Page 1 of 12

Great Grape Gathering 2017 By Roy E. Smith, Contest Manager

This year’s edition of the Great Grape Gathering saw a satisfying number of entrants, a total of 27, despite the fact that the weather forecast for Friday was not favourable. In fact, although it was cool and breezy, with an occasional shower, most of the day turned out to be quite flyable.

Gerry Litschi with the new scoreboard. Photo: Sally Smith

Over the winter our indefatigable Jerry Litschi made a new, improved scoreboard for us. This was a resounding success. A second innovation of Jerry’s was the provision of labels for the prizes that could simply be hung around the neck of the bottles, making the organization of the prize-giving much quicker and easier.

Prizes for Sunday Photo: Sally Smith

On arrival at the field the wind was very light and from the South – the forecast, however, claimed that it would strengthen and become Westerly by mid-morning. We had originally set up on the South side but quickly made the decision that we would move the headquarters and the flight line to the West side of the field, leaving a shelter and the HQ table on the South side temporarily, so that people could register while we did so. My wife,

Sally, remained stalwartly in place to supervise that activity until we rescued her an hour or so later. This worked out well because, by the time the wind had changed and everything was set up to fly, most people had registered and were ready themselves.

Flying activity commenced around mid-morning and the wind did as had been predicted for most of the day, which made retrievals reasonably easy. A couple of rain showers interrupted us, and the wind turned due North during and just after these episodes, making flying impossible for a short while, because of our position not far North of the museum and its aircraft, but all-in-all we had a good day. Joe Mollendorf, Brad Bane, and Simon Blake conducted a spirited battle for honours in the ABC Classic power event. Joe’s model hooked a ‘boomer’ on one flight and continued to go up quite swiftly even after DT’ing. It was down at 7½ minutes, just off the field near the SUNY campus. Brad also had a long retrieve from one flight but eventually was able to get the model back again.

Brad demonstrates a perfectly vertical launch

Photo: Richard Barlow

Page 2 of 12

P-30 was hard fought, with lots of good flying from the seven contestants, but Dave Pishnery dominated. Third place was a tie between Tom Juell and David Acton so a fly-off was held the next morning, which Tom won.

Bob Clemens’ P30 DT’ed at the edge of the corn

Photo: Bob Clemens

While Dave Pishnery was busy flying, his better half, Robin was busy participating in one of her craft activities – applique.

Robin and her applique Photo: Sally Smith

Simon Blake brought his AM 25 powered Eureka to fly in the diesel event. Unfortunately, an unscheduled hard

landing resulted in broken wooden engine bearers. One of the museum’s aircraft can be seen to the right behind him in the picture below.

Simon and his Eureka Photo: Roy Smith

After a good day of flying, about 24 of the competitors and their spouses made their way to a local restaurant and continued to enjoy one another’s company and tall tales into the evening.

The wind direction on Saturday was forecast to be from the North all day. Upon arrival at the field the direction was in fact Southerly, but light. We decided to believe the forecast and set up on the North side of the field. The NWM field has suffered from a surfeit of cool, wet, weather over the whole summer, just as all of NW NY State, and SE Ontario, have. This area of the field now has deep ruts, from heavy equipment, swamp areas, and extremely long grass and weeds. We split into two groups, a little distance from one another. The FAC and rubber fliers elected to remain near the access track to the runway, where the grass was a bit shorter, while the power fliers had to venture somewhat to the East of that point, to reduce the danger of DT’ing onto one of the NWM aeroplanes. We had to wait a short while but the wind did eventually reverse itself and start to head from the North, or thereabouts.

Don Myers and Jim Smith had elected to conduct a fun-fly for Ebenezers and Saturday was the day that these were brought out. Sadly, neither Don nor Jim were able to make it to the contest, Don for health reasons and Jim because of work problems, but our own Jerry Litschi once more stepped up to the plate and organized the event for them. Two models did turn up, from the Blair team. Richard Barlow had threatened all year that he would be bringing one because “it only takes an evening to build” but none was forthcoming!

Page 3 of 12

Robert Blair and Fokker DR1 Tripe Ebenezer Photo: Roy Smith

Campbell Blair’s D7 Ebenezer Photo: Roy Smith

One of the two Ebenezers to be flown was Campbell Blair’s pretty Fokker D7, powered by a Redfin .020 sideport diesel. Both of the Ebenezers flew steadily and well. Unfortunately, the D7 had a rather long engine run, and was flown before the wind had changed to be Northerly, so it ended up in the 10ft high corn, North of the field, and has not yet been found. All hope is not yet lost, Brad will be flying over the area looking for models in the not too distant future. Robert won the Longest Flight Time with 117 seconds and Campbell won the Best Sport Scale. There was no prize for The Most Exotic Design because neither fitted that category.

We lost one of the most stalwart supporters of the GGG, earlier in the year – Bob Morris. He will be sorely missed. His wife, Miriam, drove up from New Jersey to be with us, and a small ceremony was held to honour him. I read a short eulogy and

then Miriam released Bob’s FAC Moth, attached to some Helium balloons, for its final foray into the heavens. Many a tear was shed as we watched it dwindle into the distance.

Bob’s Moth on its way Photo: Vic Nippert

If anyone couldn’t hear what I had to say, my voice is very quiet (most of the time), and would like a copy of it, please just ask.

Brad Bane and I have had a long-standing desire to pit our 650 sq in Dixielanders against each other, and the B/C Nostalgia event seemed like just the right occasion to do so. As mentioned, the HQ tent was some distance from the area where power flying took place. I observed Brad putting up a

Page 4 of 12

number of flights so I thought I’d better play catch-up. I put up several in a row, prior to the ceremony for Bob, and then checked the scoreboard, finding that I was one ahead of Brad. I then thought I saw him put some more up, so I followed suit, and then added a few for margin, because I knew I would have to stop flying before contest’s end, in order to help out with the preparations for the end-of-day. When I checked the board later I found that Brad must have been test-flying, because he had no more scores on the board than he had previously. By that time I had nine, so I decided I would go for the 10th, just for the ‘heck’ of it. The transition for the last flight was poor, the model lost about 1/3rd of its height after the climb, and I was down at 105 seconds.

The WWII Combat event was held over from Friday and flown on Saturday. The winner was Matt King, flying a Heinkel 100. As well as the bottle of wine and the ‘sticker’ denoting his win, Matt also received a framed certificate which contained, as well as John Magee’s sonnet “High Flight”, a picture of Flt. Lt. Magee, and a picture of a spitfire in clouds. Matt was also supposed to receive the John Magee Memorial Trophy – which has a spitfire atop a pedestal – but last year’s winner did not bring it back with him. As Matt and that unnamed person live fairly close to one another, a transfer of custody will take place at a later date.

Competitors wind for the 1st heat of the WWII Combat event

Photo: Bob Clemens

The Dave Andrew Memorial event was also competed for this year, the first time in a number of years. Jim Moseley and Jerry Litschi launched

simultaneously, from spots only 20 ft apart. Jerry’s model climbed faster initially but Jim’s model found good air and eventually outclimbed Jerry’s considerably. An illustration of just how different the air can be, even in such close proximity.

The 1/2A Old Favourites event attracted three fliers, Simon Blake won with three maxes and young Bobby Vidovich put in two very creditable flights. Bobby also did very well in Junior HL Glider.

In the FAC Two Bit Plus 1 event, there were six competitors and the top three were separated by 3 seconds. A remarkably tight race.

After the flying on Saturday, ‘Heather’s Barbecue’ was held in the museum’s Swanson Hall, as has become usual. As has also become usual, Heather Mollendorf did a superb job of putting it all together, despite having to overcome some significant difficulties. Firstly, a few weeks before the event, Heather found out that the supplier of the hot food no longer supplied the baked beans that had been a staple to go with our barbecued chicken and potato salad. Undeterred, Heather determined that she would make them herself. This entailed doing the final cooking in the Swanson Hall kitchen, of course, after much preparation at home. To complicate this situation, the museum had arranged for a pilot’s class to take place in the room where our evening repast was to be enjoyed, right next to the kitchen where Heather planned to complete the preparation process. Complicating this still further, apparently the class could not tolerate extraneous sound even at the level of a whisper, even though there were only ~6 of them around a table at the side of a room that is at least 30’ x 30’. Our intrepid barbecue provider did not let this prevent her from getting the job done and, with help from husband Joe, all was ready and looking spectacular when the group of free flighters came in from the field, hungry and exhausted from their labours. Everyone agreed that the added work for Heather meant that the rest of us had an even

Page 5 of 12

more enjoyable meal than usual, these were the best baked beans ever!

During the dinner, Jerry Litschi made the announcement that he was introducing a new feature at the GGG – based loosely on the SAM Sweethearts – he will each year nominate a GGG Angel – from the ‘partner’ side of the ledger. For this, the inaugural year, he nominated not one but two angels, and presented each with a porcelain angel. The two, highly deserving, initial GGG Angels are Sally Smith and Heather Mollendorf. Both were delighted to have been recognized in this way.

Jerry Litschi and the two ‘GGG Angels” Photo: Roy Smith

At the end of dinner a draw was held for the two door prizes that were offered. These were one-of-a-kind (well, actually, two-of-a-kind) commemorative coffee mugs for the Great Grape Gathering 2017. The lucky recipients were Ruth Ann Bane and Tom Juell.

The weather on Sunday was predicted to be similar to Saturday, but warmer. That turned out to be the case – the wind was light in the morning, from the South. We decided to remain at the North side of the field and sure enough, once again, the wind direction reversed by mid-morning and came from the North for the rest of the day. The ‘warmer’ part of the prediction also did materialize, later in the day, but it wasn’t exactly a September heat wave even so.

Flying was good and all of the events were flown by at least one person. In fact, throughout the contest, only two events were not patronized at all – SAM Large Stick and 1/2A Texaco – and only seven had only one flier. I know that several of those events had other potential fliers who, for one reason or another, weren’t able to get around to flying in them. Considering that the wind direction and, on Friday, the rain showers, reduced the time available to fly, I am very pleased by the level of participation that was achieved.

Jim Moseley had been ‘chatting’ with an aspiring young modeler on the Hip Pocket Forum, providing advice on building and trimming. This Grade 9 girl, whose name is Celine, got her introduction to model aircraft in the Science Olympiad program (I wish we had similar in Canada) and had become ‘hooked’. She had built a P-30 for outdoor use.

Celine and Jim Photo: Celine’s Mother

When Jim found that she lived in Buffalo he mentioned our contest and suggested that, if she could get to Geneseo, she could get some first-hand help and see some outdoor models flying. On Sunday, the young teen arrived, with her mother, looking for Jim. Jim spent considerable time with

Page 6 of 12

her, going over her rather well built Kiwi, and helped her to fly it. He then also gave her one of his P-30s to experiment with (and maybe beat Jim with one day!).

It was great to see this enthusiastic young person come out and be so willing and eager to learn about our relatively low-tech activity. Kudos to both the Science Olympiad and the Hip Pocket Forum for being the conduits that enabled this to happen.

The Ladies Cloud Tramp Mass Launch event was held over from Saturday and occurred at around noon. The event was organised by Richard Barlow. The two top models both flew out-of-sight (not an uncommon occurrence in this event) but were retrieved. The winner was determined as the one which was found furthest from the launch point, both having gone OOS at about the same moment, and that aeroplane was flown by Carol Crawmer.

Ladies Cloud Tramp Photo: Richard Barlow

The A Nostalgia event winner was determined by a coin toss. Paul Nelson and I both had our models fly away on our third maxes. I eventually recovered mine from a cornfield South of the Genesee river, but Paul’s was never found. My 550 Dixielander had continued upwards for some time after DT’ing, and eventually was down at 5½minutes, once it escaped the boomer. I was too late back to the field, however, to make another flight and, the contest being over, we tossed a coin, which Paul won.

One of the memorable events that occurred during Sunday was the flight of the B17 – Memphis Belle. This is actually the Movie Memphis Belle, not the original, and is undergoing some renovation work at the National Warplane Museum, whose airfield at Geneseo hosts our contest. We witnessed engine run-ups outside the hangar on Saturday and then, on Sunday, the aircraft actually flew.

Memphis Belle takes off Photo: Vic Nippert

I’m not sure whether the pilot training class going on at the museum on Saturday had anything to do with the flight on Sunday. The aircraft made a circuit reasonably close to the field and then flew off, to return and land later in the day.

Upon closing, on the final day of the GGG, a number of trophies are presented, as well as the plaques and bottles won for individual events.

The John Magee Memorial Trophy went to Matt King, winner of the WWII Combat event.

The Dave Andrew Memorial Trophy went to Jim Moseley, winner of an unlimited mass launch.

The Don Reid Memorial Trophy goes to the person who places highest, using a Gollywock, in any event (usually SAM Small Stick). Once again, this year the award went to Dominic Algieri.

Page 7 of 12

Dominic with the Don Reid Trophy Photo: Sally Smith

The Jack McGillivray Achievement Award goes to the flier who accumulates the most points in all of the FAC events. This year it went to Jim DeTar.

Jim DeTar and the Jack McGillivray Award

Photo: Sally Smith

The Jim Anderson Memorial Trophy is awarded to the flier who accumulates the greatest aggregate flight times in rubber events. This year’s recipient was Jim Moseley. Unfortunately, I have no photo of him with the trophy because last year’s winner, who shall remain nameless, forgot to bring it back. That is the second trophy this year that this has

happened with – I am going to have to start sending out reminders prior to the contest.

The Bob Gordon Memorial Trophy is awarded to the flier with the highest aggregate time in power events. This year’s recipient was me.

Roy Smith with the Bob Gordon Trophy Photo: Sally Smith

The final trophy to be awarded is the MAAC Can-Am Free Flight Trophy. This trophy was provided by the Model Aeronautics Association of Canada and is awarded to the flier who accumulates the most points at the Empire State Championships and the GGG. Points are awarded on the basis of placing in each event, they must be from at least two of the three categories (glider, rubber, and power) and the recipient must have flown (but not necessarily achieved a score) at both events. This year the trophy went to Dave Pishnery.

Page 8 of 12

Dave Pishnery, NWM Series Grand Champion, with the MAAC

Can-Am Free Flight Trophy Photo: Roy Smith

Dave flew prolifically and well, at both contests, and achieved a score almost double his closest rival – very well earned Dave. Dave tells me that a retrieve bike is probably in his future, so he will be even harder to catch then. We may have to introduce a rule that no-one with a surname beginning with P can win!!! 😊

A few notes upon wrapping up. Although we ended up with only two events that nobody flew (and one of those is an R/C event that nobody has flown for quite a few years) and that, considering our flying time restrictions, is actually very good, I did hear some people express a reluctance to fly certain events. The primary cause seemed to be that people didn’t want to fly an event that no-one else had yet flown, for fear of being perceived as flying just to get a bottle of wine, or just to accumulate points for the Grand Champion award. Our intention in providing those things was to provide incentive for people to fly as many events as possible. We are anxious to see the competition be really active, in as many events as we can. Over the winter I will try to find a way to circumvent this paradox – where our attempts at encouragement may actually discourage

people from flying. In any event, however, whether a solution is found or not, can I hereby put out the word – please fly as many events as you can, don’t wait for someone else to fly it, lay down the gauntlet yourself. Remember, if no-one else follows you into the fray, it’s because they’re afraid to challenge your prowess, so feel good about it. Also, if you obtained a bottle, and/or a point towards the championship, you earned it legitimately – that’s exactly what we wanted you to do, fly! The award is as much for participation as it is for placing highly, which is why you get a point even if no-one else flies the event. Dave P put up 38 official flights over the two contests to earn his 33 points so, by flying in lots of events, you too can be the NWM Series Grand Champion.

It is important that I here thank those whose hard work made this contest happen. Jim Moseley acted as Event Director for the non-FAC events and organized the raffle for us, Jim DeTar filled a similar role for the FAC events. Ruth Ann Bane was our Contest Director and dealt with all of the AMA red tape for us, and Jerry Litschi tackled the major task of organizing the wine distribution, as well as most of the physical work of setting up and tearing down the HQ, etc.

Now I must come to a major ‘mea culpa’. At the closing ceremonies I thanked most of the people above, but not all of those that I should have done. As I mentioned in my address at the ceremony for Bob Morris, I am not a good extemporaneous public speaker, which is why I read my eulogy, not wanting to leave out something important. Usually, on the last day of the GGG, there is a short while before the presentations where I have time to collect my thoughts about what I need to say. On this occasion, I was retrieving an errant aeroplane until 30 mins after the close of flying and arrived back at the field with just enough time to participate in the proceedings. I made a complete mess of my thanks at the end, leaving out Ruth Ann entirely, but even worse, considering our close relationship, also leaving out my thanks to my wife, Sally. As you all

Page 9 of 12

know, Sally worked tirelessly on the registration and scorekeeping desk for the whole weekend, taking only comfort breaks for herself and our dog. Jim and/or Jerry took over at those times, to keep things going smoothly. Sally was also ably assisted on Saturday by Miriam Morris, which was much appreciated. The HQ desk task was even greater this year as we took care of the FAC scoring at the HQ, as well as the Non-FAC. My omission to recognize that huge contribution by no means indicated a lack of appreciation for it, but it did deprive all those present of the opportunity to express their thanks to Sally. I apologize most

profusely and I hope that I never again make such a grievous mistake.

The dates for next year are already set – September 7-9, 2018. Please mark these on your calendar. Weddings, daughter’s weddings, trips to Alaska, etc., are not adequate excuses for non-attendance at the GGG. Have a good building season and we will do this all again next year. The detailed contest results follow in the next pages.

Page 10 of 12

Great Grape Gathering 2017 Results Friday, September 8th

1/2A Nostalgia Gas Roy Smith 348 Brad Bane 339 .020 Replica/¼A Nostalgia Gas Paul Nelson 294 A/B/C Classic Gas Joe Mollendorf 716 Brad Bane 600 Simon Blake 560 P-30 Dave Pishnery 510 Jim Moseley 320 Tom Juell* 240 + 208 Dave Acton* 240 + 49 Dom Algieri 197 Paul Nelson 174 Bob Clemens 120 *tied, so decided by a fly-off Senator Jim Moseley 360 Richard Barlow 308 FAC No-Cal Scale Mark Rzadca 425 Jim DeTar 155 Matt King 123 FAC Embryo Endurance Matt King 353 Vic Nippert 311 Jerry Crawmer 310 Lynn Miller 267 Jim DeTar 113 FAC Dime Scale Jim DeTar 251 Mark Rzadca 143

Saturday, September 9th Diesel Duration Roy Smith 342 Vic Smeed Design Campbell Blair 155 Robert Blair 109 Richard Barlow 100 HL/CL Glider Combined Vic Nippert 156 Dave Pishnery 127 Gerald Crawmer 100 Jim Moseley 29 36” Bungee Launched Glider Richard Barlow 143 Vic Nippert 98 Dave Pishnery 80 B/C Nostalgia Gas Roy Smith 1185 Brad Bane 600 Simon Blake 110 ½A Old Favourites Simon Blake 360 Robert Blair 224 Bobby Vidovich 172 E36 Electric Paul Nelson 342 Dave Pishnery 209 Cloud Tramp Richard Barlow 239 Vic Nippert 200 Mark Whalen 189 Bob Clemens 184 Robert Blair 142 Nostalgia Rubber Bob Clemens 248

Page 11 of 12

SAM Small Stick Dave Pishnery 360 Paul Nelson 348 Dominic Algieri 327 Dave Acton 226 FAC Golden Age Scale Jim DeTar 353 Matt King 221 Mark Rzadca 56 FAC Two-Bit Plus 1 Jim DeTar 322 Vic Nippert 320 Matt King 319 Dave Pishnery 248 Mark Rzadca 234 Mark Whalen 196 FAC Combined Race Planes Jim DeTar 1 Vic Nippert 2 Matt King 3 Jerry Crawmer 4 Bob Clemens 5 FAC WWII Combat (John Magee Memorial Trophy) Matt King 1 Jim DeTar 2 Mark Rzadca 3 Vic Nippert 4 Robert Blair 5 Jerry Crawmer 6 Dave Andrew Memorial Jim Moseley 226 Jerry Litschi 58

Sunday, September 10th Ladies Cloud Tramp Mass Launch Carol Crawmer 1 Pat Barlow 2 Mary Ann Nelson 3 Robin Pishnery 4

A Nostalgia Gas Paul Nelson 360 Roy Smith 360 (Note: placing decided by coin toss) A/B/C Ignition Simon Blake 195 ½A Classic Gas Joe Mollendorf 360 Brad Bane 240 Unlimited Towline Glider Richard Barlow 138 E20 Electric Dave Pishnery 270 Mark Rzadca 246 Jim DeTar 231 Ruth Bane 227 Junior HL Glider Bobby Vidovich 64 SAM Small Fuselage Dave Acton 285 Dave Pishnery 261 Jim Moseley 237 Dominic Algieri 75 SAM Large Fuselage Paul Nelson 120 SAM Commercial Rubber Richard Barlow 353 Robert Blair 317 Mark Rzadca 88 Jim DeTar 66 Mulvihill/Unlimited Rubber Tom Juell 240 FAC Simplified Scale Jim DeTar 275 Matt King 232 Vic Nippert 120

Page 12 of 12

FAC Half Wakefield Jim DeTar 352 Jerry Crawmer 302 Dave Pishnery 238 Vic Nippert 208 FAC WWI Combat Jim DeTar 1 Vic Nippert 2 Matt King 3 Campbell Blair 4

Trophies Dave Andrew Memorial Trophy Jim Moseley John Magee Memorial Trophy (1st place in FAC WWII Combat) Matt King Don Reid Memorial Trophy (Highest placing Gollywock) Dominic Algieri

Jack McGillivray Achievement Award (Highest total points in FAC events) Jim DeTar 34 Matt King 24 Vic Nippert 17 Jim Anderson Memorial Trophy (Highest aggregate in rubber) Jim Moseley 1143 Dave Pishnery 1131 Richard Barlow 900 Bob Gordon Memorial Trophy (Highest aggregate in power) Roy Smith 2235 Brad Bane 1779 Simon Blake 1225 MAAC Can-Am Free Flight Trophy The NWM Series Grand Champion (Highest total points at ESFFC and GGG in at least 2 categories) Dave Pishnery 33 Jim Moseley 20 Roy Smith 17