The Bwlch PSSA Fly-In – 19th/20th September 2015

The PSSA hold their first event at this renowned South Wales soaring site.

Andy Meade reports – All photos by Phil Cooke.

The run up to the inaugural PSSA meet at the Bwlch, South Wales, saw some mixed weather forecasts switching between bad and amazing, but as the weekend approached the forecast for High Pressure and light winds became more firm.  Saturday duly arrived and a few plucky pilots braved a very quiet Mickey’s slope on the Bwlch, near Treorchy, South Wales.

The wind on top was only just blowing up into double figures most of the day, so flying commenced with electric-assisted gliders, and progressed onto pure sport gliders a little after lunch.  With the high pressure so dominant, the light winds remained and sadly, no PSS flying was achieved on the Saturday, but a couple of the fliers met up in the evening for food and drinks, hoping for better weather the next day.

When we gathered in the ice-cream car park on Sunday morning, we were met with some impressive valley mist that looked like flying would be off at the start.  Turn out was improved, a couple more PSSA regulars had arrived along with some new faces, who duly rigged their aircraft ready for flying as soon as the sky was clear.

Phil Cooke was first to commit to the air over Mickeys, with his high-visibility Jet Provost.  A veteran of last years Jet Provost mass-build, Phil’s little RAF trainer worked the light early morning lift well, and looked the part in the mist blowing up the slope edge.

It wasn’t long before the rest of the mist blew out of the valley, and the wind speeds started to get up well enough for all of the PSS models that were in attendance to be launched.  Finally we had ourselves a PSS event!

Phil May wasn’t far behind with launching his correx MiG-3, (Top Right) with it’s fantastic black and white winter camouflage scheme looking most effective, especially against the dark forestry backdrop.  Phil was obviously enjoying the conditions, giving the little MiG a very good workout, putting in a splendid aerobatic display.

There were a couple of new models on show – first up was Andy Meade’s Horten 229 v2 (Right) from the Guiseppe Ghisleri plan.  Weighing in at 3lbs 10ozs, Andy felt the model was a little overweight, but still good to go in the lift available.  Phil Cooke gave the model a test-launch further up the slope enabling Andy to test the control response and balance, and on the second launch with the model floating on in ground effect, Andy took the aircraft forward and out into the lift.

The model went very well indeed, and Andy handed the controls to Phil for a stir of the sticks too, as the model felt well balanced and more than responsive enough for some basic aerobatics.  This really was a well refined flying wing, a beautiful shape in the skies!

Phil May was next up for a maiden with his camouflaged correx Impala. This is Phil’s fifth correx slope soarer, and he obviously has the build methodology down to a fine art with the excellent finish on this one.  A quick heave off the edge, and the Impala was away without any problems.

Dave Gilder was in attendance with his parcel delivering Airbus A380, (Left) finished very nicely in FedEx colours.  Dave has tweaked the construction a little since it’s maiden on the Lleyn peninsula earlier in the summer – with the removal of blanking plates from the engine nacelles, and with this modification the A380 got into it’s groove much quicker than before.

Man and machine were working well together with the less draggy nacelles, and Dave continued to fly the Airbus very confidently throughout the day.

Andy Meade launched his silver Boeing B-52 into the lift, but had a small problem with one of the engine nacelles that detached in a high speed turn.  A recent modification moved away from the pin retention system that was originally fitted on the aircraft in favour of little magnets, much more robust, but one nacelle has some alignment problems (easy to fix) which gave Andy sweaty thumbs when it dropped off.  A kind fellow pilot retrieved the dropped nacelle from the slope ready for more missions over Wales.

Steve Houghton flew his correx Impala to get his eye in, before the launch of his brilliant Hawker Typhoon.  The newly acquired Typhoon (Below, Left and Right) is built from the famous Brian Taylor plans with some modifications to the wing, and was finished superbly in a weathered camouflage, complete with a rack of rockets under each wing!  The launch provided by Dave Gilder went without a hitch and Steve looked instantly comfortable with the aircraft’s performance.

After only a couple of slope side passes, he was rolling and looping the big attack aircraft, it’s mass and bulk giving great presence in the Welsh skies.  It looked just the part when diving down below the horizon, forests and buildings in the background.  WW2 Tankbustin’!  On the second flight, Steve tried out the rocket-drop successfully, Phil capturing the moment perfectly in the view-finder.

Phil May decided today was the day for him to fly his recently acquired Jet Provost, a model originally built by Andy Meade.  Phil got the model away well, but decided the centre of gravity was a little too far forward, so landed out to make some alterations.  After a little lead was added to the tail, Phil tried again but may have moved it too far the other way – this time ending his flight with a stall and slope-side landing.  The model wasn’t too badly bruised, so some more fine tuning required before the next outing.

Phil Cooke campaigned his venerable T-33 Shooting Star in the improved lift for a couple of long flights throughout the afternoon, the big whistling jet trainer looking as graceful and smooth as ever, carving out large aerobatics over the valley.  The sun decided to poke through the cloud layer for a few moments at one point, and we were all hopeful for some better light for photography, but it wasn’t with us long.  We had to make do with just the great lift instead!

Andy Meade flew his MiG 29 in the higher winds late on, but still has some gremlins to sort out with the C of G position, with tight turns causing quite a deep stall across the wing.  Back to the drawing board again!

With a relatively small turn-out (the forecast not helping with peoples travel commitment I think), the slopes were never over crowded and each pilot flew as and when they wished throughout the day.  The wind was still blowing well when the pilots all decided that they’d had their fill, and so the first Bwlch PSSA event drew to a close around 5pm.

On the walk back down to the cars, talk naturally turned to the next (and final) meet of the season back up on the Great Orme – only 3 weeks away!  But we’d all enjoyed our flying at this new site and we all felt that this was a great venue for future meets that should be repeated next year.

Certainly the slopes here are large and produce powerful, clean lift – ideal for our PSS machines.  From an event organisation perspective there are local slopes for every wind direction and ample space to park the number of cars we might amass with a more normal turnout.  Even the landing zones are model friendly!

Our sincere thanks go to Steve Houghton and Andy Meade for helping arrange this new event for us this year – The PSSA look forward to returning  again in 2016!

More photos and video captured at this event can be found at the following links.

Photos

Blog review and Video