I think in my last quarterly report I mentioned that Martin and I have some big shoes to fill. I know I am still working on it. Well as the first race of the year is now in the record books I can tell you that these races don't just happen. There are a lot of dedicated folks putting in a lot of hours and $$ to make our events fair and enjoyable for all racers. That being said I learned a lot and admit that things could have gone smoother from my perspective.
As usual Horizon Hobbies stepped up and made this a first class event for everyone who attended. The racing format was voted on by the racers and we ran 2 rounds on Friday and 3 on Saturday. This made for a very exciting Gold/Silver round late Sunday morning with awards at 1 PM and on the road early. I hope we have this opportunity at our other races this year. Speaking of on the road, while I was only 180 miles from home it took me the rest of the day to get home since my water pump went out about half way home. My wife Kathy rescued me with the “new” truck and things are back to normal now. I hope your journeys to and from our races are less eventful.
Part of my job description as the USRA VP is being the Chief Technical Officer. Conducting Safety inspections at Rantoul was a real eye opener. I learned a lot about how you guys set up your planes. With rare exception most of your installations were flawless. When presenting your plane for the Safety inspection the observers would like for you to have the wing off and the cowl off as well as having the Safety Inspection form filled out both front and back with your logbook handy. Other hatches may need to be opened at the inspectors request as well. This makes it easer (and quicker) for the inspector to check out your plane.
Areas that caught some guys and are in need of attention are.
• Keepers are required on all clevis type connectors. Jam nuts on metal clevis are encouraged.
• On Ignition engines (regardless of class), two ignition kill switches are required one on the outside (not under a hatch) and one internal, operated via the radio.
• If you have a PCM radio installed you must have the failsafe set to either
o engine shut off
o fuel shut off
o low throttle
• Engine retention lanyards are required to be 200 lb tensile strength. While I won't contest the load carrying capability of your cable if it is screwed into the firewall with a #6 wood screw I will mention it. The intent is to keep all the mass together in event of a crash were it will slow down quicker and possibly cause less collateral damage.
• Battery maintenance must be done annually at a minimum and noted in the Aircraft Log book. In my log book my entry reads “Batteries cycled OK and the date”
The other thing that you need to be aware of is that at each of these races we conduct a Board of directors meeting. The one item that was discussed that impacted you as a racer at this race was the propellers you use. The rules stipulate that the race props (GT and T-6) will be supplied by the race event organizer (via the USRA). How this impacts you is that you cannot use a prop that you used at a prior event. While I know none of you would modify your prop this eliminates that possibility as well as keep some one from repeatedly running the golden prop that may be just a little bit better than the standard propeller. Other issues included concerns about fatigue life on the propellers. Having now experienced two prop failures this year, one on the test stand and the other shortly after takeoff on my unlimited in round 4. They are a painful and expen$ive lessons. This will have virtually no impact on most racers but those who have a “pet prop” can leave it at home.
After the Gold race at Rantoul the planes were de fueled and then weighed. Here are some interesting numbers:
F1 GT winner Robert Vess was 28.3 lbs lightest plane was 27.48 lbs
F1 Alky winner Kenny Mac was 25.88 lbs lightest was 25.33 lbs
Unlimiteds are now in the low 30’s
My last comment, one of the nice things about conducting the safety inspection is that I get to closely examine your planes. In some cases to get a better view of the hook up and connections I would stick my head inside of the airplanes fuselage. In one case the fumes from the CA and accelerator were almost overpowering and I quickly retreated from that up close a personal inspection. After all passing out from CA fumes would have slowed down the inspection process.
It’s only a little while to Ashtabula and another chance to beat the best.
See you in August!!!
Tim Sparks
Vice President