1986 Nats: FF Outdoor Rubber
Larry Kruse
Weather and Conditions
Tuesday, FF Outdoor Scale day, was expected to be a carbon copy of opening day — some wind early in the morning tapering off as the late-afternoon heat increased. That was not the case. Those who waited until late in the day to fly were met with the same sporadic westerly breezes evident during the morning hours, but now occasionally punctuated by short periods of calm. For some fliers the heated breezes proved propitious; for others, much gnashing of teeth was heard.
Open Rubber Scale
The most significant event in AMA Rubber Scale flying at this year’s Nats was the arrival of a new name to the event: Dave Platt. Although not new to Scale modeling, Dave made a grand entrance with a Jumbo Scale Grumman Guardian, complete with a four-bladed flying propeller, and punched up through ground turbulence to max out for a well-deserved win.
Dave’s last flight was the sort of thing Scale fliers dream about — an out-of-sight (OOS) overhead flight which the timer lost at 16:08. The model later reappeared out of some high cirrus clouds and was timed to the field’s tree line at over 55 minutes. Amazingly, the plane was recovered from dense underbrush and returned the next day. Thanks for the thrills, Dave, and welcome to Rubber Scale.
- 1st: Dave Platt — Jumbo Scale Grumman Guardian
- 2nd: Mike Welshans — Porterfield
- 3rd: Larry Kruse — Cracker Jack (highest number of scale points, but flight performance fell short of Platt and Welshans)
Terry Rimert, the NFFS’ guru of unofficial Nats events, has officiated, provided trophies and certificates, timed, cajoled, promoted, and generally kept alive Rubber events like Autogyro, Helicopter, Embryo Endurance, Unlimited Biplane, and Speed. Many thanks, Terry.
Peanut Scale
Peanut Scale saw essentially the same lineup for the younger set and was pretty much a Lacey derby.
- 1st: David Brown (repeated his win with the same plane he entered in AMA Rubber Scale)
- 2nd: Lance Ferguson
- 3rd: Jay Horn (following in his dad’s Scale footsteps)
Senior and Open Peanut Scale
In Senior, the fairer sex dominated by bracketing second-place Dan Isaacks.
- 1st (Senior): Melinda Anderson
- 2nd (Senior): Dan Isaacks
- 3rd (Senior): Dana Wile
Take note, guys: both Melinda Anderson and Dana Wile compete seriously in sport.
Open Peanut Scale was seriously contested by Fred Anderson, Curt Sanford, and Dorothy Odum. Dorothy was a very able representative of the female persuasion in this class; she finished third and obviously had the best time.
Curt Sanford edged Dorothy out of second place by nine points flying a (what else?) Lacey. Fred Anderson captured first with a very nicely detailed J-3 Cub, apparently from the Peck-Polymers kit.
- 1st (Open Peanut): Fred Anderson — J-3 Cub
- 2nd (Open Peanut): Curt Sanford — Lacey
- 3rd (Open Peanut): Dorothy Odum
Gas Scale
Gas Scale turned out to be just that for the first time in several years. Those who chose alternates to glow or diesel engines this year bought more trouble than they could handle in the high heat and humidity. Larry Kruse, Mike Welshans, and Curt Sanford all had CO₂ power plants in their planes which simply would not perform under the existing atmospheric conditions.
Duke Horn, on the other hand, entered a large, well-done Longster powered by a diesel and had no problems with motor runs. Duke's problem occurred on the downwind leg of the Longster's first flight, when the ship was irreparably damaged as it flew into a tangle of angle iron, conduit, and wire that apparently used to be part of the runway defense perimeter when Chennault was an active air base.
Second place in Open Gas was taken by a Goldwing pusher-canard entered by Larry Kruse. Although the model garnered top scale points, its balky CO₂ motor would not allow the scale ultralight ship to ROG.
The beneficiary of these CO₂ blues was Robert Schneider and his glow-engined Monocoupe. Not only did the plane's engine run well, but its flight performance was picture-perfect. After a long and realistic takeoff run to gain airspeed, the plane rose majestically into the air with just the slightest wing waggle, bringing back images of the Golden Age of aviation. The little blue-and-white Monocoupe's performance was perfect and served as an excellent reminder that the name of the game is still Flying Scale.
Thanks and Acknowledgements
A special note of appreciation is owed to the hard-working officials who manned the officials' tent throughout five full days under unconscionable heat and humidity. We owe a large debt of gratitude to:
- Murray Frank
- Sandy Frank
- Linda Brown
- Kay Brown
No FF Scale coverage would be complete without a special thanks to the judges. They were the able crew of Scale Director Dale Drew:
- Cliff Tace
- Ron Sears
- Jack Shecks
- Mike Welshans
- Frank Schwartz
Gentlemen: we appreciate your time and effort. Without you, Scale is only half an event.
To everyone present: we all need to recapture some of the exuberance that Dorothy exhibited and remember what Free Flight is all about.
Transcribed from original scans by AI. Minor OCR errors may remain.
