Ribcrackers Model Airplane Club

Thunderbolt May 2012 Club 2067 We’re on the web!

http:/www.ribcrackers.org

May Club Meeting

In case of fowl weather, the meeting will be held in Warren’s garage. Call any officer for directions.

Monday, May 7, 7:30 pm Ray Field - 55495 Grand River - East of Milford Rd.

F

Don

Student Night begins

Wednesday May 2, 6:00 pm

Continues every Wednesday

Dennis Kirkwood at the controls.

Ray Field LAT: 42.5062 N LON: 83.5987 W

Another flying season and the field is ready. The flight

line and pit area have been moved further to the South

to give pilots more room in the North air space to help

in preventing flying over Grand River. Parking now is

limited to a single row next to the pit. Additional park-

ing now will have to be in the gravel area down the

“hill”. The grass will need to be mowed shorter on the

“hill” to make easier movement carrying planes and

supplies to the pit to discourage animals from digging

holes. A few members have stepped into them in the

past.

Weak Signals put on another terrific show last month

and it was shoulder to shoulder on opening day. The

planes were detailed beautifully. It seems that the “fit-

n-finish” is improving by leaps and bounds each year.

I would really like to see the Green Monster fly.

Is anyone going to Joe Nall this month? If you do,

please take a lot of pictures for us. Student night starts

this month, every Wednesday at 6:00pm, weather per-

mitting. The underlying theme of AMA is to get young

people into our hobby. Perhaps the Ribcrackers can do

some recruiting this summer and add some new mem-

bers to this sport.

The AMA is asking for the club’s GPS coordinates, so I

have added ours to the Thunderbolt. Thanks to Greg

Kostyniuk, Veep Cruzen and Scribe Jerue for the photo-

graphs. I am always in need of photos and stories of

club member activities.

Ready to Roll

Ribcrackers April Meeting Minutes - April 2, 2012 Meeting called to order at 7:37

Previous meeting minutes were approved as written

Treasurer’s report – Bills are paid. Grass cutting has been arranged. Rolling needs to be arranged (please

include Dennis in any plans to roll the field)

Vice President’s report – Grass looks good with lots of

people already taking advantage of the nice weather.

Field desperately needs to be rolled. Probably best af-ter the flight line has been moved.

Secretary’s report – If you haven’t renewed by now

you are late and will be assessed late fees when renew-

ing. Everybody needs to keep an eye on who else is

flying at the field. Check to make sure that those flying are active members.

Student night starts first Wednesday in May (5-2-12)

President’s report – The fence proposal fell through. Would still like to move the flight line on April 28 with

rain date 4/29 at 10:00am. Storage building is now

gone.

Marshall’s model of the month was featured in last month’s newsletter which Marshall sent to Seagull

Model’s (maker of his Pilatus plane) president. Mar-

shall received a nice letter in return from her.

Model of the Month

Roger Wilfong brought in a mustang like model

featuring Sheeted foam wings, fiberglass fuselage and powered by an Astro 020 brushless motor.

Scott Cruzen brought in a model of a T-45 made by

China Made Products. His model featured a 3 to

3.5KW in-runner driving a 12 bladed fan unit using

electrons from a 6 cell 4500ma lipo battery. It also had electric retracts complete with sequenced gear

doors.

And the winner was Scott

Raffle

Gus won the blue ticket and Roger won the $50.00 gift card to Nankin.

Don’t forget that the next meeting will be at the field.

Compendiously submitted,

Gerald Klose

And the winner is

Scott “VEEP” Cruzen

and his T-45

Roger Wilfong

displaying his

Mustang.

MODEL OF THE MONTH

Coffee break.

Man, that Easterly

wind is cold.!

The pit fence and pilot

stations were removed.

The pit fence was relocated 20

feet to the South.

Thirteen mem-

bers turned

out for the an-

nual Clean Up/

Work Day on

Saturday, April

28. A steady

ten mile an

hour wind com-

ing out of the

East put a real

chill in the bod.

The task for the

day was to

move the pit fence, pilot stations, flight box, specta-

tor stands and shelter tent to the South at least

twenty feet. By 10:00 am the fences were down, in-

cluding the poles and plans were starting to move

the flight box. I arrived at 10:00am, the scheduled

start, just in time for the box move. The box was

rocked for a short time then eight or ten of us took

hold and whalla…...out it came. By 12:30pm all was

moved and set up

except a little fas-

tening of the fence

to the poles. All

morning we were

entertained by

Sam, the meat

hound , chasing a

ball thrown by

Greg Kostyniuk

and Errol Peschel.

I do think Sam was

tuckered out from

the experience.

When finished, we were cold…..time to go home.

When you see the following members give them a

big thank you. Dennis Carpenter, “Veep” Scott Cru-

zen, “Prez” Gus Dabringhaus, Art Jeffrey, “Scribe”

Matt Jerue, Dennis Kirkwood, Greg Kostyniuk,

Louie Marcon, Ron McHale, Ron Odom, Errol Pe-

schel, “Exchequer” Dennis Robbins, and me Don

Unsworth.

Spring Clean Up and Work Day

Where can I get a

drop hammer?

One tuckered out

dog. Greg

Kostyniuk and

Errol Peschel

making sure he

would sleep the

afternoon away.

OK, Sam…….give it up!

Ten guys were able to pull the flight

box out of the ground and walk/drag

it to a new location.

Weak Signals—58th Toledo RC Bob Brooks and I drove down to Toledo to attend the Toledo RC Expo . It was good as ever. The

planes were spectacular, the opening day crowd was crushing in the aisles both on the hall floor

and the mezzanine sale area.

It was shoulder to shoulder!

The detail was spectacular.

Don

A real

show

stopper,

and yes it

does fly.

That is some rocket!

Spring Flying Day After the Big Move

Ron Odom and his plane

Whose bike?

The Veep adjusting his plane.

The two Rons and Scott

checking out Scott’s plane.

Nice day and place

to hang out.

Repair Clinic

The Repair Clinic wrapped up at the

April Club meeting and Marshall re-

ports that Roger glued in the leading

edge and gave him explicit instruc-

tions on how to prepare the wing for

installing the final pieces of 1/16 ply

and balsa. Marshall when you com-

plete the task, bring it to a Club meet-

ing so that we can see the finished

repair.

What did you do this time, Hank?

Prez Gus showing a repair

technique to Greg and Ken.

Wings hang

from a small

aluminum or

wood strip in-

serted through

the spar tube

Some tail draggers can just hang from the tail wheel

Storing a bunch of large airplanes in such a way

that they don’t clutter up the floor in your shop,

garage, or basement - but are still easily accessi-

ble when it’s time to fly - can be a real chal-

lenge. A common solution is to build a rack

from PVC or wood that holds wings and fuse-

lages on the wall, and this works well if the

wings are removable and not too much of a

pain to assemble and disassemble. I store mine

in a slightly different way that keeps them out

from under foot and works whether the wings

are on or off. It also doesn’t require building

wall racks. I attach a picture hook or small

piece of bent aluminum to the underside of the

fuselage, typically held in place by one of the

landing gear bolts or in between the struts as

shown in the picture, then simply hang the

plane from a wall hook using a couple of zip-

ties connected to form a loop. The small hooks

on the belly of the plane are typically not visible

unless you flip the plane upside down. To save

wall space with planes that have removable

wings, you can insert a dowel or flat piece of

wood through the wing spar tube in the fuse-

lage and hang the wings from holes in the ends

of the wood using the wings’ nylon mounting

bolts. Store the spar itself in its mating hole in

the end of one wing panel. This makes it really

easy and quick to just grab a plane and go when

you’re ready to go flying.

Scott Cruzen

Small aluminum hook

screwed to landing gear

Planes hang with wings on or off

Simple Hints and Tricks

Club Positions

Vice President /

Field Marshall

Scott Cruzen

248-275-3416 scruzen@me.com

Treasurer

Dennis Robbins

248-661-3562

drobbins421@yahoo.com

Thunderbolt Editor

Don Unsworth

248-348-0961

dunswrth@sbcglobal.net

Minute Recorder Gerald Klose

248-582-1803

Raffle Coordinator

Warren Wells

248-437-2694

Safety Officer

Alex Alexopoulos

248-909-6869

Chief Instructor

Matt Jerue

248-348-5948

Ribcrackers 2012 Board of Directors

Librarian

Ken Hilton

248-885-9048

Secretary

Matt Jerue

248-348-5948

mdjerue@mi.rr.com

President

Gus Dabringhaus

248-486-4274 gusd@trudexone.com

UPCOMING LOCAL EVENTS

May 2—Student Night, Ray Field—6:00pm

May 6— Indoor Fling, Cloudbusters

May 7—Ribcrackers Club Meeting—7:30pm

May 19—Annual Spring Contest, Strathmoor Club of Detroit

May 19—Watts Over Wetzel, RC Club of Detroit

June 4—Ribcrackers Club Meeting

The planes were great, both vintage and new.

First time seeing the Air Force thunder-

birds….WOW!

Check out the details of local flying events on page 156 of Model Aviation, May issue.

Fun-n-Sun Fly In, Lakeland, Florida

Look familiar? Leon in

the April Thunderbolt re-

ported seeing FIFI at the

TICO show in Titusville,

Florida. My sons, Don and

Matt (a Ribcracker) and I

went to the Fun-n-Sun Fly-In

at Lakeland, Florida and

there she was again. It is a

great show, second only to

OSKOSH.