Reminder…due to 4th of July occurring this Friday, it was decided during the June club meeting to hold both the hotdog night and July club meeting this Wednesday July 2nd.  Please join the club members at 6PM for great hotdogs, good company and maybe even a little flying.

The FliteTest guys put out a video last week Friday about building a battery bunker and some tips on putting out a lipo fire.  This got me thinking about how and where I charge my batteries.  My workshop is in my basement and this is where I charge my batteries.  When I am charging batteries I am in my workshop maybe half of the time.  The other half I am in my office, watching tv, outside doing yard work or taking a nap!  I have never had a problem with a battery while it was charging. I have become complacent and figure that I am safe and that it will never happen to me.  But what if it did, even if I was in the same room what could I do to put out a battery fire?  Currently I would have to somehow move the battery 3′ to a sink and hopefully not burn myself.  That doesn’t sound like fun.  Even though we all probable think that it will never happen to us we should consider taking a few precautions at home AND in our shelter at the field.

At home: We should all at a minimum have a bucket of sand by our charging area.  At about 7:10 Josh talks about a small single cinder block bunker.  You put your battery in the slot of the cinder block and place a bag of sand over it.  If the battery starts on fire it will melt the plastic bag and the sand will flood the cinder block slot and put out of fire.  This would be a good method of charging our batteries in our homes!

At the field:  Again, we should at a minimum have a bucket of sand and a fire extinguisher in the shelter.  I am not sure how I feel about the need for a battery bunker.  On one side it would be a very good safety thing but do we need to be that safe…it is not our house, its a shelter.  I can’t imagine a battery getting out of control and somebody not seeing it and being able to take action with a sand bucket on the batter and a fire extinguisher on the table or shelter if it progressed that far.

I would love here your thoughts on battery safety at the field and at home.  What measures have you taken at home?  Please post a comment with your ideas and thought.

John “plane addicted” Russcher

If you did not know, Baldwin airport has a wonderful field to fly on. I believe the official club started a few years ago. They have a 3,500ft runway with a lot of jet pilots. This past weekend they held an event with many pilots. It was a great time. Here is just a small clip of some of the jets.

I am looking to borrow one of these HD Wing Camera II’s(http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/__25656__hd_wing_camera_ii_full_hd_1920x1080p_30fps.html) to shoot a couple test videos from my Quad copter.  If you have one that I can use on my quad please call/text me at 616-836-8489.

Thanks
John Russcher