Next meeting: Tuesday the 15^th of June 2003. Time: 7:30 P.m.

Vice President: Red Jensen (707) 585-3170

Secretary: Larry Miller (707) 577-0496

Treasurer: Tom Haddorff (707) 526-7058

Member @ Large John Reade (707) 545-9831

The other "special thanks" goes to Sid Maxwell and Ralph Grella. It looks like they have found us an ideal float flying site less than a mile from our Transfer Station flying site. There are issues about frequencies that we’ll tell you about later on in the Newsletter, see the Minutes for the Board Meeting.

No new members this month but we think we see a member or two coming our way for next month. We’ll keep you posted.

Submitted by Phil Leech

Members who turned out for the June 21 Work Party were: Phil Leech, Leonid Schwarzberg, Dale Chiaroni, Steve Cole, Sid Maxwell, Ralph Grella, Brian Blackburn, Duane Hope, Joe Geiger, Mark Evans (guest), Chuck Green, Mike Cincgari, Tom Haddorff and John Wolfe. Thanks, Guys.

The big news for the month was the "Learn to Fly Day" June 28. It was a sizzler with temps approaching 100 degrees. The heat held down attendance and participation with 50 – 60 people that turned out with 25 or so flights given young and old first timers. Highlights of the day were Tom Haddorff’s Kadet equipped with a banner that he unfurled with a servo that triggered a release mechanism. The banner was lettered with "Wine Country Flyers" and it really looked great but it did slow down the Kadet quite a bit. He made a couple of passes down the field and then cut the banner loose with the same servo fitted with a razor to cut the tow cord. Dropped it right in front of the flight line. The other memorable event was the combat demonstration performed by Sid Maxwell, Steve Cole, and Robbie Jensen. Their three planes were all fitted with streamers that were about 20 feet long. They went round and round for about 10 minutes or so with several dramatic moments when it looked like mid-airs were about to happen. Steve Cole’s Zero suddenly ran out of fuel and disappeared into the Jungle (Steve spent four hours the next day looking for the plane and I don’t think he has found it yet). Then the wing separated from Robbie’s plane and that left Sid…the winner? All in all, it was quite a show and we all enjoyed it. Sid has some combat kits for sale and hopes more of us will join in the fun.

Financially the event was a modest success but hey, we made 65 bucks and everybody had a great time.

The meeting was called to order at 7:30 PM by President Steve Cole with 20 members present.

Taylor Jensen drew the ticket for the door prize, a gallon of fuel that was won by the Glider Guy, Bob Film. Now what does a glider guy need with a gallon of fuel?

TREASURER’S REPORT

Tom Haddorff presented the treasurer’s report for the past month and informed us that present membership stands at 97.

SECRETARY’S REPORT

The minutes for May’s Board and General Meetings as published in the Newsletter were approved as written.

OLD BUSINESS

Sid Maxwell enquired about the status of the New Member Info Package and the Solo Certificate. After some discussion it was agreed that Sid would form a committee with John Wolfe and Ralph Grella to pursue this.

A discussion of the ongoing conflict between airplanes and helicopters developed with a number of ideas and suggestions. Some thought that general camaraderie and field etiquette coupled with required spotters would be sufficient while others suggested review of

our field layout after removal of the "mound" with the return of our alternate runway would help matters. Or, maybe the field could be rearranged to allow for an area large enough to be designated for helicopters alone. A scale drawing of the field with current improvements in place might be a good starting point.

NEW BUSINESS

Red Jensen has investigated what a new P/A system for the field would cost. Systems range in cost from $200 - $300 and require a generator that might be rented. A 12 volt battery powered system would require an inverter. John Wolfe, Dale Chiaroni and John Reade agreed to pursue this.

Sid Maxwell brought up the issue of Membership Cards that could be posted in the Impound Shed instead of AMA cards. Others pointed out that we used to have cards but have changed to badges to be worn on hats or shirts. The problem being that not all members wear or display the badges.

THE RAFFLE

The Half-Cash ($47.50) was won by Lou Winnard. Julio Alvarez won a battery re-cycler and Lou Winnard won an electric "Fundango". Ralph Grella also won an electric plane a Spitfire.

SHOW AND TELL

Steve Cole brought in some original photos of a P-80 prototype that a friend that worked for Lockheed had since the mid forties.

Larry Frank brought a scratch built DeHaviland Tiger Moth that he has just completed. He found the drawings in an English Scale magazine that he re-drew to scale up for a 54" wingspan. He has mounted a Saito 56 on the plane that is enclosed with a fiberglass cowl that he also custom fabricated. He covered the plane with Century 21 fabric using an orange and silver color scheme that was shown in the magazine article. We would all like to see the maiden flights of this bird.

ADJOURNMENT

The meeting was adjourned at 8:40 PM with refreshments and discussion at the rear of the room

The meeting was held at the offices of Gary Childs, Mortgage Broker. Thank you Gary. Members in attendance were: Gary Childs, Steve Cole, Sid Maxwell, Larry Frank, Rob Jensen, Stevo Smith, Tom Haddorff, John Reade and Phil Leech.

The meeting was brought to order at 7:30 by Steve Cole.

Sid Maxwell told us that he and Ralph Grella took a little time out to investigate a potential float flying site that is just west of 101 at the Alexander Valley Road exit. The site is owned by the Salvation Army that has a 30 acre pond on it. They talked with Major Clyde Canow about flying from their pond and the Major was agreeable to the idea provided that we provide him with a Certificate of Insurance for $2.5 million. Sid has contacted AMA and they are forwarding the insurance forms for us to fill out. The paperwork plus a check for $60 and it looks like we have a flying site! There are issues regarding frequencies because the site is just .86 miles from our present site. The new site is available sunrise to sunset and it was discussed that between the hours of 8AM til 4PM flyers would have to visit the Impound Shed to secure a pin as well as leaving a note that they have the pin and are at the float site. Maybe leaving a note with their cell phone number. Another idea was to determine what frequencies are not in use by any current members and then reserving those numbers for float flying.

Larry Frank has been doing a review of the By-Laws and presented his findings. He has consulted with Donna Roper of The Volunteer Center of Sonoma County. She is an authority on organization and governance of non-profit groups. She reviewed our by-laws and brought to Larry’s attention a problem that we have regarding the requirement for a quorum of the membership for the passage of any motion when in fact a quorum of those present at any given general membership meeting would be more practical. Rob Jensen suggested that Guy Nicholas was also working on the By-laws and that he should be made aware of Larry’s material. Gary Child, who has past legal experience with By-laws offered to help resolve what should be done regarding making these changes.

Plans for the upcoming Fun Fly were discussed and it was decided to raise the entry fee to $10. Steve Cole and Rob will do the planning for the type of events and Gary Child will put the flier together with Phil Leech getting printing and mailing done. $300 was authorized to be spent for prizes.

Art’s party for August was discussed with the thought that it should probably be a BYOB event with the club providing soft drinks. There is concern about securing positive commitment from members before we commit to a quantity of food.

The meeting was adjourned at 9:15 PM.

Respectfully submitted by Phil Leech for Larry Miller, Secretary

The following is a list of persons that are currently in flight training and haven’t soloed yet. Let us know if we missed anybody.

Lou Winnard, Ollie Burns, Stuart Dobbie, Bilal Maqsood, Robert Sherrill, Bill Boitano, Jordy Strong

What do you see when you look

At the sun? One big bright ball of fire, a blinding brightness. Any doctor will tell you never look directly at the sun. RC flyers fly around or in the sun as a regular routine. So what do you do when you fly into the sun? The main thing is, "don’t panic". Don’t start moving the gimbals all around. Hold the gimbals steady and don’t really look into the sun. Watch your plane go in then watch for it to come out. The sun at our field can be brutal in the morning. It takes some getting used to. After a while you get used to it – maybe 80% of the flying fields have the sun at their back in the morning but they have the sun in their face in the afternoon. It’s only one more challenge we RC flyers enjoy.

So let’s fly – See you at the field.

Sid Maxwell

As far back as he can remember Red Jensen has been building, flying and thinking airplanes. His father Steve started Red out right from the beginning. If you look up "natural" in Webster"s dictionary it will read: Natural – free from restraint, at ease, a thing that is or promises to be immediately successful. A gift of nature. In other words it was meant to be. Anyone who can "solo" an RC airplane at age 5. Building it from scratch he covered it with monokote using his mother’s iron. She still has that plane to this day. Red and Steve their flying on Calistoga Rd. in Santa Rosa and the old Cotati drag strip. There was no buddy cord in those days. In 1978 Red built a Mini-Mambo .25 and at age 7 Red did his solo. Later that day Red hit a fire hydrant with it but it was fixable. Now he was on his way into the magic world of RC. Red was always doing something with RC. When he would come home from school he couldn’t wait to build models. With his best friend in Jr. High School they would fly "chuck gliders" and throw his "gentle lady" at school grounds which made him comfortable flying low and close and to this day he still likes to fly low. He was still flying RC, now at the Naval Base in Santa Rosa. In 1989 his senior year in High School he focused on gliders and slope flying. He was a "go fast" type of guy. He was impressed by Mark Allen and Darrell Perkins of the local clubs. Their influence made him start paying more attention to how things were designed and why and taught him aerodynamics and airfoil theory. Red’s flying skill was improving at an enjoyable rate. I asked him what was helping the improvement he said, "see the airplane and feel what it is doing and practice a lot. Never have a fear of flying. And my dad, he’s my best friend and my best flying buddy." In 1997 Red joined the WCF and was getting out of gliders and into power planes. He started racing 500 Quickies and learning composite construction, vacuum bagging and cutting foam wings. He thinks the club has come a long way with many building quality planes and the quality of flying has gone thru the roof. He has 6 planes to fly but the total amount of planes are too many to count. He uses JR radio equipment and also has many small planes. I asked him how he’s progressing now and he said, "I take pride in flying smooth and learning the rudder opened the door for all maneuvers. I practice the same maneuvers over and over, but I just don’t have enough time to fly." Now he’s back into soaring, Dynamic Soaring going 154 MPH. He wants to make his mark in the speed world setting world speed records with Dynamic Soaring and Float planes. I asked Red what advise he could give, "relax, don’t be tense, you have to understand what the plane is doing, you have to be the plane, let the plane fly itself, it took a long time for me to realize that too", he said. For beginners he said, " get help and relax, it takes time to learn." Red owns the "Hanger One" Hobby Shop in Rohnert Park. "I love the hobby shop and love being there helping people", he said.

Red is married to Carole and they have 3 beautiful children; daughter Taylor 6 and twins Jack and Macy 3, and a new one coming just over the hill. As a final work Red said, "I eat, breathe, live airplanes, I am an airplane except for my loving family the majority of time I am doing something with airplanes. I just love it, absolutely love it." I would say – there is nothing left to say.

Red Jensen..as told to Sid Maxwell

Timely Tips

By Sid Maxwell

1. To remove the sharp edge on props, use your prop reamer.
2. When mounting engines to motor mounts and looking for dead center, put masking tape on the motor mount and mark with a ball point pen.
3. To remove "flash" on plastic or ABS parts use a sharp wood chisel instead of a #11 knife so you won’t remove too much of the plastic material.

When I was up at the Ukiah Scale Fly in I was talking to a gentleman from the East Bay and he mentioned that they had some astro-turf if anyone was interested it was free. That sparked my attention so I have been following up with him and Phil Leech and I went down there a couple of weeks ago to look at it. Come to find out this is the same club we purchased our current turf from the SACRATS near Fremont. We did a little digging and we orginally paid 3700.00 for the turf we have now plus the cost of transporting so we could really come out ahead and only have the cost of transportation this time. There is enough to cover our entire pit area and then some. We were considering extending the south end of the field maybe another 50’ and also have plenty for an expanded heli pad. We will need some help getting the stuff as we are trying to figure out the best way to get it. If you would like to volunteer to help or with the use of equipment let me know. Shoot me an email or give me a call. I will include all my contact info below.

By the way, I have a combat plane now so watch out Sid, I’m coming to get’cha.

Later friends,

STevo

For Sale:

(2) FunBat .15 size combat airplanes complete hardware incl. motor mount, hinges and 2 oz gas tank. 37" wingspan $34.00. I ordered 6 and have 2 left

Sid Maxwell (707) 584-4428, (530) 832-4548

STevo Smith has a Dazzler 40 kit new in the box for very decent price. Shoot me an email with an offer.