Fellow Hexham flyers Mark Siddley, Michael Ronan and I have just had the most amazing flying experience. In front of a crowd of approx 15000 people. We performed a night time display, flying GoFlyKites supplied by the local based UK distributor Stanegate Flyers. Proprietor Joe Ronan, a former international businessman takes up the story.
This was rather cool I thought, at the same time wondering how they managed to avoid tangling up the flying lines, since there were more than half a dozen in the air at any one time. A few more minutes watching revealed that these were not kites at all, but free flying radio control aircraft lit up brilliantly for night flying.
Fascinated by now, I walked down to the field at the side of the Singapore river and stood with a crowd of sightseers mesmerised at the display of lights wheeling through the sky – this looked fun!
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Don’t be deceived – a free flying R/C delta model, the GoFlyKite isn’t a kite at all in fact.
Eventually I succumbed and came home with two of the machines. From there sprang the relationship that led to the formation of Stanegate Flyers and the distribution agreement with GoFlyKite.
It took a while to find the right premises; Hexham is a popular market town, and suitable units are not easy to come by, but in April 2009 I opened up, stocking not just GoFlyKite, but additional popular model lines such as Silverlit and the Horizon Hobby range. Traditional stringed kites have also been a very popular part of the stock.
Hexham is a very close community, and the bonfire and fireworks display in November has always been a very important part of the town’s year as well as an important fundraiser for local charities. The show opens with the large bonfire being lit at 6.30pm, and the fireworks at 7.00pm.
The large crowd can become a little restless, especially if the fireworks are late starting. Soon after opening, I had one of the organisers in the shop, and suggested that it would be a useful warm-up act to throw the night flyers up for a short display. This suggestion was enthusiastically taken up, and after further discussions with the organisers, and the fireworks company to ensure the safety angles were covered, we had the go-ahead and so, this year, the event was started with our flying display of the SB42 GoFlyKites! Back to Clive now….”
Carry bags protect the machines in transit.The motor control is via an Electronic Speed Controller with a battery eliminator circuit to power the receiver and servos. A separate feed is wired to the coloured LEDs, red for port, green for starboard, white at the front and blue on the body. These LEDs were far brighter than I had expected. A pair of tail fins is easily removable and the whole model fits into a very convenient bag. The model shows a surprising speed and agility, but as Joe flies mode 1 and we were mode 2, we had no opportunity to try it out at the time of Joe’s demo.
The SB42 fly’s very crisply, in fact too crisply for us. We were soon looking for expo and reducing throws, these would make perfect 3D trainers! In fact apart from rudder initiated manoeuvres, there is little that they are not capable of. Orientation took some getting used to, and a couple of prangs resulted. Whilst embarrassing for us, thankfully Joe had a comprehensive stock of spares and repairs when necessary, took just a few minutes. Joe had assured us that the orientation difficulties would disappear as soon as we started night flying. I found this difficult to accept but with so little time to the big night, every suitable moment had to be grasped for practice.
The first time I saw the SB42 switched on in full darkness amazed me. It seemed even brighter than I had remembered. Immediately after launching I accepted that Joe was right. They were actually easier to fly at night. Joe then dropped the bombshell that in order to maintain safety, we were to confine the display to the area the size of a football pitch. I wanted to slow the flight speed down, but when I did so, maintaining height required such high alpha that I was anxious of stalling. It took some time to get used to the fact that with such a light wing loading, the SB42 was more than happy to fly like this. It was actually possible to fly at little over walking pace if needed.
The effect of several GFKs flying at once is very impressive.Just like a Delta, these things have an impressive speed range. For peace of mind, Mark and I also substituted the 9 x 7 prop for a 9 x 3.8. This didn’t seem to limit top speed much but certainly made it easier for us to keep the flying display within the area required. Aerobatics could be accomplished within a very tight space using this prop. Michael decided to stick with the original prop that he was accustomed to rather than learn a new set of characteristics at this late stage.
Quarter of an hour before the fireworks were due off, we all launched together. The concentration levels for the next 8 minutes were such that it seemed like seconds. I could hear the wows and cheers of the huge crowd behind me as we flew our hearts out. The plan for the display was to fly anti-clockwise and in line as much as possible. We had also decided that unless we felt completely comfortable on the night we would shy away from aerobatics, for fear of embarrassment.
In the event, with the boundaries of the display area perfectly back lit, all of us felt comfortable to ‘wring’ them out a little. Rolls, loops with freestyle weaving and diving gave the crowd quite a treat, and with the spectacular backdrop of a flaming bonfire, was a memorable experience for the pilots too. The unique SB42 proved well up to the job with a precise flying style and instant response to the controls.
Then, all too soon it was all over. We had to quickly pack away and clear the area before the fireworks started. As we walked clear quite a few of the crowd came across to show their appreciation and to ask about the kites – we’d clearly made quite an impression, check out the video below to see display.
