SLOPING OFF...
...the Newsletter of Christchurch and District Model Flying Club for September 2021
WHITESHEET HILL
by David Bicker
Whitesheet sloping on a SW wind 11/08/21
Bowl height: 600 feet
Large landing-out zone
Shelter for the "pits" area behind a mound behind the flight line
A while back I mentioned that there was excellent soaring & sloping to be had at the SW Whitesheet Hill site near Mere. (see the Club Slope Sites pages for details - Ed)
I arrived about 11:30 am to find a large presence already at the field. There were around 20 cars parked in the gravel roadway behind the site on both sides of the road, but there was still plenty of parking available. Once through the field gate there were members' set-up benches & many wing protector bags stacked up in the grass by the fence. The reason for this became apparent when you approached the "pits" area behind the flight line. So many flyers had turned up that there wouldn't have been room for all of the benches & bags in the area as it was a sprawling mass of beautifully built large gliders & performance models, with a few fun fly planes as well. A quick head count showed that there were 20 models in the "pits" area.
I had brought my Volantex Phoenix 2400 & Zagi on to the slope, leaving my other models in the car as the wind was a little high for some of the more sedate models that I had brought along. The Phoenix 2400 had its maiden flight without misshap & landed quite well - if a bit far back on the field. I had configured flaps & spoilerons but was advised to configure crow braking to get more control for landings. As I'm getting used to an Open TX- based transmitter I haven't got that far with the programming yet.
As can be seen Trevor Hewson was present but I think that we were the only two from CDMFC. Most of the rest being from Whitesheet Radio Flying Club (WRFC).
At times there were up to 8-10 planes in the air at the same time. Some members opted not to fly while other members had a session throwing performance gliders around the bowl at high speeds. There was plenty of time for everyone to get flying time in & there wasn't a single near-miss or collision, although one large model fell out of the sky due to a battery failure (luckily pretty much undamaged) & another model that went down, never to be seen again even after a prolonged search.
Unfortunately flying was abandoned mid afternoon due to a cattle invasion of the flight line. Members got a bit twitchy with all the cattle moving closer to the fragile models on the ground.
A brilliant site to fly on a SW.
The site & directions to it are listed on the CDMFC slopes web page
David Bicker