The Whitesheet club's 24th scale day of the year inspired me to return to Portland for the first time in many years and the first time with my Harriers.
The predictability that come from a model I've flown for well over a year really helped to put the harrier in the compression more often than not. And that made it fast and fun!
A fun weekend's flying with the Harriers. I've not been able to make any league comps for a good few years but a 2 day comp close to home was one to make. Day 1 was cancelled and so I had the chance to fly Beer cliffs. A stunning place to fly with 400ft vertical cliffs and a steady breeze. But as prep for Whitesheet it wasn't the best!
Whitesheet's thermal lottery was always going to be a challenge. The organisation from the club managed to squeeze 10 rounds in and give everyone the chance of at least 1 good flight. Once I remembered where the bases were I was really pleased with the pace of the Harrier between the bases. When my good air did come (round 9) she was away and screamed around the course to set the 2nd fastest time of the day.
My eventual 10th is the second time in 2 comps that the Harrier has delivered this year, after the Nationals. Looking at the other models on show it's clear that there's more than 1 way to set up and fly each model. The Pike Precision 2 was a good example, Mike Shelim had his set up really nicely and and when the lift came he delivered some very impressive times.
A few weeks to the Welsh open any my next comp.
Between kids holidays and having so much fun flying the Falcon for he last few week's I realised that with the English open thermal lottery next week it was about time I got the Harrier going again.
Sunday was Whitesheet's open slope day and it was fantastic to see so many modellers arriving at the hill with an array of toys. Rusty? oh yes! but its wasn't long before I was wondering why I fly anything other than the Harrier- this is possibly why I always seem to take 2 models and just fly 1 when I go flying.
I see that flightech have received their latest batch of Harriers. It won't be long before there'll be more of these in the skys!
Starting work again has meant that trips to the slope have been more restricted lately. But some summer evening fly shouldn't be turned down when you get the chance. The Falcon has been the model that has come with me on just about every trip. Forget the the Harrier did so well in the nationals, I'm just loving the Falcon. Where as the Harrier I love putting the ballast in, the Falcon seems to feel better with a lower wing loading.
I really do enjoy a 100inch model, a lovely size for glide performance and agility as well as being able to centre on small pockets of lift.
Summer evenings, flying until the light goes are a special part of flying that I really enjoy. The antidote to that storm flying in the winter wearing 3 jumpers.
I've been sent details of Guillaume's excellent blog. He's taken a Harrier and electrified it. This is something that I have very little knowledge about and so I wouldn't want to make any recommendations of my own.
Harrier build log (guillaumeplayground.net)
It's great to see someone taking the Harrier and having fun with it, this is the whole point of this flying game!
After a great weekend at the nationals, the light winds and sunshine tempted me out to whitesheet with the Falcons. I had my blue fuselage model to maiden, a great excuse to get out. Team tea bag were, of course, there.
With the usual conversations going on about 'this model fly in up to 10mph then I'll get the next model from the car' I couldn't help to remember that this was the falcon that I had screaming around the crest in 40mph.
Dry, the harrier are spritely models and I've been dialling back the ailerons when in 'speed mode' to reduce the drag. It's light weight really helps it circle up in the summer thermals. I've not done much playing with reflex but having a lovely time learning.
