Best wishes to everyone and have a great time, both in the air and in celebratory recreation at Retroplane 2009.
I had intended to attend from Canada and had planned a totally scratch built 3 metre Kranich II, modelled on an original Swedish built Kranich which we flew in the Cork Gliding Club from about 1959 to 1962. (I have a 1mm piece of 1mm ply from a tailplane rebuild, with a Luftwaffe stamp from May 7 1941) which was obtained from a tailplane half which was damaged in a take-off accident in Ballincollig Airfield in 1961.
Had hoped to get some decent documentation on the aircraft, but as I had no feedback and other than a few sketchy drawings, did not feel that I could make a model which do it justice.
I had a hard choice, attend Reploplane 2009, or my 50th School re-union in Cork in August.
Without the required Kranich documentation and the the resulting inability to produce a model which satisfied my standards, I opted for the school reunion.
I will be in Ireland from Aug 20 to Sept 23.
I hope to get as much aeromodelling exposure as possible during that time and will be bringing an electric photoplane with me. This is my Eyespy (
www.windandwavemodels.com/Eyespy07.html ). I hope to get some decent airphotos of the Irish scenery.
I have been dabbling with Autopilot control on this design and am a Beta tester for a lightweight, but powerful system (
www.attopilot.com )
This unit is currently legal only in the US and Canada, but if it is cleared for international use before August, I will bring it with me.
I wish you all a wonderful time at Retroplane 2009 and wish you all the best in keeping the tradition of the developing years of true non-powered flight alive.
Perhaps I can get a Kranich ready for a future Retroplane session, wherever it may be held. If any of you have any additional information the Kranich II, I would welcome any information to make this model a reality.
John O'Sullivan
MACI # IRL-26