoeuvres to fly. There was some bumpy hovering but when the helicopter went off to fly the aeros it went into ballistic mode and before you could blink it had done the first manoeuvre at jet speed. The next flier up was Mike Gilfillan who had a new paint scheme on his machines, these were very visible in the air. Mike again seemed to have improved from last year with some nice hovering manoeuvres, but his aeros let him down with the helicopter not being central to the pilot and the general execution of the desired manoeuvres. A few of the judges bought this to his attention and hopefully these would be taken in good stead for the next round. Dave Fisher was next in the start box with the Scottish debut of his newly designed and British built Avro helicopter from Blitz Helicopters, this model had a nice presence and the hovering and aeros were very nice allowing some good scores to be produced . The wind for the day kept having a mind of it own which I think affected a few pilots including Dave with some of the hovering over the flags being slightly missed, but most of the pilots were having this problem which was influenced their scores aswell. Daniel Crozier was next with his Venture 90, Dan has made it into the British Team this year for the world champs in Poland, so all eyes were on him to see if he could keep up his good flying at the ripe old age of 17!!, and he was not going to disappoint putting in some nice solid slow controlled hovering and nice controlled aeros. Most of the day on Friday Darren Hardy had been putting in some hard practise and from my observations he was putting in some awesome flying, but on Saturday he seemed to be having a little bit of trouble getting the helicopter to lock into the hover and this was unfortunately shown in the scores, maybe down to nerves?, but the aeros he was completing were very good and a pleasure to watch. The last flier for this round was Steve Roberts, again putting in a good round, as I was on the end of the judging line I could see he was not hitting the flag I was in line with, he was not alone. Steve as most of the other pilots put in a good round of aeros and his pushovers were vertical, locked and level which was commented on by the judges.
By the end of the first round the judges thought it would be a tight result and we were not wrong, Steve Roberts had made it to first place with Dave Fisher in second and Daniel Crozier in third.
All five judges were all enjoying the flying until about 20 minutes into the round when we all began to get very cold. It can be a long process and you are not permitted to leave and get a coat or a blanket until the round is over, luckily Jim, who was collecting the scores after every flight was at hand to bring drinks and food and of course clothing, which he did very promptly.
Round 2
In this round it was noticeable that the pilots had either got used to their machines or the weather conditions, as the flights began getting better which also resulted in the scores going up. Mike Gilfillan had obviously took notice to watch the judges had said as his flying and scores improved. Steve and Dave were again in their usual battle for the top with Darren and Daniel battling it out for third place. Steve Roberts had come out first again with Dave Fisher in second and Daniel Crozier securing third.
Round 3
As from previous AHA (Aerobatic Helicopter Association) competitions the pressure was now on for the top pilots to put in their best round of the day, as this would be the last and could make all the difference. This was very noticeable in the flying again. One person who improved from the last rounds was Darren Hardy who accumulated 8 extra points. This may not sound a lot to people, but in F3C terms it could move you ahead of the competition. But Daniel was following suit with a 7.5 point rise, so again these two were clipping at each others heels. Unfortunately Steve Roberts had a worse round than the previous and Dave Fisher had improved by 5 points allowing him to clinch the final round. The results were calculated and waited for in anticipation. Once bought out, Steve had continued his reign for the fourth year as national champion with Dave being a very close second. Daniel had won the battle with Darren.
My conclusion as a judge for the day was the flying was very consistent and precise with some very nice aeros, a pleasure to watch.
Sportsmans
This year there were 6 pilots competing, and only two from last year, that was myself and Brian Nicholas. Scott Marshall, John Martin, Jon Gardner, Stuart McCallum, Rob Westwater and David Nolan (The Flying Lepricorn) were all competing for the first time.
The first flier up was Scott Marshall who is new to competition flying with only one previous competition under his belt. Scott put in a very good round with some nice hovering. On talking to him after he said “I was fine until I realised I was hovering nice and I got really nervous after that.” Next up was my main competitor John Martin, again another nice round with some nice aeros which put the pressure on me who was next to fly. I tend not to like the first round in any competition as I do not now how the weather conditions will affect the flying of the helicopter and to me it is always a test, but I seemed okay except I could not keep the model still in the hover.
Next up was Jon Gardner and Stuart McCallum who had never flown this schedule till the day before where myself and a few other competitors had spent some time going through it with them and demonstrating the manoeuvres. They both done very well in the competition environment and put in some good scores, so well done to the two of you. Rob Westwater was next up and was putting in some really nice flying which got everyone worried as he has only been flying for a short time in competitions and some good scores again were produced. David Nolan had travelled from Ireland to compete in the Freestyle event on the Sunday, but had been persuaded to join in the sportsman for a bit of fun as he put it. Dave’s Stratus is really a 3D model so was not set up for FAI flying, but he had a go and done quite well. This will be good practise for the Irish helicopter competitions that require some precision flying. The final competitor was Brian Nicholas who was flying his new TREX 600 Nitro with a OS50 Hyper, this got everybody’s attention to see how these new machines flew. As I was calling for Brian I had the best view of the model flying and I was very impressed. It seems to be as stable as the electric 600 machine and it had lots of power with the hyper engine.
At the end of the first round after a bit of confusion over the scoring I ended up on top spot with John Martin on my case and rob Westwater not too far away.
As with the F3C, 3 rounds were flown, on the second round there was not too much change except the flying order. Again the scores were going up as pilots were getting used to their machines and the weather conditions. I had adjusted some settings on my pitch curves to make the machine more responsive, and on my second round the heli seemed to be more stable and locked in the hover.
Round 3 was completed and the scores were calculated and the nervous wait was ended with myself being in first place and John Martin being placed second and Rob Westwater taking third. All in all a very tense battle for the top as there are pilots that are all closely matched in their flying skills. In my mind this makes a good competition as you have to “pull it out of the bag” to get to the top positions.
Once the competition had finished it was time for everyone to have a bit of a fun fly, and the first in the air was the Motors and Rotors gang with a variety of models. By this time a crowd of spectators had accumulated and Dave Wilshere decided to get the Composite-ARF Flash jet out for an airing. WOW !!! that thing can move and Dave can certainly fly it, with slow rolls and vertical climb outs, so high they disappeared through the clouds with everyone waiting to see where in the sky it would return, but this did not phase Dave. One comical moment was Trevor Skedge with a Mig ducted fan jet, happily flying around when some how it went behind some trees, Trevor thought he had lost it, but as he turned away to get the waders to retrieve it, up it came over the trees. Everyone then began to shout at him, but by the time he had turned round and got his hands back on the transmitter it had disappeared again, so the waders were required. The rest of the day was spent with pilots practising for the next days competitions of freestyle, scale and autospot.
Sunday
I got to the field before the 10am start call, to find that I was one of the last to arrive. Today was the day for freestyle, Scale, fun fly and Autospot.
First competition was the fun fly which involves three-two minute rounds of figure of eights around two poles, then knocking bottles of a table and finally picking up wooden triangles of a pedestal. The eventual winner was Dave (nutter) Wilshere.
This led onto the scale, only four models entered. A beautifully painted cobra from Bruce Irving with realistic moving cannons, a Bell 47 and a red Augusta 109 from Pete Christy and another Augusta from P Nichols. After an in depth assessment from the three judges and a demonstration flight the eventual winner was Bruce Irving.
It was now time for the freestyle, this consists of three minutes 3D flight that should be a pleasure to watch, but with technical ability added in. In other words no dramatic close to the ground manoeuvres, but this did not seem to be adhered to by the pilots as there were many close calls with mother earth. The eventual winner after a fly off with Dave Nolan was Daniel Crozier.
Throughout the afternoon the autospot competition was going on, which involves having two attempts at an auto to a four inch disk on the ground, once landed it is measured from the nose of the heli to the centre of the disk. This was won by Jamie Cole with his Stratus. I did not get the exact measurement but from observing his flight which came in inverted till the last minute, I can imagine it was very close to the marker.
After all the presentations were completed and photos taken, we started to make our long journeys home.
I would like to say a thank you form everyone to Ian Corse, Campbell Gray, Jim Selkirk for their great hospitality and for making it another smooth running competition, and see you all next year.