This weekend Jay and I attended a fun fly in Fredonia. It was chilly (I was wearing a turtle neck, a sweatshirt, and my windbreaker), but the sun was out and the grass was dry. It was a lot of fun, though we did get wind burned! My face is still sore.

We don’t get our picture taken together very often, so I wanted to post this one. You can ignore me, but isn’t he handsome? Have I mentioned how lucky I am??

This was the first time that I’ve been to the Fredonia field and it’s fantastic! I wish that it was closer so that we could fly out of it more often. From what I was told, this used to be a landfill and a swamp, but now it’s not really used for much. The people who own the property allow the Fredonia guys to cut the grass and fly their RC models whenever they want. It’s great because it’s a big, flat area that is almost above the tree line. Since you are already above the trees you don’t have to worry about running into them. You have this huge, wide open expanse of sky that you can tear up! I wished that we’d had my LT so that I could take advantage of it. We’ll have to return to this field again.

Jay paid enough attention to the weather that he knew it was going to be quite windy, but there was a chance of rain so he only brought his F-16 and the MiG-15. I believe that he had two flights on each of these. It was so windy that a lot of the time was spent chatting, catching up with guys he hadn’t seen in a while, and relating stories about eJets to the guys that he hadn’t seen since getting back from Ohio.

There were quite a few guys there, and I was happy about the turn out from our club. Considering the distance there was a very nice representation of the membership. There were planes of every kind, too. Gas engines, electric, EDF, and even a couple of turbines. Later in the afternoon Jay wished that he had brought the ‘Hog.

You’ve seen a million pictures of Jay flying his various planes, so now you’ve seen a million and one. lol. This was when Jay was flying the 16 over the edge of the field and down into the valley. It really was a neat field to fly out of!

The one thing about being with Jay at a fun fly is that he’s usually very busy. If he’s not flying his own planes then somebody else is asking him to fly their plane; or they are asking his advice on the particular power set up they are trying to put into a jet; or Jay is harassing the elderly members (sorry Al! lol). A lot of the time the guys want Jay to maiden their plane so that he can get it trimmed out to where it should be, then they can just concentrate on flying it. Here Jay is helping Chad trim out his combat foamie that he bought this summer.

Before that, Jay was assisting Barry with his combat foamie. It needed to be trimmed out just a little. These guys are getting good at flying the foamies, though. I’m hoping to be good enough by next summer so that all of us can get our foamies out there (my watermelon) and really go to town.

This is when Jay was flying Barry’s combat foamie. I thought that this was a neat picture so I wanted to include it in this post. That little plane really sticks out, doesn’t it?

Yes, there were other guys at the show. Here’s proof. I know that you usually only see Jay’s pictures in my blog so I thought that I should prove that there really is a club that we belong to and it’s made up of real people. lol

This is how most of a fun fly is spent. You will spend on average about 5-10 minutes in the sky, and 45-50 minutes hanging out. Even when it’s not windy.

Doug… wake up!

There’s Jay flying somebody else’s plane again. In fact, I think that he flew other guys’ planes more than he flew his own. On this flight the guy had neglected to top off the gas tank and it ended up dead sticking (the engine quit). You still have control of your surfaces, though, so Jay was able to bring it down without any issue. In fact, Jay is so good that he will take a plane way up into the sky and have you toss something out on the field as a target. Once the plane is really high up he will cut off the motor/engine and bring it down using only the control surfaces to keep it in the air. Ninety-nine percent of the time Jay can land the plane within 6 inches of the target on the field. I can’t wait until I’m that good!

It was a very good day overall. We were out there from about 10:30 until 7:00. The flying was good and the company was great. I always look forward to these types of events. It’s just too bad that the flying season is winding down. 😦