| IRCHA Southwest Fun Fly |
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The IRCHA South West event, was held on September 22, 23 and 24th at the Utah Valley Aeromodelers field in Lehi Utah.The weather was cold and rainy on Friday, but Saturday and Sunday were perfect, cool and still. There were 30 or so pilots from around the western states, and probably (I don't think anyone counted) 90 - 100 helis.
I flew my Mars electric and my dads Predator max 90. There was quite a bit of interest in the Mars, only a few people had seen pictures of the Mars online, so it generated quite a few double takes. We had a great time, and I'm really looking forward to attending more events and meeting more pilots. Here are some photos and a bit more information. Since this is my first AMA event, I included a shot of my name and number on one of the Helis I'll be flying, This is a first for me, I've been flying helis for about 11 months. Click on any of the pictures for a closer look!
Heres the Helis we took to the FunFly
These are the flyers, all the others were for demonstration purposes.
Getting things setup early Friday morning, The weather was cold and rainy.
{mospagebreak_scroll title=Saturday} Once the weather cleared, things started to happen, there were a lot of nice helis,
Heres a closeup of the canopy and chassis, VERY NICE.
Heres a Very nice trex 450 owned by a friend I met at the event, Paul Grohman
To start off the event Saturday, there was a pilots meeting
Then there was a experimental Helicopter landing of a single seat turbine powered HeliCycle,
Next was the pilots "photo op" (I'm in the red T shirt furtherest to the left)
Never miss a chance to showoff your machines !
And heres the important part, The Helis!
Heres a shot towards transmitter impound.
There were some vendors well represented,
Here's a closer look at the Bergen and PHI areas.
{mospagebreak_scroll title=Sunday} There was quite a bit of activity, I even got to help out a few people. Here I'm helping "Tin" a struggling raptor pilot. He had most everything setup backwards, including the direction of the tail rotor rotation. But within a short time we had him all straightened around and his Raptor 30 V1 hovering. I'm busy here, while someone is looking over the Mars. He offered to let me try his 320 Align carbons on the Mars, but he somehow disappeared after he saw me do a blade scrape with it. Hmm... never saw him again
I got to fly in the Pod Hop, where I got the second best time with only 2 seconds given away to the winner. I also attempted a flight in the 3D competition, but I had a damaged speed control (which I found out about later) that caused a in-flight failure only about 45 seconds into the competition. so I was out of that early. After repairing that I got several very good 3d flights. There is a video on the videos page of one of the flights
I also met some new friends, Paul G , Tin, Gary Travis, Lee and many many others.
Here's Paul and parents with his Gohbee Stinger 50, Nice folks !
The youngest pilot there (I believe) was Jake Botita, He's somewhat of a celebrity, because his Dad taught Alan Szabo to fly way back when. Now Alan and Danny are returning the favor, along with Dads help of course. This was the first AMA event that Jake has flown in, and he also completed his very first loops, first 540 stall turns, and first night flying... Way to go Jake! Not bad for only 9 years old! Here's Jake, Paul G and Jakes Dad, carrying the 3 bladed gasser (Man that thing will fly forever!)
The Utah Valley Aeromodelers field is a really nice place to fly, Grass infields, covered pits, good parking, Check out this view. (you'll want to enlarge this for the full sized view)
All in all, a GREAT TIME, I can't wait for next year ! |
