Wednesday, February 22, 2006

The Fly Paper - February 2006



The Fly Paper - Febraury 2006

New Members
This month we welcome another two new members. Bill Fry and Stephen Ayres have joined the club. Bill is from Natimuk and is in the process of deciding what sort of aircraft he would like to build. Stephen is from Hamilton and is an established Light Sport Aircraft and glider pilot. Stephen has already got in a few hours in the Jabiru and on his next visit hopefully we can get him going in the Twin and ultimately the Janus. Stephen also owns a Jantar Junior which is currently based at Tocumwal.

Joe's Back
Joe has returned from his extended working holiday in England. He arrived back in Horsham on Sunday 19th and received a quick briefing on how I have let the club go during his absence. He already has work to be getting on with and Phil Colquhuon can again have access to his advice about working with composites on his Jabiru.

Hatched, Matched and Dispatched
Only hatchlings this month. We have another set of new Grandparents. Phil and Deb Colquhuon have a new granddaughter and as most people know Phil has a baby Jabiru under construction in the clubs workshop. It seems that these days you get a grandchild with every new Jabiru.

Next Monthly Meeting
The next club meeting will be held at the clubrooms on Saturday March 11th from 7.00PM. The minutes of the last meeting held on Saturday 18th February have been included with this newsletter.

Air-We-Go! Air-We-Go! Air-We-Go!
This is the sort of thing one expects from Irish football hooligans, but 'Airwego' is the name of our new resident Light Sport Aircraft flying school. Peter and Mark, along with Tony Brand and Rob Johns have graduated from instructor school and are starting to train students. Peter has recently had his CFI's test and is now awaiting the completion of the required paperwork and recognition of his vast experience as a gliding instructor. So soon PW will be supervising Mark, Tony and Rob. The group is currently using a Tecnam belonging to Tony for training. Ultimately they will be using the Aeroclubs new Tecnam when it arrives in the next month or so. Their rates are about $150 per hour under instruction.

The issue of training on the Jabiru is subject to obtaining suitable insurance cover. Max is researching this subject and will report back to the next meeting of the club. At this time training on Jabiru aircraft is still available through Cliff Banks of Sun Centre Ultralights. Cliffs details and contact information can be found on the clubs web site. Once the Airwego guys have them selves sorted out I will include full details of their operations on our site, just as I do for Cliff.

Horsham Week 2006
The Horsham Week competition has come and gone for another year. Six competition days were flown over the eight days of the competition. Thanks are due to those members and their partners who provided assistance with operations and looking after the domestic arrangements, feeding the troops, cleaning the toilets, emptying the rubbish. The multitude of things that need to be done to make the week the success it continues to be. Once again through the hard work of a small number of people we have been able to add to some much needed income to the club coffers. Lorelle and Leon have requested that some minor works be done to the toilet facilities to make then a little more usable when we have a lot of visitors at one time. The club has approved that Leon can undertake minor works in the mens and ladies toilets.

Now for abit of history and trivia. Many pilots have been coming to Horsham Week for many years and we are thankful for their support. But we must remember that they do come to Horsham to fly and compete. One person who has done that for many year has been Keith Willis. Keith reached a special mile stone at this years competition. Many pilots would think that 500 hours gliding is an achievement in itself. This year Keith managed to total up his 500th hour flying in competition at Horsham Week. Well done Keith, a milestone in anyones book.

So on to some details of the actual Horsham Week operations. There were 8 aircraft competing in Open Class, with Tracy Tabart in his Ventus 2 the eventual winner on 4964 points, from William Hatfield in a Lak17 on 4521 and Pepe Grasa-Valero in a Janus on 4508 points.

The 15 Metre Class had another 8 gliders. Bruce Cowan in a Ventus was the eventual winner on 5100 points from Steve Trone in a Mini Nimbus on 4650 points and Dave Nugent in an LS3 with 4599 points.

Standard Class had 10 entries and was won by Gary Stevenson with 5005 points in a Libelle. Gary was followed by Wayne Mackley in a Jantar on 4073 points and David Wilson with 4050 points in his ASW24.

There were 8 gliders in Sports Class which was taken out by Brian Bailey in a Janus with 4688 points, then Noel Vagg & James Henkel in a Twin Astir on 4054 points and third place went to John Ashford in a Janus with a total of 3817 points.

So there were about 34 gliders and 4 tugs for the week. The week was about normal for Horsham Week, some days were good, others not so good, but everyone had a good time all the same. A summary of the weather on individual competition day can be found at Bruce Cowans 'Horsham Week 2006' web site. The tasks flown, the daily results and final results are also included. If you have access to the SeeYou program you can relive different days and watch the pilots and their aircraft race each other. So go to; http://www.printerschoice.com.au/horsham2006/Default.htm and check out the details of the week.

Wimmera Machinery Field Days
The field days are on again from the 28th February to the 2nd of March. We are manning a display in one of the pavilions along with 'Airwego' and the Horsham Aeroclub. We are looking for people to help man the stand over the three days and talk to people who may be interested in flying. All three organizations will have material available to hand out to field days visitors. We have produced some postcards and fliers on the club, gliding and light sport aircraft. It is only a small display and unfortunately there is no room to display an aircraft. So if you can help man the stand please get in contact with Max Hedt, Mark Griffin or PW.

Thats the newsletter for this month. Until March. Safe flying.

Mike