hi CG, i haven't called in here for a long time , so just catching up on my reading now. Your Excelleron i see is still surviving, so is mine. I just checked the log book and it is fast approaching 3500 flights now. Flown most of the colour off it , an Eagle tried to pinch it during one flight, so more patches were necessary, but it still flies .
Now Hello to the beautiful Bev , who i see is still keeping this thread open , wonderful work Bev, keep it up.
Bill from down under

[color=#FF0099]Bill,
Great to hear from you. How are things down there in the other colonies? What have you been flying? As you notice, the gang still hasn't organized the cruise to Australia yet.
Bev

Hi Bill.

Great to hear from you too. I've had an interesting summer and the fall is looking as interesting. It started of with surgery on my left knee that went a bit sour.. got infected, ended up back in the hospital for almost a week, then on anti-biotics for a month following that. Then, I went to England for work, back home then to Massachusettes, Florida, then back to England, then to Prague and Salzburg for vacation.

Then we found out that our vacation get-away apartment in Florida was going to be converted to Condo/Time Share so we were force to find somewhere else to live, so we bought a villa-condo of our own.. bigger and nicer than the apartment. Now, we have to head back down next week, and again in November followed by a trip back to Massachusetts to see my Mom (she's 91 and going strong) and then out to California for a couple of weeks in December. Wphew.. a truly busy and, if I might be redundant, interesting.

I flew last week, but flew the Goldberg Protege and my trainer. I wanted to make sure the trainer was good to go because we have some new students in the club that will be using it. I have not flown the Excelleron since last Spring. But, the way the weather has been lately, I imagine that I will head out one of these weekends and will take that fine bird out there and put some time on that engine. I have to replace the pull-pull cable on the elevator before I do, though. I am using Kevlar but it has frayed at the elevator connection and I don't trust it to fly safely the way it is. I have some new vinyl coated kevlar that is really good stuff and am going to use that.

Keep up the flying, my friend. And take care. Hey, we gotta keep Bev informed and motivated, eh?

Hey Bev, I thought we were gonna use one of those 777's Bruce has lined up for our trip down under? [8D] See.. I have my shades ready!!

Dick.

CG, i would have thought you'd know how to look after the body beautiful better than that . Where you hoping Bev would come and be your nurse????? She is too engrossed in her stable of models. As for the other aspects of your past year , well i guess that is called progress. You have to live with that .
Well Bev , since my last post , i rushed out and mowed the airstrip in readyness for your arrival in the 777. I know it will be left up to you to do all the organising, but i feel with your expertise you will have no difficulty. I am still flying the Excelleron , now with its third motor. My intentions are to see just how many flights i can get out of such a wonderful aircraft, without performing major surgury to it. I have however replaced the undercarriage once. I orginally constructed it with a Bolly Fiberglass undercarriage, it eventually cracked , so it now sports a new Bolly swept back carbon fiber undercarriage. Beautiful setup for dreamtime landings. So keep posting to your forum, i still enjoy reading it from 1 to 733 . XXXXX just for you bev .
Bill , from down under

G'day Bill,
You sweet talker, you.

Hey, Bill.. one nurse is enough, thank you!! Not that I would reject the offer or anything like that

I've done no flying the past two weeks. Darn!! I really got the itch to get my planes in the air!!!!


Later guys. (and Gal!)

Dick.

[color=#FF0099]Dick and Bill,

Yes, we are still on for the trip, but with fuel prices the way they are....I think we are getting delayed again. Keep saving that loose change, gents!!!

Gentlemen,
I had to post a few pix from yesterday at the field. We have a new pilot, John, who has that whole setup to put the camera in the plane and wear the special glasses to fly from inside the cockpit. He got everything all wired up and had Joel maiden the cessna that he used, while he watched "from inside the plane". Afterwards, we watched the video replay, and then he flew it with the glasses on......TOTALLY COOL!!! including the unintended loop around the windsock he had to bank 90 degrees at the last moment....(it was something right out of the Red Bull Air Races) and then flew right over us as we stood out on the taxiway with him (which almost shot the "stand behind the pilot and you'll never get hit" theory out of the water ) I loved it!!!
Bev

Heading south to fly my new trainer....

Well, I checked weather.com and all looks promissing for this weekend. Can't fly during the week now, days are too short.[:@] I looked in my flight box and am still on the first gallon since May. I need to do more flying and less socializing at the field. It's all fun.

Bev, you haven't said anything about your first kit build in quite a while now. Any news? Any new PINK airplanes?

So what is the mode of transportation, Is Bruce getting a 767, or is Ken getting the RC Universe yaht?

We're not getting 767's, they're going to be 777's but the first haven't been delivered yet. We've got a rebuilt 757 about to go into service but that's a lot smaller. Gonna have a bunch of them before long. The way this place buys planes you'd think we were printing money.

I think we all decided that Bev was getting the yacht.. but that 777 sure does sound like the way to go!!

We had a guy at our club with the on-board camera and a set of VR (virtual reality) goggles that we could wear and fly as though we were in the cockpit.. Very cool!!!

Dick.

I wish that 'was' my Yacht heading south!

You can have your 777, I'll take a 787 Dreamliner.

Whatever. I'll be flying in our 777 next year or early 2009. When do you think you'll have a 787?

747, 757, 777, 787, yeah, yeah, yeah. Give me a nice luxury yacht!!

I'm with you on the yacht....

[color=#FF0099]Dick,
One luxury yacht coming up!!!

JR,
No pink planes yet, although I just got a gentle lady glider. lots of color on it, but no PINK....can you just imagine....I must change that!!! I was just given a tiny kit for a Laser Cut Stick .10 made by get this ...House of Balsa....sounds like a rekit already. it also states .... "Note: This kit was not designed for the first time builder" We may be in trouble now gents!!! If I manage to build it, I'll make it PINK!!!

Gentlemen,
Well on thursday, David put me up on the buddy box and took away my aileron controls (and shut down my throttle intermittantly). So I was forced to fly "right" pattern in a crosswind and do approaches and amazingly had a handful of good landings. It forced me to use the rudder and elevator for virtually everything. I definitely need to be pushed (left to my own devices, I tend to take the easy way out lately....left pattern and ailerons) He says this is the first step to becoming "Eddie" ( a major 3D pilot at our field) Thanks David! Can't wait to do it again.

Bev [sm=kiss.gif]

I would rather have the money it takes just to fill up that boat. Diesel is around 3.50gal. When it was around 2.50 it took around 3000.00 to fill up for an excursion. Now it is around 5000.00 for just a loop around Gulf just for diesel not to mention the Captain and deck hands. And then you have the slip. Unless your the owner of one that is the cheapest way is to just buy the slip and then if you happen to upgrade or downgrade you can just sell it with the Cruiser and that actually helps sell it. I could have a few good planes with what one fill up costs lol.

Chicken feed for us high-rollers, Kid Chuckles!! Just chicken feed.

CG, Can I have your table scraps ??

Sure. You can have whatever is left after the cat is done. [sm=lol.gif]

$5000? That should just about cover starting up and taxiing a 777 to the runway. Might cover takeoff if no delays. It burns @9 gals per mile cruising at altitude. And filling the fuel tanks is 47,890 gallons.

Thats just the "Launch" to take you out to the real boat! [sm=wink_smile.gif]

Hi All-John the Wine Country Flyer-here. From way over on the LEFT COAST!! I found this thread the other day and have read every post. Love it!! Bev-it's great to see a female out here flying & crashing with all of us guys. Wish there were more like you. Sounds like you are truley enjoying the hobby and doing real good at it , too. And actually useing the left stick !! I'll bet 80% of the guys flying RC don't use it as much as you do. Give yourself a big left handed pat on the back. CGretired--you mentioned you had an Elder 40 kit new in the box. I built one a few years ago. It was a fun build and a great Sunday flyer. I put the wire spoked wheels on it. They look so cool on a sunny day doing a low & slow fly by. The vibration keeps 'em rolling and the sun sparkles of the spokes.
COOL. I didn't want to buy a whole roll of chrome ultracote, so I just used red. Looks OK to me. You also mentioned not getting to fly in your local Air Show. Bummer. My club has been very lucky the last three years. We've had the honor of OPENING the Air Show with our models flying for 45 min. to an hour before the BIG BOYS come in !! Gets a l ittle nervous, though, when ya know there's a few thousand people behind ya watching. Great fun, though. And our display gets lots of visitors during the show, plus a new member or two each year. We also have a free raffel for kids under 16 to win a RTF E-Cub. That always goes over big. Well, I'll get outa here now and sit back and read future posts. It's been real enjoyable. And Bev--I can't wait to see your PINK Cub.