By John Moll
Day four of Control Line (CL) Speed is over with. We flew only two of the three events. No one had entered C Speed, but we had two entries in D Speed. D speed is flown using a .60-.65-size motor. It’s almost always flown on a monoline and has 70-foot length lines. Chris Montagino won the event with a speed of 181.55 mph. That speed moves the airplane around the circle really fast!
In Fast Jet, there were a total of eight entries. They flew a total of 17 attempts, having 12 official flights. An attempt consists of any time that you enter the circle to put up a flight. Sometimes they go and sometimes they don’t. Each pilot is allowed four attempts for three official flights. So, with 12 officials, they made a lot of noise!!
There were a lot of spectators who had to come by the circle to see who was flying and how we were going so fast. First place was won by Steve Perkins with a speed of 186.2 mph! That’s fast!! Brandan Robinson took second place with a speed of 186.07 mph! That is a difference of only .13 mph. That’s close between first and second. Andrew Robinson came in third place with a speed of 182.76 mph. Patrick Hemple took fourth place with a speed of 182.21 mph, and Dave Rigotti came in fifth place with a speed of 180.24 mph. So, between first and fifth place, there was only a 5.96-mph difference among the five pilots. That shows you how just a small amount of getting these jets to run just right can make a big difference in the final speeds.
The jet motors that are run for this event are small-scale pulse jet engines. There is only one moving part, and that is a reed valve inside that looks like a flower petal. It lets in fuel and air and mixes in the combustion chamber. It’s then fired with a spark plug; once it fires off, it just keeps on going until all of the fuel is used up, which is around 10 ounces. When it fires off, it will get your attention really, really fast!
Along with the awards for our two events today, the North American Speed Society, or NASS, also presented the Doc Davis Award for the fastest Jet speed, which was won by Steve. He has won this award several times. Also presented was the High Speed Award, which is given to the pilot in any class of Speed who gets closest to the respective AMA record. This wis won by Chris for going 97.72% of the Formula 40 record, which was flown on Monday.
Another award given was the Grand High Point Champion Award, which is awarded to any contestant who places a high Speed score for all of the AMA events. The results are added up to come up with a winner. This year, the winner was Chris, who had a score of 400 points. James VanSant had 389.95 points, and Glen VanSant had 384.71 points. All three flew so many flights trying to win this award. Congratulations to all of our winners this year. See everyone back in 2025.
There will be an F2A World Cup held on Site 2 tomorrow and Friday. There are going to be 13 fliers from four different countries. Come out and watch some more Speed!!
Note from AMA: Do you have photos from the Nats that you’d like to share? If so, email them to Clarissa Poston at clarissap@modelaircraft.org. Please include a brief description in your email, naming any individuals pictured in the photo(s), the name of the event that the photo(s) were taken during, and the name of the individual who took the photo(s). Your submission(s) might be posted on AMA’s Flickr page, which can be found at www.flickr.com/photos/modelaircraft/albums!
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