'Fruit Bat Flyer' goes solo

A report today from Peter Weissenfeld, CFI of Airwego. Doug Brooke went solo in the Jabiru on Wednesday afternoon (26th April) at Horsham.

Doug is sometimes known as the 'Fruit Bat Flyer'. Doug is also a trike pilot and until recently was regularly taking to the air over Horsham is a yellow and black trike. Some wag described it as a flying fruit bat as Doug often flew in the later part of the afternoon. So the name stuck.

Doug has sold the 'Fruit Bat' and is preparing to build a Jabiru J160 or J170.

Well done Doug, congratulations on your recent solo flight.

Narromine Fly-In Photos

No club members were able to attend the annual RAAUs Fly-In at Narromine, but Daryle Hooke a former member and instructor with the club did. Daryle has some great photos from the Easter event. The pictures can be viewed at http://www.darylhooke.com/narro/index.html

Major win for Laurie's Daimler

Laurie's Daimler Wins Major Award

Laurie Bunnik passed through Horsham on Good Friday on the way to the Biannual National Daimler Rally in Bendigo. Laurie has been working on his Dailer for many years now and came up trumps at the Rally winning two awards. Laurie and his pride and joy picked up the 'Presidents Trophy' and the 'New Zealand trophy' for the best presented Daimler. On Easter Monday Laurie again passed through Horsham on the way home to Casterton. He filled up on fuel and took PW and myself for a drive around the taxiway to the fuel bowsers to refuel.

First solo for Steve & PW

First Solo for Steve and PW

Congratulation to Steve Schneider who completed his pre-sol exam and flew his first solo in the Jabiru over Easter. Steve was also PW's first student to go solo. Well done both of you.


Keeping with what happened around the club over Easter. Good Friday was a little quiet with PW getting in one flight with a student in the Jabiru. Saturday was again quiet with just a few people 'pottering around' the club rooms.

Easter Sunday was the busy day for the Easter break with the Jabiru flying for over 5 hours with a few students and members enjoying the conditions, which were perfect for flying.

The Fly Paper - April 2006

The Fly Paper - April 2006

New Member
This month we welcome Paul Walter as a new member. Welcome to the club Paul, we hope you enjoy flying with us. Please make yourself known to Paul when you next meet him.

Hatched, Matched, Dispatched & Flown
This month we have a sort of hatched and flown all in one. Joe Luciani's Esqual was test flown last weekend. The first flight was flown by Cliff Banks of Sun Centre Ultralights. Doug Brooke reports that no changes or adjustments needed to be made after the flight. Congratulations Joe on a job well done. I have no reports yet of Joe's impressions of his first flight. Hopefully we can get a more detailed report in the next issue. See the pictures from the earlier posting.

New Signs
If you've visited the club in the last couple of weeks you will have noticed one small change. At last we managed to get one of the signs changed over to the new club logo. You humble editor managed to get the old sign off and attached the new small sign to the car park door. It was a struggle, especially when I used Phil's biggest rivets and then could only pull the very first one half way through (I am only a weak and feeble Librarian, not a big butch outdoors type), but a change to small rivets and advice from my fellow government worker Steve and the job was done. So take note all you right wing reactionaries and Max – government workers get things done!!! Now we only have to wait for the big sign for Geodetic Road to arrive. The new signs are just larger versions of our logo.

Next Monthly Meeting
The next club meeting will be held on Saturday 13^th May at 7.00PM in the clubrooms. Please note the time. All are welcome at the monthly meeting. So take some time to get involved in the administration of your club. The minutes of the last meeting held on Saturday 8^th April were included in the distibution of this 'Fly Paper'.

Fly-In at Donald
The Donald Aero Club is holding a 'Fly In' on Saturday 29^th April starting at 10.00AM. The day is being held in conjunction with the Donald Baby Boomers Festival. All general aviation and sport aviation enthusiasts are welcome. Catering will be provided during the day at Donald Aerodrome. For further information contact Robert Adams on 5498 6253 or 0408 590 621. The other contact is Laurie Goldsbury on 5497 6255 or 0427 887 236.

Direct Payments to the Club's Bank Account
Now that Mark's got our flying accounts coming out on a regular basis (good on you Mark), some members might find it convenient to make payments direct to the clubs bank account via Internet Banking. I find this a get option as I can pay my account as soon as the statement arrives. Its very easy. All you need is the account name, account number and the BSB for the bank and away you go. Most Internet Banking services work in a similar manner and you can make one off payments or schedule regular payments to a nominated account. The details you require for direct payments to the clubs banks account are:

Account Name – The Wimmera Soaring Club
Account Number – 10006008
BSB – 063 675

To help Mark identify your payment on the monthly statement we should all adopt a standard approach to the 'To Account Description', which describes the transfer on the clubs monthly statement. I would suggest the following format. First initial and surname followed by the words flying fees, for example 'MHogan Flying Fees'. If your bank doesn't provide enough room for all the characters abbreviate 'Flying Fees' to 'FFees'. Its simple really

Dates for Dadswells Bridge Weekends
Once again the Dadswells Bridge group will be operating through the winter at Colefield, Dadswells Bridge. The club will be supplying TOJ as a tug and on those weekends gliding operations will at Colefield. The dates for this year are;
June - Sat 10^th, Sun 11^th and Mon 12^th.
July - Sat 15^th and Sun 16^th.
August - Sat 19^th and Sun 20^th.
September - Thurs 21^st, Fri 22^nd, Sat 23^rd and Sun 24^th.

The Grampians are a fabulous area the fly over and depending on the winds we can get either ridge lift or the allusive 'wave'. There will be more information as we get closer to each weekend. You can also check out the details for each weekend and other club events on our events calendar as part of our web page.
The link address is http://my.calendars.net/jabirubookings

The New Blog
The club now has another communication tool. I have created a Blog or Weblog to share information about club events and happening between 'Fly Papers'. Blog is short for weblog. A weblog is a journal (or newsletter) that is frequently updated and intended for general public consumption. So a Blog is a virtual diary stored on the Internet and generally consist of text and images. They appear in a calendar or chronological format.

Our Blog can be found at the following address http://horshamflyingclub.blogspot.com/

I will set up access for for members to be able to comment on the Blog and eventually provide input or 'post' information direct to the Blog.

So thats about it for another month. I'm still looking for input and ideas from you the members. So please help me out with the 'Fly Paper'. If you have contributions then please send them to me. I can be contacted by email on mphogan@ncable.com.au or by post to 171 Tenth Street Mildura 3500. I can be phone on 5025 8997 or text me on 0409 028 895. Go on, as those late night ads say; “Call me, Call me now”.

So until next month, safe flying.

Mike

First photos of Esqual test flight

First Photos of Esqual Test Flight
Doug Brooke has been my 'Cub Reporter' for the test flight of Joe Luciani's Esqual VM-1 today. Thank you Doug for your contribution. The test flight was flown by Cliff Banks, CFI of Sun Centre Ultralights Swan Hill. The test flight went well and the aircraft did not require any adjusting when it retuned to the aerodrome. So now Joe can get on with the test flying program.

After some time Joe luciani's Esqual VM-1 is finally flying. The Esqual is the first light aircraft built by a member of the Horsham Flying Club to take to the air.

Joe Luciani sitting in the command seat of his Esqual VM-1. By the look on his face I thinks he's happy with the way things have gone. Congratulations Joe. Cliff Banks of Sun Centre Ultalights who was the initial test pilot in in the RH seat

The Esqual taxiing back to the hangers at Horsham Aerodrome today. Note the prominant flaps.

The Esqual VM-1 coming in on runway 08/26 at Horsham after its first flight today

Joe's Esqual has its first flight

Joe's Esqual has its first flight
Great news today. Joe Luciani has test flown his Esqual VM-1 ultralight today. Joe is the first member of the Horsham Flying Club to complete a home building project at Horsham Aerodrome.

As photos and flight reports become available I will add them to the blog.

Joe is pictured completing some of the final work on the engine a few weeks ago.