Gyronuts `98
Autogyro Fly-in .... Martinsville, Indiana June 26 - 28, 1998
Page 
Note: A complete and wonderfully presented video tape of this event is available...
interested?
Fellow GyroNut Rick Anderson hosted this three day event near his home in Gosport, Indiana. Gyromodelers from Wisconsin, Minnesota, Washington, Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky, Arizona, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Louisiana, and Ontario (Canada) enjoyed wonderful mid-west hospitality while spending 3 days of hot summer flying near Martinsville, Indiana... southeast of Indianapolis.
Rick was about to die come Monday morning, 4 days before the event was to begin..... The airport site had been slowly drying after all the terrible rains of late, things were at least rising to the marginal point... when it stormed again Monday and the airport field was wiped out completely. Time was short.
Getting desperate he went looking for an old flying site (in use for perhaps 30 years) out behind the local cemetary, a short two miles from town in a corn field area, to see if it was still usable. Life is good, he was saved. Of course the trees on a couple sides had grown, the surrounding corn was indeed going to be `knee high by the 4th of July`. The grass runway was still there... it was usable! Life is good, he was saved... This was Tuesday, and time was getting even shorter..
Now another new problem... the cemetary people said "OK, but you gotta get the AMA site insurance before you touch the field." Naturally the AMA said OK, "but it would be a few days..." Rick didn`t have that kinda time, he had to have it `right now`! He moaned, pleaded, & cryed to AMA .. and finally they agreed. Life is good, he was saved... Then he had to figure out how to notify the attendees of the big change. E-Mail, signs at the airport, notices at the motels... word of mouth... whatever. He wasn`t about to let a year of preparation go down the drain... and time was `really` short.
Rushing back to the site, one can only visualize Rick standing there thinking: "If you mow it, they will come"... He did, they did... and a wonderful time was had by all at the largest and by far the best Autogyro Fly-in ever.!
Of the recorded 38 models and 23 modelers... It is difficult to single out the highlite of things over the three days, however consideration should certainly be given to Les Garber, of Duluth, Minnesota.
After traveling a long distance, he amazed us with an incredibly `light` electric dc gyro. His model convinced us that the electric gyro is finally here.
Despite temperature/humidity in the 90`s, Les was able to obtain consistently long flights. Our hats go off to Les! The key to his success was most probably in the exceptionally light and well designed rotor blades. Les also gave us our new motto: "Wings are for Wimps"...
Can you believe using a Ban Roll-on ball for a dc rotor socket? Bob Gardner, of Oshawa, Ontario, did! The design idea is unique to say the least. Hisi needs a little refinement, however the model flew (be it in a right turn -only-), and certainly deserves further experimentation. Hopefully we can post more detailed information on these designs soon....
We experienced a much wider variety of models with this fly-in than ever before... several "DC Gyros" (Emilio Cabezas design ), a "Whistler" (Wolfe) , several Cierva C-4`s (Tillson design), a couple "Gyraces", two "Suitcase Minnie`s" (Baxter design), two "Gyro Bees"
(Tillson design), an "Osprey"(Harris) , a "DC Gyro" (Anderson design) , Jim Baxter`s "Twirl" (DC), Bob Gardner`s "Roll-on" (DC), Bill Friedlander`s twin rotor "Prairie Gyro", Bill Hatcher & Fred Knoffsinger drove all the way from Pennsylvania, bringing a Cabezas DC Gyro and "observe and learn" as they put it. Our only lady Gyronut, Theresa Rozman and her father Bernard brought the only co-axial model (Falcon Gyro ?) and a Cierva C.4. It was great to meet and visit with our gyro friend Fred Siedow, the `traveling man` come by and spend some time with us... Thanks Fred!
Several "Kombat Kopters", were flown courtesy of the Airplane Factory crew, and a variety of others which I`ll list as soon as I receive a detailed list... I should point out that the flying skill with these unique models has improved somewhat, and little damage was experienced...
Several new gyromodelers had their models launched for the first time by experienced Gyronuts.. The "average" model seemed to be at least partially direct control (DC) and wingless! The Airplane Factory was kind enough to donate a Kombat Kopter kit for a raffle..
Photos courtesy of Gyronut Leon Wolfe....
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