Contest 6 of the

2006 North Island F3B Series,

hosted by HBRF at Hawkes Bay,

on November 18-19, 2006.

CD: Peter Williams

Summary, Round 1, Round 2

Report by Peter Williams

Well we have completed contest 6 of the North Island F3B Series.

The wind was already blowing when we started flying on Saturday morning. We had the unusually small number of nine which made for a relaxed feel to the contest. We flew the first round of duration and I was convinced that my model was damaged in some way, it wouldn't fly in a straight line let alone achieve any sort of duration, the air was very rough and with massive sink and no real lift to be found. After the first round of duration scores were in we stopped flying as I had measured the wind speed at over 20 mph and we knew it would just get stronger (it was only 9.45am). Rob Martin Deromph a dedicated slope head from the Netherlands damaged his model in this round and so did not continue. At this point we decided to head back to Kevin's house and grope his latest slimer model (comp ARF 2 by 2) and then we went fishing on Kevvies boat (thanks Kev) actually I mainly used the fridge and it's contents. We later went to the salt water pools and then across the road for tea at the Loaded Hog.

Sunday dawned with less wind and so we made a start with distance. There was some air coming through with scores ranging from 8 laps to 28 for Peter Williams. Large lenticular clouds had formed and I was not optimistic for a full 2 rounds but the wind abated somewhat and so we continued and this provided some thermal activity albeit fast moving and
broken. All fliers performed well in speed with round 1 and 2 slowest times being just under 21 and 22 seconds respectively. Kevin Botherway really showed the way here with 2 16 second speed runs and great launches with the new Crossfire. The Crossfire really has become the model to have with quite a few fliers in possession of these models. I recently upgraded to one and my trusty Cobra has not seen the light of day since. Certainly it is a very forgiving model after flying a slower model for the last few years. Ken Duffell joined the sub 20 second club (and almost joined the 18 sec
club) and flew a great run and also opened a can of whoop ass in distance in round 1 by cunning use of a thermal and then some decisive flying. The opposition relaunched and chased him but it was too little too late. Craig Dawson is probably missing his Crossfire and so was flying his X21. Part way through the second round the wind speed had again increased and several fliers pulled out with model damage and winch line was regularly broken. We stopped after the second round at about 1 o'clock as the wind was steadily increasing.