The LMA’s most northerly public show was held over the weekend 29-31st May. This report by Chris Bland.

A general scene of the flight-line on Monday.

This is one show I had been meaning to visit for years and never quite got there. Still, this time there was an excuse to make the long tourney from Coventry, an LMA Committee meeting had been called on the Friday evening. So off we went (my wife made one of her few visits to a model show on the pretense of some walking in the great surrounding countryside).

Well it was a long journey, with my van cruising at 60mph, it took about six hours. When we got there at 5pm many people had already arrived and were busying themselves settling-in. I rushed off to the Committee meeting and left Rose to the unpacking and making of tea.

The Committee meeting over, a good natured affair as always, I had my first proper look around the site. The Longhorsley group have only been on this site a couple of years and what a grand job they have done with it. The nicely mown runway was plenty long enough for all models and there was a welcoming club house with bar. I thought I should visit this in the evening and see if there was anyone there. Yep, by 9pm it was packed with much talk on modelling and the forthcoming weekend. The weather forecast was variable with showers and sunny intervals promised so we crossed our transmitter sticks and hoped for the best.

Saturday was a non-public fly-in. We woke to rain. In fact, it rained all morning. Rose and I took the opportunity to visit some of the local villages. Very nice they were too and some really nice countryside. After lunch the rain turned into occasional showers. This gave us the chance for a bit of flying. I had just fixed the rudder on my Wilga (which I damaged getting it out of the trailer) and wanted to give it a bashing. No problem, there was plenty of help about with John Greenfield and Steve Holland taking turn on the transmitter. Could we land it without it bouncing we wondered? There was no wind at all and this doesn’t help. So we tried and struggled. We did manage it, of course, but any excuse to reject the landing was made. Think that’s hard, says Steve, try it with my Hots then. So we did and gain struggled for the perfect landing. I tested Steve’s undercarriage strength with a stall from about 2ft (whoops) still no harm done, it survived. The evening soon arrived so what shall we do, oh yes visit the club house bar again.

Sunday and Monday were the public show days. The weather improved and improved as time went on. Infact, it almost got hot. The flying was good and the public support magnificent, I’m told the best ever. There was very good and informed commentary by Dave Boddington and Brian Spoor. There was a lot of support from LMA members who made the journey to this most friendly of flying shows. Some idea of the number and range of models can be seen in the rest of this report.

Many thanks to those who contributed photographs. In addition to ones from me and Rose I was emailed many superb pictures taken by Alan Judge, Alan Tait and Steve Brunsden. You can see who took what by placing the mouse cursor over each picture. It is nice to see more and more people contributing to the site. Please support the site and feel free to email articles and/or pictures to the address on the home page.

The final thanks should go to the members of the flying group at Longhorsley. There are only 17 of them and boy did they and their family and friends work hard over the weekend. I noted Keith Mitchell slaved in the club house cooking all weekend and I don’t think he had a single flight. John Townsend was everywhere. One minute I saw him as flight line director, then he was helping the start-up organisation then he was seen walking around the site and picking up rubbish. Ted Allison kept a low profile handling monetary issues and was only seen occasionally when he managed a flight. Finally, Gary Armstrong spent all day on the frequency board and arranging the flying slots. This can be a high pressure activity and Gary approached it unflustered and efficiently. There were of-course many others carrying out thankless tasks all weekend. Thanks to you all.

Two nice Cap 232s.

This model Spitfire always gets a lot of attention wherever it is flown. It is owned by Richard Rawl.

Dave Johnson’s Dakota landing.

Phillip Robertshaw’s Huricane. This was a 25% scale model built from a Richard Rawl plan.

One of several Jet models flown. This one is Dave Swarbrick’s ‘Tsurname’.

John Townsend’s Miles Magister.

Richard’s Spit again. I can’t resist photographs of it!

Andy Johnson’s Wellington makes a low pass.

The USAAF were active.

Steve Holland’s Zlin performed effortlessly as usual.

Tony and Emily Hopper with their newest model of an Islander.

Phillip Robershaw’s Heinkell 111

Ted’s Texan.

Here I am with ‘Old Fart number 2’, John Townsend. The ice cream was bought me by Keith Mitchell as I correctly identified John from a comment Keith put on this site’s Forum. Thanks Keith, it was most welcome.

About as real as it gets…. Richard’s Spit again.

Here is Dave Johnson’s Herc. being ‘guarded’ by my wife Rose.

Andy Johnson’s Islander. This model flew very well. It was demonstrated flying in a scale like manner and was shown flying fast and low like a sports model.

Unusually, one of my models appears. Chris Bland’s 25% scale Wilga.

John Greenfield’s Beech.

A 25% scale Triplane. There was not a great contingent of WWI models this year.

Good to see some non-military models as well. This one is a Tomahawk.

A 25% scale Seafury.

The Junkers gets around many of our shows.

Ian Turney-White’s superb Nieuport 28.

The B17 ‘Hang the Expense’ is another regular around the show circuit.

Finally, a cluster of fighters!

A great weekend and public show. I certainly plan to go back next year. Hope you can make it too.