Looking to build a grass runway next spring....any advice?

[Farmwithjunk]

Use your rototiller and make a beam drag that can be angled. Till and drag till its nice and smooth and repeat two or more times just to be sure.

Look into putting green grass planted on the strip. [I think they use bent grasses??]

And do post pictures of the planes!

Bentgrass is primarily a cool season grass. The further south it grows, the more trouble it is. It HATES hot humid weather.

 

[Egon]

Yes, bent grass may be a poor choice for this location.

 

[have_blue]

I built my landing strip round. It was 300' in diameter, making it quite large. However, it mowed surprisingly fast. I set the mower to 1", and cocked it back in top gear. Mowing in a circle is much faster, but can make you dizzy near the center. I used bermudagrass, var. Sahara. Now there's a much better variety called Princess 77 that grows slower and lower. The grass should never be more than 1/2 the wheel diameter, or it will try to pull the landing gear off. Use bigger wheels, or mow low enough to make takeoffs easy. Try to avoid mowing more than 1/3 of the grass length, and it will be putting green smooth. Good luck!

 

[BTDT]

Astroturf/indoor-outdoor carpet. Just box off an area as wide and long as you want with 2x6's, flush with ground, fill with something that will maintain a packed surface (decomposed granite, etc., maybe even paving stones), and cover with carpet/astroturf fabric.

 

[Egon]

Now that sounds like a good idea!

 

[dmartin88]

On our RC club's (link below to the web site with some pictures) grass field, we've mainly added some very fine top soil in a few rough areas and the grass grew through it and smoothed out well. We keep the grass cut very short and for most of the glow planes, no issues. Because we're in a nature preserve, we have some noise limits that keep us to smaller planes but really no issue with the grass field.

For smaller electrics, folks have sometimes gone to a slightly larger foam wheel to keep the weight down but with enough power, you're not on the runway that long anyway! LOL

Good luck with getting back in the hobby.

Loudoun County AeroModelers Association