Rutland Airsports

Welcome to the first Rutland Airsports Club Bulletin of 2018. There might not have been a lot of communication during the winter months – but there has been a tremendous amount of activity going on behind the scenes.

Starting with the winches, work has continued to improve these, ably led by our Equipment Officer, Mick Roche and supported by numerous others. Cooling systems, brake controls, lines and drums – to name but a few things – have been upgraded. And they’ve been given a top-to-bottom sprucing up, so they really look the part too.

We enjoyed one day operating on the field with our friends from the Northampton Club late last season, and we’re hoping to strengthen that relationship in 2018. They’ve also put a lot of work into their winch – and we hope to see more of them at North Luffenham in 2018!

You should by now have received notification of the Flying Dates for 2018 via the Club’s Facebook Group. Our aim has been to focus on the second weekend of the month to keep things regular, starting with 9-11 March. These can all be found on our FaceBook Group ‘Events’ section. Most of these are 3-day 'Development' weekends when we'll be training staff and carrying out Tow conversions in addition to regular club flying - but please do note that some may be limited to just club flying. Of course, our Powered flyers continue to operate even when the winches are not out - so please do get in touch with Mike Gaylor if you'd like to get your motor running or just find out more. We’ve already got a pretty full schedule lined up this year - but watch this space for updates and news of other activities.

The club’s Committee continues to work hard on your behalf. But there’s lots to do - so if you think you might like to, or be able to help, then please do let one of us know. We will be holding a short Committee Meeting on Sunday 11th March before flying – so this could be an opportunity to sit in and learn more. If you’d like to attend with a view to getting involved, then please do Contact Us.

You may be aware that our Chief Tow Coach, Andy Shaw, intends to gradually hand over the reins this year. He’s put in a colossal amount of energy, hard work and enthusiasm to get us where we are. But we need others to come forward and take up the strain. So, calling all potential (Senior) Tow Coaches and Winch Operators, please do come forward and take advantage of the upcoming Development Weekends as the club needs more trained staff members, which will allow us to fly more.
If anyone has ideas for improving the hangar area, then it would be nice to hear about those. There’s only so much we can do to a military building but perhaps someone has some old garden furniture - a table and few chairs perhaps - that could be donated to create a seating / social area? All ideas welcome!

Meanwhile a huge amount of work has gone into upgrading and automating our website and membership portal (via Membermojo). You should shortly receive an invitation to renew your membership – made much easier by these upgrades, which include easier online payment facilities. [Note: existing members only need to “Renew” – you should already have a profile in the system] Please do familiarise yourself with the Membermojo portal and use it to keep your information up to date. A huge thank you to Rob Pugh as Membership Secretary and Dave Toach as Treasurer for masterminding this. And of course Nige Barker for all his hard work building the foundations. Please do let Rob know if there are any teething issues so that we can fix any bugs.

The new Membership rates for 2018 are up on the website (thanks to Paul Buckley for keeping the website in tip top shape). As per the AGM, membership will be £60 for Flying members, which covers the period from expiry last August plus 12 months from when you sign back up. Renewal will then be on an annual basis thereafter. Military members get to join for free. For less frequent visitors or those wishing to try the club out, a Day rate of £20 can be arranged which includes up to 5 tows. This is subject to availability with full members taking priority if it looks like a busy weekend. We’ve compared our rates to other tow clubs and can confidently say that Rutland is extremely good value. (With volunteer staff and no rent to pay, all the funds just go to keeping the equipment in good shape).

To help with Communications, please could we ask members to accept the GoogleGroup invitation that you should have received. This will be used to communicate on occasional Members-only matters. The Facebook Group will remain the main means of communication - but that includes a much wider audience. So please note: if you don’t accept the GoogleGroup invitation you may miss important communications. The Telegram group also remains active for chatting. Please let us know in case you are having issues with any of these.

Our club has now been in existence for 18 months and as well as having fun in a friendly atmosphere, we’ve developed a strong culture of safety and discipline. We can never take this for granted and rely on our members to continue to operate at the highest standards. With the first flying date – and those spring thermals – a few weeks away, now is a good time to check over your kit and think about preparing for the upcoming season. That means getting your reserve re-packed (for skydivers a reserve repack is mandatory every 180 days!), doing some ground-handling, and carrying out any other servicing that may be necessary.

Please do Contact Us with any feedback or suggestions. We wish you a fun-filled – and above all safe – flying season in 2018, and look forward to seeing you on the field very soon.
The Team at Rutland Airsports

Great news - the CAA today informed us that our tow permit has been granted and we are authorized to winch up to 2000ft. A lot of work went into the consultation which proved much more involved than anticipated so a big thank you to our Airspace Officer, Mick Roche, who put in a huge amount of effort and whose connections in the aviation community proved invaluable. And of course to all our members for their patience during this process. Our Senior Tow Coach, Andy Shaw, meanwhile has been scoring high on the leaderboard in the World Accuracy Champs in Albania - so we look forward to welcoming him back to home shores and to getting some Flying Dates in the diary very soon. Please keep an eye on the Facebook Group for more news and udpates...

Winter is not behind us yet but we've been using the cold months to maximum advantage. We acquired not one but two Koch winches in the autumn and these have been undergoing our own version of scrapyard challenge: strip downs, tune-ups and lots of paint and polish means they should be in great shape as spring arrives. A big thanks you to all who helped with this project. We now have an active Facebook PAGE - the best way to keep up to date - as well as a Googlegroup, Telegram and our own website at https://rutlandairsport.wordpress.com/ with lots of information about the club and membership rates and how to get in touch etc. Our CAA tow permit application is still in the system but that hasn't stopped us flying - even though winching is limited to 200ft we've seen lots of pilots in the air on their PGs and of course our PPG pilots have been busy flying under their own power. We've even seen Foot-Launched Powered Hang Gliders in the air, not to mention Mike Gaylord's Powered Parachute aka the 'Flying Sofa'.

Rutland Airsports The home for free flying in the country's smallest county.

The club is now registered with BHPA and membership (£50 per year) is now open. You can use the 'Contact Us' button on this page which will take you to our new website where you'll find all the details. We have secured not one but two winches, which are on their way to the airfield and we expect to have them operating later this month (Aug 2016). We still have to acquire a tow permit from the CAA but are able to operate up to 200ft pending this application. Please keep an eye on our FaceBook Group for updates and news. As a new club we will be as good as our members so please come and join us and help to build on what we've achieved so far.

Inaugral meeting on 15th June 2015 - the founding team outsdie the North Luffenham golf clubhouse - the weather meant we didn't get any wings in the air but the club got off the ground today!