B.E.R.G.

Build and own your own 2 meter Tsotsi Glider.

2013-11-04T04:56:00.000+02:00

Ever wandered about flying a RC soaring glider? Here is how obtain one just follow this link.
Composite Build RC Gliders
http://www.cbrcg.blogspot.com.

A great turn out for the BERG F5J and open fly day.

2013-08-26T06:33:00.000+02:00

With better than the normal weather conditions at the BERG club yesterday,we had something of every type of flying. From HLG , F5J competition, F3B, 2 meter gliders, electric wing and a Viper SD Electric 1/3 scale tug plane.

Pilots as far as from Secunda, Silverton , Gems and other clubs attended a day of open flying.

a Big Tank you to all to made the day a great success.

The day was ended with a meeting of past and present members of the Berg club.

F5J and open fly day at Berg Sunday 25 / 8 / 2013

2013-08-23T09:10:00.000+02:00

Just a reminder that the F5J competition is at Berg ( Coordinates S 26 deg 02.555, E 27deg 47.610) and will also be open for general open flying for those that are not flying F5J. All are welcome and there will be a meeting on the field regarding the re-development of the BERG club at 3 in the afternoon. Accesses is via the electric security gate at the cellphone tower and ask for Lester at the road stall to have it open for you.

Please bring your own refreshments and water .Bring your gliders and winches along, and can you also fly the August round of postals if you want to.

Hope to see you all there.

Open Day at GEMS 14/7/2013

2013-07-17T11:18:00.000+02:00

SA Nat's Silverton 2013

2013-07-06T08:25:00.000+02:00

Make my Day !!!

2012-03-13T12:58:00.008+02:00

Hi all,

As you all maybe aware of is that it is Tuesday the 13th today , all day but at least not as bad as Friday the 13th ,that is if you superstitious about the 13th , actually good things can happen on the 13th.

Sometimes things happen and afterwards and when you think back you know that you did not plan it that way.

Well what happened this morning with me was definitely not planed at all. As I was about to leave my home for work my attention was drawn to the hedge next to our gate. The sudden movement of wings came from a Grey Lorrie that was having a meal on the ripe berries. I always carry my camera with me and with the morning light and the red berries the Lorrie would make for a good picture.

I had my camera out in no time switched on, zoomed in and focused but just as I pressed the shutter button to take the picture nothing happened. I quick look at the display showed “Memory card Full”.

Needles to say I uttered some not so descent words and franticly start to delete as many bad pictures as I can to make space for “The Shot of the day”. This took about 30 seconds and when I got back to taking the picture, the Lorrie was not on the hedge any more but in the tree just above.

I uttered some more not so decent words and strolled head down to open the gate in frustration took a picture of the Lorrie in the tree as a consolation prize.

The next moment as I was about to open the gate, still with my camera in hand, I heard the familiar sound of twin aero engines droning away. As I looked in the direction of the approaching plane I could not believe my eyes, the sound was that of my favourite plane a Rockwell Aero commander.

The last time I saw an Aero commander fly was at a Air show (Lanceria) when Bob Hoover were flying it in a aerobatic display. Next thing I realized that I still had my camera in my hands and Immediacy took as many pictures I could. This time the Camera work with me and

I got some reasonable shots that I am posting her with the Lorrie that starred the events. As for the Grey Lorrie shot that I didn’t get I don’t mind but I am really happy to get the pictures of the Aero Commander (I don’t think their are very many in flying condition out there any more)
So of to work I go with smile a mile wide no matter what happens today on this really made my Day!!!

You can get more Pictures of this Aero Commander on Airliners.net , just follow the link below
http://www.airliners.net/search/photo.search?regsearch=ZS-KPU

F5J #1 @ BERG

2012-02-22T17:13:00.013+02:00

The first F5J event of the year took place at BERG on the 18th February. Before I left home it look like it was going to rain and we wouldn't get any flying that day. But by the time all the eager pilots arrived, although still heavily overcast, the rain had held off and we were able to get of to a fairly early start.

After a brief discussion about the rules and the usual haggling about wind direction and landing spots locations, Ivan got things going. In all we had 9 entrants on the day, with three complete newbie's in the fray.

There were a few issues with the setting on some of the guys altimeter deceives..... Our esteemed host from BERG, Prepetation Piet, managed to launch to 270meter on his first attempt. A serious penalty of 370 points. But despite this, he still won the round. Mostly, because he flew the full 10 minutes, while the other pilots only managed around 3 to 5 minutes. Not much lift around at that time of the morning.

But soon things got down to normal and the rounds progress nicely with one or two more small issues along the way. Johan had the unfortunate mishap of his motor running in reverse at the start of one of his slots and by the time he had swapped models, half his working time had elapsed.

Ivan, who organised the event and the F5J rep, had a ball with his ETsotsi, winning the day. Well done Ivan.

After we all settled down to the format and had a better understanding of the rules, it was great to see how after each flight the guys would gather around and count the flashes on their Altis meters and compare times and landings with each other.
The new F5J rules are great and I'm sure that this format will grow very rapidly. It's so easy to just switch on and fly. No hassle with winches and wind direction and line breaks and all that bother.

Especially gratifying for me was to see so many Tsotsi's competing against each other.

It must be mentioned that Gordon and Jonathan flew glider that were just not suited to this type of event, while Melgardt started off with a similar type of glider, he flew the last 3 or 4 rounds with Ivan Tsotsi and the improvement was dramatic.

PSS FEST Volksrust 2011

2011-11-07T04:22:00.013+02:00

The SU-35 Sukhoi “Flanker” Russia Jet of Mike May on its Maiden flight.

The feld fire near Oom Louis Farm house made this picture even more realistic.

The settings on My Nikon D90 was As follows: 1/1000 sec, f5.6 ,ISO 100 ,

18- 105mm nikor lensSet at 40mm.

BERG Photo Of the year

2011-10-31T03:53:00.001+02:00

HTL # 3 (Photo's by Evan Shaw)

2011-04-04T15:54:00.028+02:00

Eeeish! How close is that?????

Get out of my &%$#^@* way !!!!!

"Turn right Dammit!!!!!"

Lionel the Slave Driver
PS. Read his comment below!!!!

Derek with his patched up 2met

The flight line

Close formation on landing

Rudi

Another spot landing

Ivan

The Wolfie Snarl

Nigel's little boy

Running repairs

Right - Piet's Thulani on approach. Wolfie taking evasive action!!

Below - Derek and Ian

And finally young Jason "The rising STAR"

Vloksrust midsummer trip 2010

2011-01-10T12:29:00.035+02:00

Over the last 3 years between Christmas and New Year we have done this relaxed and informal slope soaring trips and so was the 2010 event. Every year as we set out towards Volksrust there is always the concern about the weather and lately even more so because of the extreme weather conditions we experiencing. So you can land up with no slope soaring possible at all or on the other hand the conditions could be perfect.

It so happened this year that we had a perfect day one on the North West slope and the next two days with very light and variable winds. It is for this reason that you have to take an assortment of gliders that can handle from no wind to a howling 40 kph wind. This means taking more than one glider and depending on conditions you could end up flying some of them and the rest could not even get assembled.

However what made this year’s planning more difficult was that after the 3 days on the mountain we were set to travel down to the KZN South coast to spend the a few more days on the coast and while we were there we were to meet my younger daughter at the King Shaka airport to spend some time with us and afterwards travel back with us home.

Before we left we had a small rehearsal as to make sure all of us knew what space were available as I had no tow–hitch fitted to my personal vehicle and therefore could not use my trailer. Obviously as you will see in the next pictures my plans did not worked out as planned.

If somewhere in the future you land up with a similar situation you could do what I ended up doing on the home leg of our journey.

HS Buccaneer PSS Build (Part 3)

2010-12-13T13:35:00.001+02:00

The 1/72 scale Airfix kit that I build in Part 1 and Part 2 provided me with a lot of information but did not include a much needed front view of the buccaneer. I had to revert back to a Google search to find a drawing that contained cross sections of the fuselage. With the aid of this drawing I then scaled the 13 formers to I/7^th scale that I required. Six of the Formers (where the jet engines are situated) were too big to print on a normal A4 (unless you tile them) printer and I had them plotted by my brother on his A2 plotter.

After cutting them out and pasting it on thin Formica I will cut and shape those to the outlines of the plotted formers to make up templates for my hot wire foam cutter. Up to yesterday I managed to do 5 of the smaller formers with the bigger 8 still to be done. Once all the formers are done I will order the foam and proceed cutting it, building up the fuse in sections as per Formers 1 to 13.

This technique differs somewhat from the top view /side view approach and may require more work but I think that I will end up with a more accurate / symmetrical fuselage especially more so because of the complex curves of the buccaneer’s fuselage.

For now I am happy with progress and I am including some pictures of the build as up to this date.

I don’t know when I will make the next posting and therefore would like to this opportunity to whish all the BERG Blog readers a Merry Christmas and a happy new year (2011)-May all your landings be good ones.

There is a Buccaneer in my front garden (PSS build Part 2)

2010-12-04T14:42:00.006+02:00

Over the last 3 evenings I managed to finish the Buccaneer 1/72 scale model and I must say that this project is now starting to draw me in. I do not think that building the plastic kit was a bad idea as I have learned a lot and now getting more and more excited about the project.

I did not have any major problems with the build, as many reports pointed out, and found that my fuselage top and bottom lined up ok, however the right hand saddle where the wing would slot in had a 1 mm lip but I shaved this off and had no further problems with the fit after that.

My biggest problem was in and around the cockpit area, but somehow just carried on no matter what went wrong. The biggest setback I had was when the fuel nozzle disappeared after I had glued in position. I did not wait for the glue/paint to dry properly and carried on working and when I turned the model over knocked it off. Later on I realised that the nozzle was gone and started a massive search that lasted for at least a half-hour before it finely found it - stuck to my left outside forearm. The buccaneer won’t be Buccaneer without this all important feature and if I did not find would not know how to manufacture a small part like this, but in the end everything worked out I am happy with the result.

The only things that I have done extra were to make a stand to mount the Buccaneer on because I wanted to see how the Buccaneer would look like in full flight. Of the 144 pieces that came with the kit there must be about 60% or more left (fuel tank and bomb parts).

I did not fit them on the wings as they would crowd the underside so much so that you would not see any part of the wing! Anyway I think it will take about the same time or more just to assemble and paint all the bombs that the Buccaneer could carry. I probably will assemble them, but for now I don’t want to lose the focus on the building the 1/7 scale PSS Buccaneer.

I don’t think that I will get much more done in terms of building this Des but I would like to get the plans drawn up so that I can start building in Jan 2011.

I posted some pictures that I found really inspiring to me as you can see with them you do not need to imagine how the Buccaneer would look like flying on Volksrust slope and I hope that you will enjoy as much as I did taking them.

Roll-on 2011!

Building the HS (Hawker Siddeley) Buccaneer S50 PSS Part 1

2010-12-03T09:34:00.002+02:00

Well there you have it, a brave statement to make to start a build like this but this time round I decided not to rush this PSS project so rather that the 40 days build of the Aero Commander I have given myself at least 40 weeks or even more!

Not easy decision to make but I am sure it will be worth all the effort. So yesterday I bought an Airfix model Kit of the Buccaneer HS S50 1/72 scale (the same version that SAAF use to fly) and I was pleasantly surprised that kit included the SAAF livery and decals of the Air Force at the time (No 426), late 1960 to early 1990).

The main reason for acquiring the 1/72 kit was for the detail, 3 view drawings and other information that one can obtain from the kit, a luxury that I did not have at the time I build the Rockwell Aero Commander.

After studding the plastic kit and browsing the Internet it became clear to me that even the plastic kit itself was not an easy build! So I decided to build the kit even though that I am not a expert at building plastic model aircraft kit’s and so doing can get the feel for what I am letting myself into.

I have found at least one good build of this model so I will try and follow it closely and see how it works out.

The idea at this stage and similar to Aero Commander, is to scale the buccaneer to 1/7 of the original size making the scale wingspan just under 2 meter. I might also stretch wing somewhat as to improve the wing loading, although the 22 ounces per square foot of the Aero Commander work well I would not like to exceed this figure as a starting point.

Once again I will photograph and post the Build as I proceed with the work.

Here are some pictures to start with.

More Pictures of The Cesna 'Dragonfly'

2010-11-16T08:32:00.001+02:00

GEMS PSS 2010 Event a major successes.

2010-11-14T23:40:00.026+02:00

Paul Carnel’s winning entry with the Cesena ‘Dragonfly' does a close in fly-by on the Volksrust North slope.

The wind was howling on Saturday, so much in fact, it was very difficult to lift the bigger models into the wind and launch. In the video below, take note how the wings are bent downwards by the force of the wind until Norbert manages to get them up and flying just before the launch. Also note how the guys shirts are flapping in the wind!!

Evan Launching Izak’s Mig 7 for it’s Maiden flight.

Paul receiving the winner’s trophy from Evan Shaw.

The 2010 GEMS PSS event over this weekend started on Saturday with excelent conditions for the entire day with a steady North westerly wind of +/- 30 kph and at times peaked as high as 40 kph. This proved to be Ideal conditions for Pauls ‘Dragonfly’ my Aero Commander and Norbit’s Jet. Sunday however, some low cloud set in and the wind changed direction to easterly. Despite this Norbet flew his 6 met SB10. Not exactly a PSS, but spectacular none the less!

There were not many slope gliders that didn't take to the air and everyone had a ball of a time. Thanks to a well run Event from the GEMS club. Here are just a few of the many pictures that we took over the weekend.

Evan Launching the Aero Commander

Norbit’s Jet Fly By.

The War-birds squadron displaying how to do formation flying.

Paul’s "Splatfire" did not got shot down in a dogfight with some other war birds, it just promptly explode on a perfectly normal landing !

By Sunday the wind turned Easterly and most of the pilots had already stared the journey back, however we manage to take this group photo with the aid of 3 photographer’s and if you're wandering what Evan is doing on the ground take a look at the picture below.

I took my E-slope Mini Pulse with and it had no problem flying in the high wind conditions we had on Saturday, but unfortunately the way I mounted the wing proved to be the weak point, breaking away from the fuse on landing, (no major damage and it can be fixed in half-hour or so.) Flying out over the slope I never needed to run the motor as there was so much lift. However the one time I needed it was when I came to far back over the slope and go into some serious turbulence just behind the edge of the slope. I just open the motor for a burst and it shot forward back in to the smooth air within a few moments.

To all the Members of the GEMS club, thanks for a very relaxed and pleasant weekend.

Now to think of a PSS topic for next year’s event!.

Seems Izak was very upset the weekend came to an end!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (Actually the ravages of flying in very windy conditions and facing the setting sun on Volksrust west facing slope)

Berg Picture of the Year (2010)

2010-10-24T20:44:00.003+02:00

(Click on the picture to open it in a new window and then click on the picture again to make it bigger)

This picture collage was compiled consisting of 11 pictures all taken of the last 11 months of postings from the BERG blog.

Thanks to all of you that have contributed to this year’s postings.

(pictures and articles)

I hope that next year’s postings on the BERG blog will be as rewarding.

Fireworks at BERG Nats

2010-10-04T17:13:00.017+02:00

And this is the result of Juanita's now famous "flaming exit" speed run. The model was rather far away and rather low on the last leg of her speed run and "landed" on the HT wires across the road from the B.E.R.G. field.

There was a big spark with the model disintigrating immediately and before we knew it, the dry grass was alight. To make matters worse, there was a bee hive situated in the burning long grass making firefighting a tad difficult.

Here is Juanita with the only parts of her model salvaged:
the towhook and canopy!

E-slope Mini Pulse successful maiden flight

2010-10-02T21:26:00.010+02:00

About a year and 6 months ago I bought a Mini Pulse electric kit from a LHS. At the time these kits were hard to find but if you did found one on shelf in a hobby shop like I did you don’t even argue about the price and just buy it like I have done.

At the time the kit coast around R1250.00 and took about 2-3 evenings to assemble and install my radio gear. But here comes the catch, the Mini Pulse is tail dragger and if you want to ROG it, you will need a reasonable length of smooth run way to do so. The same argument also holds true for when you want to land it.

I was hoping to fly it at the Berg field but as you can see in the pictures the grass is not even enough to allow ROG. So the next thing it did was to hand launch the Mini Pulse only to find that on landing the undercarriage was ripped out and ending up with two neat holes punched into the wing were the wheel pads went in.

After repairing the damage the next thing was to find a field were one could ROG and land the Mini Pulse. So I ended up going all the way to the new GEMS field (in the mean time all forms of e-flight have been banded here as well) and at last I could take off and land from any direction. Now the only problem was to travel the distance but as keen modeler I did not mind doing the trip, however this set my mind into thinking mode and after speaking to Izak Theron (he also fly a Mini Pulse at GEMS) about the undercarriage problem and the possibility of removing it so that I can hand launch and land it on the BERG field, he pointed out to me that the next Items in line will be the under wing mount servos and then the fixed prop that will hit the ground on landing.

So Izak suggested that I mount the servos on top of the wing and ad a folding prop in order to save the prop and electric motor from damage on landing. After milling the Ideas around a bit I thought that I would rebuild the Mini Pulse from scratch with foam and a bagged wing construction including all modifications that we spoke about. The building took about four to five weeks and the Turninge 480 motor, speed control and lipo-battery were bought from Hobby King. The AUW came just under 1 Kg (without the undercarriage) and that is about 100 gram heavier than the normal Mine Pulse.

So as you can see I made the maiden flight yester day and it flew strait away the only difference that I could detect is slightly less vertical performance due to the extra weight. Landing now is now more a pleasure than a headache and as you can see after three landings on the Berg field I could hardly notice any damage on the underside of the Mini Pulse.

It would now also be possible to fly the Mini Pulse from the slope and you can be sure it won’t stay behind on my next trip to Vloksrust , and O yes if you are lucky enough to fly on tar runway you can always put the undercarriage back.

I would like thank Izak Theron for all the Ideas that made this really such a fun project and for Jogen that took all those stunning shots of the maiden flight.

Spectrem Air operates a much modified Basler DC3-TP67 for airborne mineral exploration based out of South Africa. The aircraft was converted at the end of 1992, and has been operating as a turbo-prop since 1993. More photos here http://www.douglasdc3.com/safrica/safrica.htm

More Nationals Pictures

2010-09-30T17:38:00.027+02:00

Almost ideal weather, great company and good food for a full
three days of flying flying and more flying. Our B.E.R.G 2010
Soaring Nationals held over the long weekend was a resounding success. Thanks to all too many to mention who put in
so much effort to make it all possible.

BERG Nat's 2010

2010-09-27T08:24:00.004+02:00

Pictures from Volksrust (last weekend) and Berg( this weekend)

2010-09-13T02:38:00.000+02:00

Thulane's maiden flight.

2010-07-26T09:34:00.000+02:00

The thrill of Flying

2010-06-21T08:51:00.017+02:00

It all started on the 25 of Dec last Year (2009) when I opened the most unusual Xmas box you can think of. A small purple package the size of a Cd audio disk, and two somewhat lager packages in the same wrapping, but don’t be mistaken my family had the plot all worked out to the N’th degree.

My daughter Lauren had her camera ready to take whatever was to happen next. I had to open them in the correct order. The first gift contained a small plastic toy plane with the fuselage filled with sweets and the first picture was taken of a puzzled me.

Next I had to open the gift that contained what I thought was a Cd disk, still puzzled I had to read carefully before I eventually realized what they were giggling about, and then the second picture was taken.

I was totally supersized that they got me a flip in a DH82 Tiger Moth and I had to do this with in the next 6 months.

The last gift was a pair of flying goggles for the flight, along with the third picture been taken.

At first I was a bit concerned about flying in a just about 80 years old Tiger Moth and was putting it on hold until Lauren came to me 3 weeks ago and announced that “ Guess what Daddy?, you are going to fly in the Tiger Moth on Father’s Day".

Well there was no turning back for me now and all I could do was to count the sleeps (20 of them) as Father’s Day came closer and on the last two day’s I even started to look up the history of this once famous trainer.

So when the sun came up yesterday (Father’s day) I at least new that the Gipsy Major inverted 4 cylinder power plant of Tiger moth could deliver 100 KW or 130 Hp (well that is the same power as my car develop) and that over 4000 of them was built before and during the second world war with the main aim to be used to train pilots.

With most of the butterflies in stomach now under control (only just) we set of at 9.30 AM to Rand Airport where there are two Tigers Moths operating from. I was treated to a Breakfast in the Harvard Café (overlooking the apron).

We were just about finish with our breakfast when Lauren got a call on her cell phone that it was my turn to get ready.

First I had to get into a proper flying overall and then my wind breaker over that. The outside temperature was around 12 deg C. So I was expecting it to be colder once in the air and in an open cockpit.

Then all of us set of to where the bright yellow Tiger were standing and with the aid of a small step ladder I mounted the front seat of the Tiger Moth.

As you can see on the photos there is no fancy instrumentation and the original huge compass is still in place (Yes Sir No GPS!!). In the mean time Lauren and Celeste were taking pictures as much as they could while I was getting strapped in and making me comfortable.

Then the pilot Ken Cloete gave me a short flight briefing for the 30 minute flight( with some planed low flying included) before he step to front of the Moth and after the second swing the Gipsy major motor jumped to life(Yes , no self starter). What surprised me was that even with the open cockpit how smooth and relatively quiet the Gipsy Major was running.

We took off in a southerly direction and the headed towards the south. The Tiger Moth effortless gained height while the Gipsy Major motor hummed along. As we got close to Klipriver drive, we cut across the hill and Ken came so low down a narrow valley that I was able take a picture of our shadow on the ground.

When we got to the bottom of the valley Ken carried on flying just about ground level and flowing the Klipriver back towards Rand airport. Every now and then he would pull hard up if the reeds and trees would get to close for comfort. Eventually as we got back to the main highway( I think from Durban) and when we turn and flew parallel with it could not help to smile as we over took some expensive motor cars on the highway just below us.

Then all to soon the Runway at Rand Airport appeared before us and Ken Made a Perfect 3 point landing (I could hardly feel the moment we touched down) in the short grass next to the tar runway (due to the lack of brakes on the Moth) and a end to a flight that I will still remember for a long time to come.

To my family and all the staff at Classique Aviation ( http://www.classav.co.za/index.html ) many thanks for a Thrilling experience and to Ken Cloete the pilot for the excellent way he flew the Tiger Moth especially when we were doing the low flying. I highly recommend that if you can to have flight with them to do so as worldwide there are only 250 airworthy Tiger Moths left and they might not be flying for many years from now.

3rd 2M Challenge for 2010 at BERG, 13 June 2010

2010-06-14T08:47:00.004+02:00

While waiting for Rudi I took this early Morning Sunrise photo at the BERG field!

Report by Rudi King.

Although it’s winter in “sunny” South Africa, the morning was not as cold as I expected... I met Piet just after 07h00 at the field and soon the other pilots started to arrive. Nigel was the only one to arrive after 09h00, but I guess it’s not too bad for someone with baby twins... The pilots’ briefing was short and sweet and the games begun!

Below: Nigel's Tsotsi wing repair test !!!

Above: Mark De Klerk's winch jammed and needed some frantic work by Jason to get it going again !

A coldish North Eastern wind set testing conditions for round 1, but round 1 turned out to be the easiest for the day, for me anyway... The wind direction maintained consistent throughout the day, but the wind speed increased at a steady pace. While staring up at your glider with the wintry wind in your face, one could easily have imagined yourself to be standing on a slope. Thermals blew through so swiftly that I didn’t even know they were ever there. More than one pilot showed bravery in following a bubble of warm air, downwind and more than one pilot paid the price of “the walk of shame”... It’s always a little funny, until you have to walk 200m or more to pick up your own model... The tricky conditions challenged everyone and the Greenhorns and Juniors were very impressive with the way they performed in the wind.

Martie served delicious boerewors-buns after round 5 and all pilots then decided to call it a day because of the wind.

Thank you very much for everyone that came out to the field today and added to the spirit of the 2M Challenge! Below are the scores after 5 rounds, with no throw-away round.

Names                      Class                               Total                                  Position

1 Rudi King              X-League                        4519                                   3
1 Johan Bruwer        X-League                       4230                                    5
1 Tsepo                    Junior                             1555                                   11
2 Piet Rheeders         X-League                        4383                                    4
2 Mark de Klerk      Greenhorn                        3930                                   7
2 Michael de Klerk Junior                               3009                                   10
3 Derek                   X-League                        4710                                   2
3 Nigel                     X-League                         4226                                   6
3
4 Alan Smith             X-League                        4715                                    1
4 Juanita Smith          Greenhorn                       3644                                    8
4 Reino Jacobs        Greenhorn                       3233                                   9

Congratulations to Alan, Mark and Michael who took first places in the 3 classes!!