Thursday looked like a calm day, Poh and I decided to go for some “flat field flying”. We debated on Tullahoma or Eagleville. Eagleville was closer for both of us, so the decision was made.
We set up the winch and flew electrics. Poh flew his Shadow and his Electric Skybird (similar to a big BOT). I flew my Jerry and Shadow. Local flyer, Gary, showed up and joined us with his Electric BOT.
Even with a cool, crystal clear sky we found plenty of lift. All three of us “specked out” at least once.
We spent almost 4 hours at the field, finally packing up the winch and planes around 3:30pm.
Had a couple of minor tragedies during our flying. Gary put his BOT in a drive and heard a crack. We encouraged him to land as soon as possible. On landing, we confirmed that his sheeting (and possibly spar) had cracked about 3 inches out from the root. Gary was lucky to get it down before a wing failure.
I had my own tragedy. My trusty JR XP9303 model select screen was corrupted and displaying goofy symbols. I had to stop flying my Shadow, even though it seemed to function properly. I was afraid I was testing my luck. Worst part is, I have not backed up any of models in several years and have not started setting them up on my newer Taranis. I understand that is a known issue on 9303’s and is usually a failed “encoder” or main board. Hopefully, when I send it back to JR they can save the model memory. I have too many models and trim settings to either setup on the...Continue Reading

The last two slope trips to Normandy have all been on Wednesdays. So it was not a surprise that this Wednesday showed good winds for Normandy. Wind was out of the South at 10mph, so conditions were good. We had a fair sized group (for Normandy). Poh turned up with his Ridge Ryder and Radian. Bill Jenkins showed up with his Ridge Ryder and his own design glider. Chris Woodward showed up with an Easy Glider , Miles 2M, DAW 1-26 and LeFish. I had my Mini Rotor, Gillette and Zulu. I ended up with radio problems on two of my planes and only flew my Zulu. Poh flew both his planes. Bill flew his Ridge Ryder a few times and then test flew his own design T tail glider. Chris hadn’t flown slope in quite a bit of time. He actually had to pull gliders out of a storage unit before he came over to fly. Chis ended up flying only his MPX Easy Glider and his Electric Miles.
We spent 4 hours of flying, before calling it a day to soothe our wind burns. Another good day at the “Norm”.

Mike...Continue Reading