Michael Heer
May 18, 2004, 09:00 AM
@907880:Scouts Wellerstein and Davis with Scoutmaster Heer in the mid '90s, after flying the Hirobo electric paraplane.
@907881:Scoutmaster Heer flying the paraplane at a spring Camporee. This paraplane was later attacked by a hawk on a different outing.
I have been an adult scout leader for over fifteen years and during those fifteen years I have found numerous ways to share my love for R/C flying with a variety of boy scouts and students at local schools. The purpose of this article is to share some of those experiences in hopes that it will encourage others to share your information and love for this hobby so that more of us will plant seeds that will grow into future pilots sharing this hobby we love.
@907882:This THL ZAGI flew on many scout outings from the coast to the High Sierra.
@907883:One Sunday we did a five mile hike at Los Banos Creek Reservoir and finished in time to watch slope combat take place. The scouts loved it!
The easiest way to share the hobby is with a group presentation. This is a one-time event with your audience and one or more R/C fliers. You can present it to a small group, a class, an elementary school or a Camporee with hundreds of boy scouts. The smaller the group you are presenting to, the more hands-on you can be with your approach. For a single class or a scout troop I will basically seek about 45 minutes to an hour and will make my presentation in the form of a science class. The level of complexity of the presentation depends on their age so for now let’s use 8th graders for our target audience.
!!A Single Class or Troop
@907884:The 8th grade
@907885:science class in Stockton.
@907886:The book only mentions Bernoulli’s principle but the teacher’s edition mentions that Newton’s laws are also involved.
@907887:This is the author teaching (and posing).
With 8th graders or a troop of boy scouts I will present two major scientific rules about flying in general -- a simplified explanation of how the planes control surfaces work and how the radio controls those surfaces. I will let the students operate the radio controls while I hold the airplane so they all get a short hands-on feel for how this all works. If time allows, I usually have them all make a paper airplane of their own design and then we go outside to the school grounds or field for our actual flying.
The two scientific rules I discuss with them are Newton’s Third Law of Motion and Bernoulli’s Principle. Newton’s third law as I am sure you know is: “That for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.” I point out that by setting the wing with a couple degrees of upward angle of attack it pushes air down at the back of the wing and that pushes the plane up. I also show how the control surfaces force movement such as the elevator going up causes the back of the plane to be pushed down in a conventional plane and that makes the nose go up. For props I bring a small rocket with fins, a toy jet fighter and a small toy 747, my R/C airplanes and some empty soda cans.
+907903:Demonstration of the Bernoulli principle...creating low pressure between 2 cans.
For Bernoulli’s principle I talk about low pressure and how this can pull things in the direction of the lower pressure. A wing with lower pressure on top is slightly pulled up. The best example I have found is to use two empty soda cans and ask them what will happen when someone blows between cans. Will the cans go further apart or come together? The majority of students think they will blow apart. They are surprised to see them come together when I have someone blow between the cans with a straw. If time allows I give every person a straw and set up several stations with empty soda cans and let them do the experiment for themselves. When we lower the pressure between the cans by blowing between them with the straw, the higher pressure on the outside of the cans push them together .
@907888:Teaching science of flight at local high school.
@907889:A second class, this one of ninth graders, with enthusiasm.
Using a toy rocket, a toy jet fighter, and a model of a small toy 747 the students usually realize that flight with these is primarily based on Newton’s third law and not Bernoulli’s Principle, which only helps a little in some basic wing designs. They are usually quite pleased to know something that most people understand incorrectly if at all.
@907890:On a campout at Modesto Reservoir the scouts removed a couple tons of rocks from the flying field and in return got to fly on buddy boxes.
With Newton’s Third Law clear in their minds I give every student a piece of paper and have them make a paper airplane. I encourage creative designs but usually 90% are the simple basic paper airplane. With the paper airplanes in hand we go out to the field or if the room is large enough we have a contest for the plane that goes the farthest and then for the most accurate to a certain spot. I usually have a third event with accuracy for the best paper ball and everyone wins at that one. I usually have a small balsa hand toss glider for the winners of the first two events.
@907891:This is John R Williams school, I flew there after the rain had stopped but still windy for the Great Planes Wright Flyer.
With that completed I put on a flying demonstration after establishing a flight safety line and get a firm understanding that no one will run or move from behind the flight line. My demonstration planes vary on the size of the field. My GWS Tiger Moth has been used in many demonstrations but this year the Great Planes 1905 Wright Flyer has been used the most. If the field is large enough I will fly a larger, more powerful electric, such as my Multiplex Hummel with a geared brushless motor. It is like the Miss 2 that Hobby Lobby still sells and it is a great plane to use with new pilots. I usually let the teacher or scout leader pick a person on merit to fly the plane and I give the entire class a short ground lesson while I fly the plane and then I have the student pilot pick up the buddy box and I give them control at about 200 hundred feet of elevation.
I have had very good response with this and most students have quick success in flying. I help this by programming in almost no down elevator on the buddy box and just a little up. By having the elevator throw greatly reduced on the student transmitter they don’t over control as much as they normally would on a standard set-up. After they have flown it around for about a minute I thank them and disconnect the buddy box and do some loops and a barrel roll before bringing in the plane for a landing.
!!Larger Groups
For a really big presentation to a lot of students or scouts I like to have a couple of extra pilots to show some more styles of flying and have some more experts to walk down the flight line and talk to the spectators. If time and field space allows I like to have the show finish with some aerobatics. I usually let the best pilot know in advance he will be the grand finale and he should save something for the end. The most memorable Camporee ending was Jeff Hunter doing a high-speed pass just above the ground and then going vertical at an oak tree that no one thought he could possibly miss but he did. He later said: “It was easy because I was flying your plane and I had nothing to lose.”
A little advance preparation can help share the excitement if you are making an evening or weekend presentation. For scouts I have their scoutmaster let them take home a hand out from the meeting the week before I come. The handout is an invitation for adults to come and watch the demonstration if they are interested. Over the years this has led to some dads getting into the hobby with their sons and some interest from mothers but I haven’t gotten a scout’s mother to take up the hobby yet.
@907892:It was dark by the time we finished this
@907893:presentation with the scouts of troop 148.
!!Merit Badges
That is an example of the group demonstration and I haven’t had one yet where most people didn’t have a lot of fun and learn a few basics about flight. But I have gone a lot deeper than that with scouts as well. I had a group of scouts who worked on the aviation merit badge about 10 years ago under my guidance as their merit badge counselor. The handbook sold at the local scout council supplies all the information they need to learn to pass the merit badge. It includes discussion on how real planes are powered, basic controls, visiting an airport, talking to a pilot and much more.
<b><i>Requirement 7 f. “Build a fuel-driven model airplane. Describe safety rules for building and flying model airplanes. Tell safety rules for use of glue, paint, dope, and plastics.”</b></i>
Those requirements sound a little dated ... and they are. I had a number of scouts build a Gentle Lady R/C glider and we used a small gas motor on a pod that went over the wing to meet the “fuel-driven” model requirement. There is no R/C requirement and there is no building requirement as other options are available to complete the aviation merit badge. But the scouts who did this merit badge did so because they were interested in flying R/C. I supplied radio gear and we had a great time with those planes at the slope after the one power flight per scout was completed. Since then different scouts have built EPP gliders with the power pod and a couple built R/C Trainers from kits.
@907894:Flying in a church parking lot after a presentation to the troop.
@907895:Author giving an individual answer.
@907896:This is the cub
@907897:my son made over a decade ago.
For those on budgets that prevent them from getting into R/C I supply the Sig Cub kit where they make a simple rubber powered plane. They fly amazingly well on calm days when they are made correctly. I have had flying friends help finance the purchase of many such kits for larger crowds of boys. Some scouts have gone for the modeling merit badge and have designed and built their own free flight planes as part of that merit badge. Many flew my Diversity Aircraft Models, Butterfly and have enjoyed the experience of simple R/C flying greatly.
Far and away the most interest has been to fly. Lots of scouts wanted to learn to fly and try it on a buddy box and share the joy of flying. If that was their only interest I tried to meet it without requiring them to work on a merit badge. Just get a date when a couple scouts or the scout and a parent could meet with me and fly. (Never have just one scout with the counselor as there is a requirement of at least two to protect the boys.) The Butterfly and the Tiger Moth have both done duty in these fun flights.
@907898:I helped lead a scout troop to Japan, on the 10 hour flight some scouts earned the railroading merit badge. What was I thinking?”
@907899:The youngest scouts in Japan are Beaver Scouts...I made paper airplanes with them...airplanes, not origami!
Some of the most interesting flights have occurred on campouts. I have flown the face of several dams in the High Sierras near or at scout summer camps. I have flown a Zagi 400 over Baker Beach in San Francisco just south of the Golden Gate Bridge, as did some of my scouts when we camped there overnight in an old gun shore battery bunker. I have flown the paraplane pictured above near Mt. Lassen on a high ridge overlooking a valley far below. This upset a hawk that was circling about 500 feet above my paraplane. I spotted the hawk during the last 200 feet of its dive on my paraplane. I was shocked and amazed but I did turn off the motor just before the strike. The hawk hit the chute, the circle protecting the propeller and the propeller. The hawk tried to fly away but initially his talons were tangled in the chute’s lines and he dragged the paraplane both up and toward me. The paraplane came off his talon after a few seconds and dropped like a rock with its chute collapsed. About fifty feet above me the chute redeployed about 50% and that slowed the crash. The scouts who saw that hawk’s attack will never forget it, I know I won’t forget it.
@907900:Here are two scouts flying the NexStar,
@907901:“The Ultimate Flight Training Machine.”
My most recent experience was working with two scouts to let them try R/C flying while they helped review the <a href="http://rcgroups.com/4420">Great Planes NexSTAR<a> for <a href="http://www.rcpowermag.com">R/C Power</a>. They started out working with the flight simulator that comes with the plane as part of the complete package. They had a tutored simulator session with me and then went out to the flying field were a flight instructor, Jeff Hunter, worked with them and I videotaped their flights. They did a great job and Jeff and I are going to work with them to see that they both get their own planes because they had so much fun flying.
+907904:Andy flying the GWS Tigermoth after having successfully soloed on the Nexstar.
@907902:After surviving <a href="http://www.rcgroups.com/links/index.php?id=4127">the review for E Zone</a>, the T-Hawk had many flights in the hands of boy scouts without any major damage.
If you have the interest, skill and time to share this hobby with young people I encourage you to contact your local school or call the local scout council and get involved. Being prepared for your presentation is important and keeping each segment short is also helpful. Plan for a couple hands on activities to keep them involved. Plan flights with safety in mind as the first and most important concern. If you have never done this you will be surprised by how much fun you have sharing your hobby like this.
@907881:Scoutmaster Heer flying the paraplane at a spring Camporee. This paraplane was later attacked by a hawk on a different outing.
I have been an adult scout leader for over fifteen years and during those fifteen years I have found numerous ways to share my love for R/C flying with a variety of boy scouts and students at local schools. The purpose of this article is to share some of those experiences in hopes that it will encourage others to share your information and love for this hobby so that more of us will plant seeds that will grow into future pilots sharing this hobby we love.
@907882:This THL ZAGI flew on many scout outings from the coast to the High Sierra.
@907883:One Sunday we did a five mile hike at Los Banos Creek Reservoir and finished in time to watch slope combat take place. The scouts loved it!
The easiest way to share the hobby is with a group presentation. This is a one-time event with your audience and one or more R/C fliers. You can present it to a small group, a class, an elementary school or a Camporee with hundreds of boy scouts. The smaller the group you are presenting to, the more hands-on you can be with your approach. For a single class or a scout troop I will basically seek about 45 minutes to an hour and will make my presentation in the form of a science class. The level of complexity of the presentation depends on their age so for now let’s use 8th graders for our target audience.
!!A Single Class or Troop
@907884:The 8th grade
@907885:science class in Stockton.
@907886:The book only mentions Bernoulli’s principle but the teacher’s edition mentions that Newton’s laws are also involved.
@907887:This is the author teaching (and posing).
With 8th graders or a troop of boy scouts I will present two major scientific rules about flying in general -- a simplified explanation of how the planes control surfaces work and how the radio controls those surfaces. I will let the students operate the radio controls while I hold the airplane so they all get a short hands-on feel for how this all works. If time allows, I usually have them all make a paper airplane of their own design and then we go outside to the school grounds or field for our actual flying.
The two scientific rules I discuss with them are Newton’s Third Law of Motion and Bernoulli’s Principle. Newton’s third law as I am sure you know is: “That for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.” I point out that by setting the wing with a couple degrees of upward angle of attack it pushes air down at the back of the wing and that pushes the plane up. I also show how the control surfaces force movement such as the elevator going up causes the back of the plane to be pushed down in a conventional plane and that makes the nose go up. For props I bring a small rocket with fins, a toy jet fighter and a small toy 747, my R/C airplanes and some empty soda cans.
+907903:Demonstration of the Bernoulli principle...creating low pressure between 2 cans.
For Bernoulli’s principle I talk about low pressure and how this can pull things in the direction of the lower pressure. A wing with lower pressure on top is slightly pulled up. The best example I have found is to use two empty soda cans and ask them what will happen when someone blows between cans. Will the cans go further apart or come together? The majority of students think they will blow apart. They are surprised to see them come together when I have someone blow between the cans with a straw. If time allows I give every person a straw and set up several stations with empty soda cans and let them do the experiment for themselves. When we lower the pressure between the cans by blowing between them with the straw, the higher pressure on the outside of the cans push them together .
@907888:Teaching science of flight at local high school.
@907889:A second class, this one of ninth graders, with enthusiasm.
Using a toy rocket, a toy jet fighter, and a model of a small toy 747 the students usually realize that flight with these is primarily based on Newton’s third law and not Bernoulli’s Principle, which only helps a little in some basic wing designs. They are usually quite pleased to know something that most people understand incorrectly if at all.
@907890:On a campout at Modesto Reservoir the scouts removed a couple tons of rocks from the flying field and in return got to fly on buddy boxes.
With Newton’s Third Law clear in their minds I give every student a piece of paper and have them make a paper airplane. I encourage creative designs but usually 90% are the simple basic paper airplane. With the paper airplanes in hand we go out to the field or if the room is large enough we have a contest for the plane that goes the farthest and then for the most accurate to a certain spot. I usually have a third event with accuracy for the best paper ball and everyone wins at that one. I usually have a small balsa hand toss glider for the winners of the first two events.
@907891:This is John R Williams school, I flew there after the rain had stopped but still windy for the Great Planes Wright Flyer.
With that completed I put on a flying demonstration after establishing a flight safety line and get a firm understanding that no one will run or move from behind the flight line. My demonstration planes vary on the size of the field. My GWS Tiger Moth has been used in many demonstrations but this year the Great Planes 1905 Wright Flyer has been used the most. If the field is large enough I will fly a larger, more powerful electric, such as my Multiplex Hummel with a geared brushless motor. It is like the Miss 2 that Hobby Lobby still sells and it is a great plane to use with new pilots. I usually let the teacher or scout leader pick a person on merit to fly the plane and I give the entire class a short ground lesson while I fly the plane and then I have the student pilot pick up the buddy box and I give them control at about 200 hundred feet of elevation.
I have had very good response with this and most students have quick success in flying. I help this by programming in almost no down elevator on the buddy box and just a little up. By having the elevator throw greatly reduced on the student transmitter they don’t over control as much as they normally would on a standard set-up. After they have flown it around for about a minute I thank them and disconnect the buddy box and do some loops and a barrel roll before bringing in the plane for a landing.
!!Larger Groups
For a really big presentation to a lot of students or scouts I like to have a couple of extra pilots to show some more styles of flying and have some more experts to walk down the flight line and talk to the spectators. If time and field space allows I like to have the show finish with some aerobatics. I usually let the best pilot know in advance he will be the grand finale and he should save something for the end. The most memorable Camporee ending was Jeff Hunter doing a high-speed pass just above the ground and then going vertical at an oak tree that no one thought he could possibly miss but he did. He later said: “It was easy because I was flying your plane and I had nothing to lose.”
A little advance preparation can help share the excitement if you are making an evening or weekend presentation. For scouts I have their scoutmaster let them take home a hand out from the meeting the week before I come. The handout is an invitation for adults to come and watch the demonstration if they are interested. Over the years this has led to some dads getting into the hobby with their sons and some interest from mothers but I haven’t gotten a scout’s mother to take up the hobby yet.
@907892:It was dark by the time we finished this
@907893:presentation with the scouts of troop 148.
!!Merit Badges
That is an example of the group demonstration and I haven’t had one yet where most people didn’t have a lot of fun and learn a few basics about flight. But I have gone a lot deeper than that with scouts as well. I had a group of scouts who worked on the aviation merit badge about 10 years ago under my guidance as their merit badge counselor. The handbook sold at the local scout council supplies all the information they need to learn to pass the merit badge. It includes discussion on how real planes are powered, basic controls, visiting an airport, talking to a pilot and much more.
<b><i>Requirement 7 f. “Build a fuel-driven model airplane. Describe safety rules for building and flying model airplanes. Tell safety rules for use of glue, paint, dope, and plastics.”</b></i>
Those requirements sound a little dated ... and they are. I had a number of scouts build a Gentle Lady R/C glider and we used a small gas motor on a pod that went over the wing to meet the “fuel-driven” model requirement. There is no R/C requirement and there is no building requirement as other options are available to complete the aviation merit badge. But the scouts who did this merit badge did so because they were interested in flying R/C. I supplied radio gear and we had a great time with those planes at the slope after the one power flight per scout was completed. Since then different scouts have built EPP gliders with the power pod and a couple built R/C Trainers from kits.
@907894:Flying in a church parking lot after a presentation to the troop.
@907895:Author giving an individual answer.
@907896:This is the cub
@907897:my son made over a decade ago.
For those on budgets that prevent them from getting into R/C I supply the Sig Cub kit where they make a simple rubber powered plane. They fly amazingly well on calm days when they are made correctly. I have had flying friends help finance the purchase of many such kits for larger crowds of boys. Some scouts have gone for the modeling merit badge and have designed and built their own free flight planes as part of that merit badge. Many flew my Diversity Aircraft Models, Butterfly and have enjoyed the experience of simple R/C flying greatly.
Far and away the most interest has been to fly. Lots of scouts wanted to learn to fly and try it on a buddy box and share the joy of flying. If that was their only interest I tried to meet it without requiring them to work on a merit badge. Just get a date when a couple scouts or the scout and a parent could meet with me and fly. (Never have just one scout with the counselor as there is a requirement of at least two to protect the boys.) The Butterfly and the Tiger Moth have both done duty in these fun flights.
@907898:I helped lead a scout troop to Japan, on the 10 hour flight some scouts earned the railroading merit badge. What was I thinking?”
@907899:The youngest scouts in Japan are Beaver Scouts...I made paper airplanes with them...airplanes, not origami!
Some of the most interesting flights have occurred on campouts. I have flown the face of several dams in the High Sierras near or at scout summer camps. I have flown a Zagi 400 over Baker Beach in San Francisco just south of the Golden Gate Bridge, as did some of my scouts when we camped there overnight in an old gun shore battery bunker. I have flown the paraplane pictured above near Mt. Lassen on a high ridge overlooking a valley far below. This upset a hawk that was circling about 500 feet above my paraplane. I spotted the hawk during the last 200 feet of its dive on my paraplane. I was shocked and amazed but I did turn off the motor just before the strike. The hawk hit the chute, the circle protecting the propeller and the propeller. The hawk tried to fly away but initially his talons were tangled in the chute’s lines and he dragged the paraplane both up and toward me. The paraplane came off his talon after a few seconds and dropped like a rock with its chute collapsed. About fifty feet above me the chute redeployed about 50% and that slowed the crash. The scouts who saw that hawk’s attack will never forget it, I know I won’t forget it.
@907900:Here are two scouts flying the NexStar,
@907901:“The Ultimate Flight Training Machine.”
My most recent experience was working with two scouts to let them try R/C flying while they helped review the <a href="http://rcgroups.com/4420">Great Planes NexSTAR<a> for <a href="http://www.rcpowermag.com">R/C Power</a>. They started out working with the flight simulator that comes with the plane as part of the complete package. They had a tutored simulator session with me and then went out to the flying field were a flight instructor, Jeff Hunter, worked with them and I videotaped their flights. They did a great job and Jeff and I are going to work with them to see that they both get their own planes because they had so much fun flying.
+907904:Andy flying the GWS Tigermoth after having successfully soloed on the Nexstar.
@907902:After surviving <a href="http://www.rcgroups.com/links/index.php?id=4127">the review for E Zone</a>, the T-Hawk had many flights in the hands of boy scouts without any major damage.
If you have the interest, skill and time to share this hobby with young people I encourage you to contact your local school or call the local scout council and get involved. Being prepared for your presentation is important and keeping each segment short is also helpful. Plan for a couple hands on activities to keep them involved. Plan flights with safety in mind as the first and most important concern. If you have never done this you will be surprised by how much fun you have sharing your hobby like this.