Model Airplanes

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About 30 pilots arrived Aug. 25-26 for this year’s event.

“We finally got some decent weather,” said Club President Dick Reich. “This is the best weather we’ve had in four or five years. We saw double the number of pilots compared to last year.”

Fliers traveled from St. Paul, Fargo-Moorhead, Grand Forks, Bemidji, Lake George, Laporte, Perham and Detroit Lakes.

The grassy, five-acre site — newly named Ronald Griffith Field — lies four miles west of Park Rapids. Griffith previously owned the property, but when it was sold to the R. D. Offutt Company, he made sure a corner of it would remain the club’s airfield.

“He was one of members. Passed away last year so we named the field for him,” said Reich.

Zeke Staloch is one of the club’s newest members. He prefers First Person View (FPV) RC flying. A live video feed is instantly transmitted from the aircraft down to Staloch, who wears video goggles. An onboard security camera sends a signal via a video transmitter. A video receiver, with two different antennas (directional and omnidirectional), picks whichever one has better reception, Staloch explained.

He has been building model airplanes for five years. On Saturday, he brought three planes, of various sizes, constructed with foam core board and rubber bands. The shafts are from arrows.

“Light. Cheap. You pull the electronics out of there, I’ve got about three dollars worth of material,” he said.

Two of the planes have 60-inch wing spans; the other 36 inches.

He also flies quads. “Those are all down for maintenance,”

Article source: http://www.parkrapidsenterprise.com/news/4491811-fun-fly-draws-30-model-airplane-pilots

Flying the friendly skies wasn’t always possible, Saturday, Aug. 18, as members of the Northern Connecticut Radio Control Club (NCRCC) sent their electric airplanes soaring, with the early hours of the day focused on solo flights, but also with a 2 p.m. full contact battle contest.

It was all in good fun, though. Saturday’s event at the Club’s Green Road field in Ellington was an opportunity for members who enjoy the electric side of model airplanes to enjoy a day and night of flying.

“This nonprofit Club has been around a long time. NCRCC owns the 40 acres here and for us, it’s our own little hole in the woods. It’s a really nice facility for us to play with our toy airplanes,” said Jonathan Sawn, contest director and owner of Sawncraft, a model airplane design and manufacturing firm.

Sawn said their electric group within the larger club travels up and down the East Coast to participate in electric airplane events and competitions. And while it is still very much a male-dominated field, he said there has been a push to get more women and children interested in the hobby. He recommended checking out the YouTube site called Flite Test. “They’ve done a fantastic job of taking the exclusivity out of the hobby and bringing in STEM, which is big in schools,” said Sawn. The difference between electric model airplanes and their gas-powered counterparts was immediately noticeable at the field. It was the silence. Gas-powered engines make quite a

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