Great Lakes Regional Meet Revisited 2008

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Rocket Al

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The Sky Busters (Northeast Ohio's NAR and Tripoli section combined) are pleased to announce this year's Great Lakes Regional Meet Revisited launch in lovely Amherst, Ohio, just a few miles west of Cleveland Ohio. It will be a two day launch on April 26th and 27th. Details of the launch can be found at the Sky Busters website at www.skybusters.org .

In conjunction with the sport launch, former SNOAR (precursor to the Sky Busters by 30 years) member Mike Nowak and I are holding a bona fide competition again, considering the fun we had doing it last year. The events for this year, including the weighting factor, are:


Sport Scale 20
D Egg Loft Duration 17
B Streamer Duration 9
B Helicopter Duration 21
C Parachute Duration 9
Spot Landing 4

Even though last year's contest was downgraded to an open meet (only 8 NAR competitors) it looks like we're going to be a full regional. We already have 3 A division contestants (!!!) between my daughter and Mike's kids, as well as children of some of the other members, as well as a good contingent of folks who were intrigued by last year's contest.

Thanks to some of the vendors who frequent this forum, such as Hawk's Hobbies, Apogee Components, Art Applewhite, Aerospace Speciality Products and Aerotech, we are getting together a fabulous list of prizes to offer to the lucky winners of the events. Once again, thanks to these companies (and I'm not adverse to hearing from anybody else... :D )

Even if you're not an NAR member, we will be doing an "overall" contest, for the prizes, then backing the non-NAR members out for the final points to be submitted to the contest board. Come one, come all. It ought to be a barrel of fun. The Sky Busters have a yahoo group at https://groups.yahoo.com/group/Skybusters/ I'll be doing a "contest strategy" series there shortly. Since we're not flying in any particular order, one model can be used for two different events, swapping out recovery systems, etc.

Any questions, please feel free to PM or email me. if you're possibly planning on attending, let me know, and i can enter you into the Contest Manager software.

Thanks,

Alan Tuskes
Contest Director
 
How big is the field/drift area? I'm somewhat interested, but you have a few events that would go a loooooong way (D-ELD, B-HD).
 
https://maps.yahoo.com/#mvt=h&lat=41.342364&lon=-82.311738&mag=2&q1=51236 Rte 113, Amherst OH

Has an aerial view of the area. The fields are surrounded by other farm fields that are owned by friendly folks. As a matter of fact, when that field is planted, the farm directly across the street is our secondary field. The only real annoyance is the turnpike, which is visible on the map directly north of the field, but the only thing I've ever seen go there is high power stuff.

I think that last year we only lost one competition bird, and that was a PD flight with an extremely large chute in a fairly (15mph+) stiff wind, losing sight after about 6 minutes or so. The field is rather nice, if a bit muddy at times. Would love to have you come out. Fly per your best strategy. Mine is get a qualifier, then go for broke.... reason being that people like me will be flying for fun more than points, not sure what Mike Nowak will be doing, I know Art Upton will be loaded for bear. And that may be the majority of "serious" competitors in C division.

Easy points....



Alan
 
Al,
Drop me a PM if you want any of my stuff for prizes.

Evil Ed Hartle
Hartle Engineering, Inc.

"Still Chasing the Demon"
 
Just an update...


Looks like we're going to have a decent turnout for the GLRMR contest, even though not everybody will be NAR members. As I mentioned in my first posting, I'll be breaking the non-NAR members out for the points.

I need to thank some of the folks that frequent TRF from the absolute bottom of my heart for the absolute generous contributions for the contest prizes. A number of the items donated will be going into the club raffle, but a few choice ones will be saved as prizes for the contest flyers, especially since we have at least 4 or 5 A division folks so far.

Some of the folks who this contest would not be possible without are:

Dr Zooch (You KNOW I love your stuff!!)
Hawks Hobby (Need to get my Super Sprite done!!!)
Aerospace Speciality Products (Competition products extraordinaire!!!)
Art Applewhite (I LOVE those saucers!!)
Fliskits (B Helicopter Duration is only possible because of you!!!!)
Apogee Components (RockSim... what else can I say)

Contacted all these folks because I have bought and absolutely LOVE their stuff, and they responded in kind. The newsletter with your display ads is in the works, and you should be getting it (as well as it being posted online) within two weeks. Thank you, Thank You, THANK YOU!!

If anybody else is interested in kicking in even a single item, please let me know so I can get a quarter page ad for the newsletter done up (or you can send me one you have done) by emailing me at [email protected]. Email me for a mailing address.

Thanks much


Alan
 
I'm planning on being there for Saturday, I have several other obligations for Sunday though. I'm looking forward to meeting some of you.

Who else is going... Besides Rocket Al?
 
Coming up this weekend!

Woohoo it looks like a typical Ohio Spring weekend, overcast with a 40% chance of rain.



Then again, if our weather stays true to form, the forecast will change three times between now and then...
 
I'm kind of hoping for a rainout, actually--I am taking the kid to a college visit this weekend and can't make it, but would love to make it if it gets postponed (assuming sport scale turn-in is also postponed). I'd really love to keep my regional business in Ohio and check out my northern neighbors. Maybe next year I'll have better luck (and will know to coordinate schedules with Alan in advance).

--Chan Stevens
 
Well, depending on what you're looking at, there's a 50% to 60% chance of rain on Saturday, 30% or so on Sunday. I also have a surprize party for a relative at 6 PM Saturday, so if it's postponed, even I wouldn't be too upset.

I have discussed with Mike Nowak about coming up with a list of events that we will discuss while launching at this year's GLRMR, so that we'll have an announcement ready to make by close of festivities this weekend. Of course, since we don't know when it will be held until winter/spring anyway, the point may be moot. On the otherhand, since we don't need as large a site as the high power folks (depending on events) if we obtain a smaller field that isn't dependent on crops, we may be able to have the contest independently of the high power spring launch.


Oh crap.... then we'll have civil unrest over the name GLRMR.


ALan
 
Bummer. Fierce competitor that you are, I was hoping to meet you there.

Fierce? Heck, I'm one of the nicest, friendliest guys you'd ever meet at a contest. If it weren't for that big honkin' trophy I have for a hood ornament (a la Lefty Driesel), you'd never know I was any good. You'd certainly never guess it from watching me fly...:egg::stupid:
 
Alan,

BTW,

Despite the current 60 percent chance of rain, what time is the meet supposed to start?
 
Well. it's looking pretty gloomy for the competition part of GLRMR for this weekend. Pretty much between 60 & 70 percent chance of rain, with 20 to 30 MPH winds. Tonight at 9:30 is looking nice, but I don't trust tomorrow morning.

As it is, since I live about 30 minutes away, unless it's absolutely rain cats and dogs, I will show up at the field tomorrow morning at about 7:30 to see what's going on. I'm thinking that it will be looking bad. If the weather with wind and/or rain is looking bad, we will go for Sunday, which looks less rainy, but may start getting windy sometime after noon. In the event that Saturday is cancelled and we go to a one day meet, we will have only 1 qualified flight allowed for each event.

Please call me in the morning at my cell phone at 216-701-9192 brfore you start your drive in the morning. Many of you are planning on driving in from quite some distance, and I'd rather save you the trouble if I feel that field conditions/wind/whatever are not in our best interest to fly.

Thanks,


Alan Tuskes
GLRMR Contest Director
 
Waahhh! :cry:

I hope it's better than the weather guys are predicting. Saturday is the only day I can make it. If Saturday is scrubbed, I'd favor a backup date as well...
 
Well, this was posted on the site last night....



Fellow rocketeers,

As just posted on the Skybuster site:

Weather forcast is looking bad for Saturday with rain AND HIGH WINDS,
so we will have a 3 hour delayed start - to 12 pm. Today the field was
beautiful after the morning shower (we got sunburned). Hopefully it
will be clear again tomorrow after the storms blow through - will be
muddy however. See Ya Tomorrow!

Marty Dorociak
Skybusters Pres.



So it looks like they are going to try to launch with shorter hours. I'll be heading out the be there by 11:00. Sunday may be a better day to launch, even though the wind will be starting to pick up by noon, so once again, it may be a short day for competition, if you're ever planning on getting your rocket back. If we do launch Saturday, we will be having only 1 qualified flight per event. So you'll need to make those returns (which may be challenging if the wind is as predicted....)

Alan
 
The weather was pretty gloomy when we first got there around noon but turned out to be a nice day although it was really windy. I don't know what I might have for pics, I let one of my kids take the camera. Since we only had a half a day and I can't go back tomorrow, I was pretty busy just trying to get some qualifying flights in along with helping my kids (two of mine and two borrowed :D) get a few launches off. I learned a few things and only lost one rocket. Not bad for my first competition.

The only thing that bummed me out was the MMX AGM-12B Bullpup I scratchbuilt for Sport Scale. It was sweet looking and I think scored okay in judging but was unstable off the pad and the ejection charge bubbled the paint job I spent two weeks on.
 
O yeah, I got to meet some wonderful people from TRF as well. I met Rocket Al and Art Upton but unfortunately I didn't see his name tag so I didn't know it was Art until after he left. Obviously, I never introduced myself either.:( Maybe next time. It WAS good to see everyone and our entire carload had a GREAT time. All of the "kids" age 10 to 18 want to build bigger and better rockets for "next time."
 
I attended the launch today and had a great time, every class of motor was flown up through L while I was there. I flew all H & I motors with the exception of 1 G77R LMS that promptly cato'd at about 200 feet. Luckily it blew the nozzle and the parachute did deploy so I had zero damage to my LOC NORAD. All my other flights went well. Unfortunately I forgot my camera at home so no pics :(
 
I am so sunburned and chapped, but I don't care because it appeared that everybody had a good time. Because I wanted everybody to have the opportunity to compete, I will be doing two standings lists, the overall standings and the " official" NAR standings (back out the non NAR competitors, and refigure the points). We had a total of 16 competitors, 12 of which were NAR members, with enough folks from far away enough without section affiliation to qualify as a regional. The turnout was way better than expected, so I was running my butt off all day. I'd like to thank everybody who came out to fly. I'd also like to thank everybody who cam out to fly and put up with my airheadedness in trying to keep track of times, flight cards and my kids.

The results ought to be on the skybuster yahoo group within a day or so.

Thanks everybody,


Alan
 
Sounds like a great event! Glad the weather held off for you guys.

Evil Ed:D
 
And there was a big box of Evil Ed chutes and streamers for folks who needed them. I wonder where THAT came from? ;) ;)
 
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