Cameras Go Where Eagles Dare To Fly

Comrade (yes, I like this word),

I have perfected the model after all. Please cancel your travel plans immediately. As you told me, I used their universally-available computer access system to download plans for our surveillance system. Here is the information you thought would be available:

http://www.twitt.org/1partdrib.html

I purchased the plans and have a flying unit equipped with video and sound. Our agent in the air, hidden in plain view, is circling overhead getting us the data that will make us famous back home in the motherland. I will continue to build units and add the GPS tracking systems you have sent to the warehouse. We will soon have all the data we need to figure out what they have done to anger our superiours. May their nose hairs grow to be five feet long and uncuttable!

Your brother in peace,
Nex'nint Cloeath

Training Wheels

Do some of you remember your first bicycle, the one that your parent(s) set up with training wheels? You felt like a dufus, every kid in the neighborhood looking at you wobbling along the street or sidewalk, but at least you learned how to control the bike without banging your knees and smashing your head on the ground. Of course, some of you went to school the next day with the red badge of courage - a strawberry, dead leg, charley horse or corked thigh - having skipped the sissie training wheels and jumped right into ditches.

I admit I was a training wheel kid, for a day or two at least. My problem wasn't so much the left or right control but the stopping bit. I had one of those bikes where braking was reversing the pedal action. Plus, we lived at the top of the hill in the neighbourhood. In a panic on my first pedal out of the driveway, I aimed my bike down the hill, forgot to kick back on the pedals at the bottom and WHAM! crashed into a ditch, training wheels in tow and totally useless, my crotch and my ego black-and-blue for a few days (advice: learn to ride a bike in prepuberty, guys; you'll have less bulk in your package to worry about smashing).

Same goes for UAVs - you don't necessarily need training wheels but some age and wisdom teaches you to listen. Here's your OZ (i.e., Aussie or Down Under) advice for the day - a word, or website, to the wise is sufficient:

http://www.ozrcflying.com/2007/03/learning-to-fly-beginners-guide.html

Safe battery charging and soft landings to you! It's a sunny, calm day - guess where I'll be. ;^)

The Well-Flexed Clavicle

I grew up in the late early days of electronic music. By the time I could afford an instrument, a version of the Moog synthesizer was available at the local Radio Shack store. Even so, a friend of mine and I would breadboard our own bucket-brigade sonic seasonings while trying to emulate the masters of electronica.

Needless to say, I still look at electronic music (or "damned noise," as my father called it) as a trip into my younger age, when my understanding of the bow and arrow leading to the lyre, the hammered dulcimer, harpsichord, piano, guitar and Peter Frampton's famous talk box spiel, told me that new was old rewarded for reinvention.

Music to my ears? Hearing the conversion of a radio-control transmitter to a type of theremin, where the takeoffs, loops, and landings of a toy-scale airplane sing like nothing I've heard, joined by the lightshow that flashed from wingtip to wingtip and prop to tail, writing messages in a language that we'll only decipher in the next millenium.

Some UAVs are designed for asserting aggression (donning reflective sunglasses and stating, "Respect my aw-thaur-uh-tie"). My UAVs are designed for insight, putting thoughts and ideas into heads wired for the corpus callosum, with only a small influence on the amygdala or the reptilian brain (if there is such a thing anymore in our understanding of our species' technicolor organ).

Attention On Deck

Visited the local fly zone. Just missed the weekend's activities but saw what the place is like and watched one electric-powered plane take off and land. Fun! Got some skills to aim for now.

You can also see the attached photos of the burned motor (note flame marks) and melted motor mount (note how it looks shrink-wrapped to motor), including plastic gear with missing teeth (now a molten glob), of the Super Cub LP RTF plane. No wonder the forest creatures wanted me out of their domain a few evenings ago!

Cost to repair:

• Two wing hold down rods, $1.49
• Wing struts with screws, $2.19
• Gearbox with firewall, $8.99
• Motor with pinion, $10.99
• Prop shaft, $2.49
• TOTAL (cha-ching): $26.15 + tax

How much does a flight simulator cost? lol

Bartered Theatrics

Hey, Rob. Haven't heard from you in a while so I thought I'd check in and see how you're doing. Do you remember when we went to the National Boy Scout Jamboree in 1977? When was that, 32 years ago? Amazing, huh?

Anyway, while I've been working on my latest toy plane, I had a few memories pop up that I wanted to share with you.

There's much to discuss about those warm summer days in Pennsylvania...

• The cold showers from spring-fed water.
• The rain that soaked just about everything for days.
• The patch trading.
• The lack of girls, except when Junior Miss Teen rode through the camp in her limo.
• The demonstration tents - how to make paper from scratch and stuff like that.

Hard to believe you're a judge now. Guess you've seen your share of hard-luck cases come through your courtroom.

If you're the same person you were, you still have compassion for those less able to participate in normal social activities, folks with severe physical ailments or mental challenges. I'm glad people like you exist in the world, who have the drive, commitment and patience to care for folks like that. Even when we were teens, you volunteered to help other Boy Scouts at Camp Davy Crockett during the week set aside for "special" kids.

While I was sorting through these thoughts three decades old, another memory came to me. When I was a teen, I built framed-and-papered balsa wood flying models. So, while at Jamboree, when we found out about a contest to see who could build and fly a balsa model, you encouraged me to try.

I still have the two planes I built at Jamboree. They sit on a shelf a few feet from me in my study, a reminder of my youth I like to keep handy. Somewhere behind me sits a box that contains the prize I won at the Jamboree balsa plane contest, a scale model of the B1 bomber.

I suppose you have kids by now. I don't. My wife has me as her "child." Otherwise, we spoil our nieces and nephews, although they've grown up and are past the spoiling age. Pretty soon, we'll start spoiling our great-nieces and great-nephews.

Speaking of spoiled, do you remember what happened after the contest was over? As you may recall, another Scout brought with him a large, beautiful balsa wood model he had built for the Jamboree. He was upset that the judge would not let him enter the model that he'd built with his father's guidance. After the contest, he approached me and offered to buy the B1 bomber from me. When I declined, he offered to trade his balsa wood plane for the B1 bomber, wanting to take home something to show his father that he'd won the contest with this special plane he'd built.

I have a dim memory of what that kid's plane looked like. His design was something outside my budget at the time, my being somewhat restricted to plane size/cost because of my income (lawnmowing), which was eaten up by double dates and church outings.

We all have our dreams. We have family. We have our reasons for interacting with others. Can I say why I didn't trade the little B1 bomber for a big balsa wood model I'd never build for myself? Not really. I can guess that I had a form of integrity and fairness in my thoughts, balancing my ideas of what others would say about me in keeping the B1 bomber against trading it for something bigger and better.

Today, you're probably sitting behind a bench or sitting in your chambers balancing the lives of one part of a family against the lives of another part. More than likely, you operate with your compassion first and foremost, weighing it and comparing it to the laws and regulations with which your education and on-the-job training has provided.

When we were 15, you congratulated me on winning the contest fair and square, even though I had officially gotten second place. You saw the facts for what they were - my plane had flown farther than any others - and ignored the judge's verdict that the other boy's plane had ended up farther down the hill than mine because a gust of wind cartwheeled the boy's plane across the ground.

Today, I sit here and ponder the wisdom of a fellow 15-year old. You showed me that it's what we count in our thoughts that matters, not what others say, think or do. You showed other kids it's not what you're missing or what others say you don't have that matters - make miracles with what you have. I hope you're stilling making miracles.

Your friend,
Rick

It's a Mod, Mod, Mod, Mod World

With a rainy day forecast, I decided to put my flyboy enthusiasm on hold another day and completed all the mods on the Super Cub LP, including:

1. Added red-and-white checkerboard vinyl stickers to distinguish one side of the plane from the other while flying.

2. Replaced stock wheels/tires with larger wheels/tires, 2.5" on the front (Maxx EPW250 Light Weight Foam) and 1" on the tail (Dubro). Super glued small metal nuts to front axle, with brass washers as spacers to compensate for smaller width of larger front wheels/tires. Bent wire of rudder axle to accommodate wider rear wheel/tire.

3. Trimmed width of strut skirt, then drilled holes and cut slots in order to secure skirt to strut with small cable ties.

4. Taped Velcro strips to end of wing struts and edge of battery box for easy attachment/removal of wing.

5. Glued popsicle sticks to fuselage underneath battery box lid, drilling holes in sticks to mount battery box lid through sticks to fuselage.

6. Glued popsicle stick on back of wing saddle and marked center line front and back of wing for alignment on wing saddle.

7. Ran strips of packing tape along front edge and tips of wing.



8. Wrote name and contact information on wing and inside fuselage.

Something odd about this blog entry - every time I preview it, the pictures and comments are misaligned. Oh well, not the end of the world, eh?

Later this week, I'll make a few tests, including taxiing on ground and short hops/landings, to better acquaint myself with this plane before taking it up for long flights (and crashing?). Then it's on to GPS, onboard cam and other interesting cargo. Think a wireless Internet router will fly in something like this? Of course it will. But can I keep it airborne for very long? Ha. No. Maybe an RC balloon would better serve as a node in a citizen brigade set of instant Internet connections - iSkyRouter, here we come.

Researching subjects for my next story involves more than reading. Fieldwork rules!

Time for the evening meal. CU later.

Fly the Friendly Skies

Well, when you get tired of auguring, you try something else. In my case, auger in, as in taking a five (or six?) year-old electric RC plane out for a flight, getting it airborne, making a sharp right-hand turn and then diving into the ground at full speed.

Out pops the battery pack. The fuselage splits into two. The wing cracks into pieces. Pride takes an extended vacation. Talk to wife about options. Buy a new fuselage and wing? Get a bite to eat for dinner?

How about head to the locally owned and operated hobby shop(s) - RC Hobby Barn or HobbyTown - and look for spare parts, instead.

While this big kid [me] walks through the aisles smiling, the shopkeeper describes the boxed goodies on the top shelf. Well, being the cheapskate I am, I drooled over the 7-channel beauties but opted for a hobbyzone Super Cub LP.

Now I sit here a day later collecting my courage and accumulating modification ideas, including:

• Popsicle stick behind wing
• Battery box strengthening / landing gear strut skirt narrowing and securing
• Larger landing wheels / better prop
• Fuselage/wing considerations
• Onboard camera
• Larger battery
• GPS logger (discussion)
• Other???
• Nothing

More later. Time for bed.