The Mississauga Model Flying Club Inc.

NOISE AND NON-FLYERS

To people who are not accustomed with the sound of our aircraft, especially those who are trying to have some relaxation, the steady "drone and buzzing" of these engines all day long can be very annoying. You may think the noise cannot be heard very far away. To understand for yourself how far away this noise can be heard try parking along the road a fair distance away from any flying field and listen while a few aircraft are in the air at one time.

Try this yourself. Next time you are at the field on a busy day go out of the flying site and park on the road about 1/4 to 1/2 a mile away. Shut your car off to be quiet. You will find that you can hear the planes! The noise may not necessarily be so loud, but is more of an irritating "buzzing" sound.

This irritating noise is created three ways. Two of these are (one) the "loudness" of the engine in decibels, and (two) the "frequency or pitch" of the noise. The third is created by "propeller noise" which is caused by revving the engine too fast and the prop creates a lot of noise, more of a "whining" sound. It has been found that by lowering the loudness and dampening the frequency of the exhaust can help in making the engine noise more tolerable.

More efficient muffling is the obvious cure for these two problems. The prop noise is lessened by turning the prop slower. Often, going to the next larger diameter prop, or the next size up in pitch will slow the engine enough to cut the noise but does not affect the performance of the engine too drastically. All of these techniques may create a loss of high speed performance. On the other hand however, sometimes experimenting with props and mufflers may even enhance the performance of your aircraft! Certainly, for the type of flying we do, we can well afford minimal loss of performance instead of the loss of our flying site by being noisy neighbors.

NOISE ABATEMENT

As we all know, our Flying Sites are very dear to us, for without a place to fly, what would a Flying Club be?

Over the last few years we have seen more and more articles in the MAAC Magazine, RCM, Model Airplane News, and the like about the NOISE problem associated with our SPORT.

As the SPORT becomes more popular, and financially attractive, we find that Flying Clubs are more prolific. It is more difficult to find a suitable site to fly, especially in the more dense metropolitan areas that we have here in Southern Ontario. This residential density makes locating a site far away from homes almost a non-reality. In order to situate and keep a site under such circumstances is becoming a difficult task without seriously addressing the problem of NOISE ABATEMENT.

We must stay more out toward the forest when generally flying around. Any type of aerobatics or maneuvers should be performed out further away from the flight line, certainly at least as far out as the far side of the runway. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCE should aircraft be flown behind the center of the runway line, (behind means toward the pilot's boxes and flight line) except on final approach for landing. Aircraft should not be flown to the north any further than the Hydro Wires. You should not be flying high over the wires. Do not cross beyond the wires to the north into the Brampton side of the wires.

A reminder to INSTRUCTORS. If a student aircraft starts to "drift" toward the flight line further than the center of the runway (except during landing approaches!) you should immediately correct the position of the aircraft (yourself if necessary).

The Club owns sound testing equipment and we will be testing the NOISE LEVEL OUTPUT of ALL aircraft at the field. The obviously noisy ones will be tested first. Aircraft that seem tolerable will be tested in turn. If it is deemed that your aircraft is too noisy you will be grounded and asked to remedy the situation before you may resume flying. Breach of this request will qualify as cause for dismissal of further flying privileges until the situation is remedied, and possible dismissal from the Club if you refuse to comply.