Day 9

Day 9- sunday

Gunnedah to Coolah

It was Sunday and we were finally going to leave Gunnedah. It seemed like we had become a part of the town and something else was going to fall off so we could stay. Alas not. We made our way to the strip at 7.30am only to find the wind had come up again. Disappointed as I wanted to fly the new Relay for Life printed glider over town to help the town prepare for the up coming Relay. Alas it was not to be.

Through town into Maccas for a drive through experience. We had to do it once in the Flykes. We camped in the shade and sorted out the route with consideration made to keep off the Oxley Hwy as much as possible. 40km later we turned off the main drag and headed down an alternate route.

The weather was pleasant and the road trip with out complications... Along the way we noticed the wind dropping more and more. We approached the Warrumbungles and I recall Graham Sutherland talking about them. After several km we found a paddock near the road that seemed to be launch able. Ed set up while I put up wind streamers and let off another balloon. I declared walked the area and found the best spot. Ed moved his gear over to me and we did out preflights.
Ed’s first 4 or so launches seemed to be put off by the rough ground, however the last one marked the end of the session as his lines came in contact with the prop. Luckily we were equipped with spares. Interested to see what the mountains looked like from the air, I launched. The footage of this launch shows it was not a standard run. I almost aborted once , however managed to steady the wind and motor off. I climbed slowly to 600ft and did some circuits when suddenly bang, the fire went out.... I was dead stick.... I was high enough to have several paddocks in sight however the best one required a 360 which I did before final. Nice landing. Spark was the issue and I fitted a better plug cap to start to the check. I eventually noticed a wire from the coil had broken at the spade connector. I fitted a spare which was made from silicon and offered more resistance to vibration. The motor started first pull. I helped Ed make 3 new lines under a tree and we had a bite to eat, care of Thomas.

Uneasy about launching Eddie dragged the chain a little so I decided to not fly or set up until he was off the ground. A new direction so we set up a new launch. After the first few efforts I noticed Ed’s brakes on during the launch. I lengthened the brakes lines as Ed’s short half Japanese arms were either not long or flexible enough for the job!

Next effort.... bang.... glider came up nice and Ed was away. The video shows a little more of the drama , but the concept of extending the brakes in this situation was proven to be a correct assessment. I methodically did my preflights and joined Ed after a few fly by’s to let Thomas take some shots of the new Relay For Life glider.

From Eddie:
We flew a few K’s with a tail wind over bright Green paddocks interspersed with fields of golden canola. It was a beautiful sight in the afternoon sun. We started to run in to some turbulence and a freshening cross headwind I encountered some strong sink and upped the power then my drive belt started slipping so I had to reduce and indicated to Andrew that it was time to land. He let down beside a farm road where there was no fence and I came in after him doing a vertical decent then released the wing to avoid being blown backwards. Thomas arrived in a few minutes and we hit the road to arrive at Coola. We fuelled up organized a launch contact and stayed at the Black Stump Hotel. It turned in to a great night with some interesting locals who were entertained by some of our video bloopers. I slept very well indeed.