No announcements today other than that we’re flying tomorrow – even earlier than usual. Ideally we’ll be up at 4AM and getting ready to roll into the dark. XCWeather is predicting 5mph winds gusting… 5mph at 04:00, rising to 6mph gusting 10mph at 07:00.
Points to score; much to do!
Instead of redundant announcements – the AGM highlights are best saved until last anyway – I wanted to share a personal anecdote on why the Icarus Cup is great.
So Betterfly had a booboo yesterday morning.
Fortunately our accidents tend to be merely embarrassing, and fortunately never fatal.
What happened here?
We were flying in headwinds that were… upon reflection, too strong. Having finally found a wind direction that happened to coincide with the direction of a paved surface, we were keen to get some flying in. Unfortunately, with no fuselage fairing, our drag levels were too damned high. The ~50kg pilot couldn’t produce enough power to cut through the wind (this is one of the few situations where being a heavy HPA pilot would actually be helpful) – instead, all of his power was simply going into fighting drag. The result? Climbing like a lift, with minimal ground speed – particularly when pushed by our well-meaning ground crew (indeed, pushing aircraft into the air is their job). Dave couldn’t quite produce enough power to sustain this flight, but the combination of pushing from ground crew and a particularly strong gust sent him shooting skywards. The rearward CG from the unusually light pilot also added some extra pitch sensitivity which made it trickier to bring the nose back down before the plane stalled.
Academic discussions of aerodynamics aside: two of the three tail support struts had broken off. These two supported the fin AND the elevator, so… we had no tail surfaces.
Suffice to say I was having a crap morning. My plane was broken, and my usually crap but not wholly useless tubeless gravel tyres had decided not to hold air anymore. I have plenty of experience in designing composite parts, but no actual hands-on experience in making or repairing them.
And then I received help.
Some gorilla glue, glass cloth, epoxy, peel ply and tape – and a lot of time – later, and the struts were back on. I also have something resembling an idea of how to work with composites. Seems kind of obvious now.
Technical knowledge aside: the tail bit are back on.
This got me thinking about previous Icarus Cups. I’ve received a huge amount of not just technical support, but also a great deal of simple compassion and encouragement from a community that at its best is profoundly supportive.
If not for the community that gathers together once per year, Betterfly would probably be rotting in a trailer and certainly not getting blown about by energetic headwinds. We have a group of remarkably smart and unreasonably dedicated people gathered together for the sole purpose of powering aircraft aloft with naught but their legs. That is patently ridiculous… but way that is strangely inspiring.
From a different perspective, we also get a whole bunch of really really really clever and experienced people together in a marquee on the outer edge of an isolated airfield, usually with lots of downtime. Sharing experience and helping out is kind of the default here.
Regardless of how you look at it, you can’t argue with the results.
BHPFC 
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