abufletcher

I just found out that at my new club's field no gasoline engines are allowed. They are apparently considered too noisy and either people in the neighborhood have complained or people in the club are afraid that they might complain. Since gasoline engines are popular in larger WWI models I was a bit dismayed to hear this.

The reason it came up is that I've purchased a large ARF (yes, I know, groan) of the Paulistinha P-56 with a 3 meter wingspan. The sole purpose in buying this is to get my Seidel/UMS 770 mounted on a model pronto and learn how it really works in flight. Luckily, the 770, being a 4st, is apparently OK.

Does anyone else have this prohibition against gasoline engines?

--Don

PS. I've let the scale modeling lapse over the past half year (due to a host of issues) but am gearing up to get going again.

OldScaleGuy

My Feedback: (2)

Never heard of it before. The only thing i have ran into a couple of times over the years is the request to catch the overflow to avoid killing the grass.

tailskid

My Feedback: (34)

At the field where I used to fly my son's 3W 100 passed the sound test on the ground, but just barely. BUT when he flew all the two-strokers were louder in the air! Of course dual canister mufflers helped

raptureboy

Thats funny because nitro fuel kills the grass too. I would ask them to allow you to fly if you can pass the noise test. I found switching to a 3 blade prop toned down my DLE 20 quite a bit over a 2 blade.

grosbeak

Our club has a rule that prohibits use of internal combustion engines before 9 AM.

Madman

Don

Good to see you back. I was wondering how you were. I live very near our club field (under 1/5 km in the country). My experience with gas motors is unless very well muffled (these new canisters seem to work great) they literally sound like they are in my back yard. I know they are no closer than 1/4 km or more but that is the aural effect. Personally I don't mind but there are 7 other houses in our little patch of country and our club likes to be ahead of the "issues". So we have asked anyone flying gas to be very considerate. Like grosbeak there is no flying any fuel planes before 9:00 am.

Stephen

Madman

Don

Good to see you back. I was wondering how you were. I live very near our club field (under 1/5 km in the country). My experience with gas motors is unless very well muffled (these new canisters seem to work great) they literally sound like they are in my back yard. I know they are no closer than 1/4 km or more but that is the aural effect. Personally I don't mind but there are 7 other houses in our little patch of country and our club likes to be ahead of the "issues". So we have asked anyone flying gas to be very considerate. Like grosbeak there is no flying any fuel planes before 9:00 am.

Stephen

abufletcher

Hi Steven,

My workbenches (both of them) are just as full of projects as they were when halted progress last spring: 1) re-hab a minor mishap to my SE5a, almost done 2) re-align the rigging on my Snipe 3) Continue with the 1/6 scale Albatros CI 4) Onwards with the 1/4 scale Strutter and 5) eventually backwards to the super scale DrI I was working on several years ago.

Regarding the sound of "weed whacker" engines, I agree that the sound is annoying and seems to carry further than other engines. Even the whine of 2-strokes seems to fall over quickly over distance. I don't really like gasoline engines but they're cheap and seem to be the mainstay of the dawn patrol fliers.

*****

I have tried to keep up with my flying, however...at least when I could. Prior to the summer holiday (which I spent in the US) I was teaching a course up in Tokyo on the weekends so that limited my trips to the field (and the field is now a one and a half hour drive away, one way). I got myself a nice little ARF of the Paulistinha P-56 which is a (un?)licensed production of the Taylorcraft. It's a great everyday flyer. And now the same company (Modelcraft) has come out with a 3 meter wingspan version which seems like a perfect platform to complete the break-in and learning curve with my UMS 770.

abufletcher

Actually, my project for today is to clear off one of those workbenches so I have a spot to have a Thanksgiving dinner!

OliverJacob

My Feedback: (12)

I can understand noise restrictions. Some high tuned glow engines are louder then large gassers, so banning gas engines does not seem fair.
The club should get a meter and measure all engines - same procedure for all.

2walla

My Feedback: (10)

So they allow glow but not gas? Order yourself up a jett 50, get an 11x4 apc prop and some good ear muffs. Show em what loud is when it unwinds in the air....

WacoNut

Luckily we have no such issues at our field, we lease land from a farmer who has 3 full scale planes and the neighbors do not mind. We have not had one complaint in the 10 yrs the club has been at this location. The only noise requirement we have is that all engines have a muffler installed.

I flew at another club last year and during the Fun-Fly the neighbor was complaining the planes were making too much noise at his house. One of the guys ran down to his house and checked the noise level, it checked right at 62 decibels max over a 15 minute period and we all put our planes up during that period to get a good reading. Some people just hate to see others enjoying themselves. He was annoyed just because he could hear the planes.

Most gassers are fairly quiet if propped accordingly. I do have to say my Waco with the 3W-157 and 34x10 prop really rips the blade tips, well over 100 db on the flightline.

Boomerang1

I think the problem can be summed up in just 2 characters - 3D.

This type of flying has become popular with the average aerobatic wannabe (who could not be bothered with the
commitment required with proper competition aerobatics) so he's happy to hang of his propeller at the local club.

The flying becomes popular hence the large availability of cheap chinese gas engines with their rubbish mufflers.
Rubbish mufflers + cheap (popular) engines + high/gunning throttle = noise problems.

Gas engines can be as quiet as any engines but need good mufflers to achieve this. These tend to be large so if
the model is to look ok the mufflers have to go inside & unless the model is designed for this from the start it's a big
job fitting them. Good canister mufflers are also expensive & this spoils the whole big, cheap power equation.

You can make effective, compact mufflers yourself but this requires skills beyond the average modeller these days.

My club has no special gas engine rules but some guys are flying noisy models so it's only a matter of time.


Paulistinha P-56 with a radial? Will look like a Rotec Kitfox! - John.

PS, welcome back.

Madman

It is not glow or 3D per se. What it is is gas engine noise carries much further and with less degradation compared to glow. I don't know the physics of it but being close but not right on top of the field gives me a unique ability to judge. We also have a turbine flier and that sound rolls around the forests and bounces back but it more like a great big whoosh. Also with canisters the gas motors are very quiet and not annoying at all. Just gas motors, even with 'good' mufflers carry long distances with no large loss of volume or change of pitch. When I step out on the back porch and hear one I keep thinking the neighbours are dropping a tree until I realise from the rise and fall of the pitch its a plane up. I am not annoyed by the sound but it is very noticeable. All the wishful thinking by the proponents and pointing at glow as bad does not change the facts.

Stephen

abufletcher

That really says a lot. My old club lost the field we had used for over a decade and at the new field they found only electric flying is allowed. One of the reasons given by the owner was that the noise of IC engines (of any type) would "interfere" with the tangerine trees.

abufletcher

There's also a lot of truth in this. Every gas-engined model I've seen around these parts is a large aerobatic bird, models that as often as not are being flown "pedal to the metal" over most of the flight.

Great! I was looking for something like this...just so that I can pretend that the monster I'll be flying is still somehow scale.

grosbeak

I'm no fan of 3D - luckily there doesn't seem to be a lot of it in our club. I do own and love to fly a 50cc SBach 342 but it's got a canister and is incredibly quiet - and it's NOT for 3D.

edh13

My Feedback: (9)

At my club there are two different rules for gas and glow. At three meters - 100 DB for gas and 103 DB for glow. All of the IMAC guys now fly at a different field. Jets and electrics are exempt.

MTK

You might consider a couple things to quiet down the large gassers....These will cost some dollars so be forewarned:
First, a soft rubber isolation mount.
Second, a tuned exhaust that is also soft mounted. This doesn't need to be a full blown tuned pipe; a well designed cannister will do.
Third, use a 3 or 4 bladed prop, sized according to the performance you want.

I do these as a matter of course to all my gas engines (for aerobatic models). One of the most interesting set-ups was a piped and soft mounted DLE55 turning a 3 blader 20x12 carbon prop. Incredibly quiet, almost electric like. My OS GT33 equipped aerobats are electric like in their noise footprint.

Having a great prop up front is very important. I have heard some woodies for larger scale models make so much noise they hurt the ears. All that noise comes from only one place, robbing a great deal of thrust in the process

Teus

Good to see you back Don,

How about a gas 4s/c? Same sound as a nitro 4s/c but much more economic and much smaller muflers, perfect for our scale planes. The sound and power of the FG-57TS in my Eindecker is awesome. Just an idea.......

Desertlakesflying

My Feedback: (28)

3 blade props are great for all types of flying if you ask me. Seems to make flying everything easier.

rc-sport

My Feedback: (12)

Our club also does not allow gas engines, due to a neighbor who complained about the noise.

jmpups

My Feedback: (1)

WOW, I guess that neighborhood doesn't cut their grass either.jmpups

abufletcher

I'm looking forward to getting back in the game!

I don't think the club has any formal "noise level" criteria. It's pretty simple: No gasoline engines, but any 4 stroke engine is ok...and I'm assuming this means any of the Saito engines. (Note that since all my communication with my club mates is in Japanese, I may not always get every subtle detail.)

Of course those Saito "gassers" are also unfortunately pretty pricey.

guitarsbanjo

My experience has been that the Prop noise of a large gas engine can carry a lot further than the exhaust noise of pretty much any .60 size nitro engine with a muffler, at least while flying. That's not true of all gas engines all the time. I heard an airplane hovering while I was on the other side of a busy interstate from the flying field. I could see other planes flying the "pattern", but you could tell the noise was from the one hovering. In that case it was probably exhaust noise, too far away to be sure, but it was the only plane you could actually hear over the freeway noise. I'm sure keeping the rpm's down, and 3 bladed props could fix a lot of that.

I also think it is a perceived noise thing. The larger gas airplanes tend to fly a larger pattern, taking their "noise" further away from the flying field. I remember reading once in a magazine about the idea of a sound cone, the higher the plane goes, the larger the base of the cone. So a .40 size control line plane would not annoy as many neighbors as a .40 size rc plane since it stayed in a relatively small area at a low altitude. I've often thought that a lot of the neighbors complaints, and the eventual loss of our flying field might have been avoided if we had limited the size of our planes. You just cant fly a 60" airplane as far out as a 8' span plane before you have to turn around, or lose it. The db reading on the ground isn't the be-all-end-all. Seems like I remember one test that showed the db's of a 4-stroke as being the same as an equal 2s, but the 2s is perceived to be louder because of the frequency. Don't know if that's true, just remember reading it somewhere. Just an anecdote, my little cox .049's scream and hurt your ears on the ground with no muffler, but if I fly with a couple of other planes in the air, once I get up to altitude, sometimes it is hard to tell if my plane is still running. That little scream hurts at close range but doesn't carry very far. Similar thing, I can crank an .049 in the back yard and walk around to the front of the house and barely notice the noise, but I can definitely tell if my neighbor is using a leaf blower in his back yard!

All just observations.