Up and Around
George M. Aldrich
12822 Tarrytown, San Antonio, TX 78233
Ignition system and spark plugs
The Lang transistorized ignition system (my version) has drawn quite a response; if that is any indication, there is quite a bit of interest in flying both Free Flight and Control Line with this mode. With the Ni-Cd, lithium, and alkaline batteries we have today, the only weak link left in the system is the old spark plugs.
While I have over 100 various makes of spark plugs, fewer than 10% of them will run an engine properly. Let's face it — these old Champion, AC, Autolite, etc., plugs are over 45 years old, and the seals have become dry and brittle. Today, if I experience any problem when starting an ignition engine, the first thing I check is the battery pack. If the battery is okay, the next thing is the plug.
Jim Reynolds, SAM Champs RC Grand Champion the past two years, passed on a neat idea recently. Jim keeps a test plug of each size in his flying box. With any sign of trouble he puts the test plug in the engine. If the engine starts and runs as it should, the test plug goes back in the flying box and a new plug is installed. Always having a known standard, he always has something dependable to fall back on. Newly manufactured plugs are available today from a number of sources if your old spark plugs pull the same fade-out act that mine have.
So Long balance-point discovery
Harry Murphy, our sage FF columnist, called a few months ago to discuss something or other, and in passing I mentioned how squirrely my newly finished So Long—an O.T.F.F. design—was. All ol' Harry said was try it with a 33% balance point! I had looked up the Air Trails article and had been adhering to the 40% CG it stated. What a difference a little over 3/8 inch can make. Every plan I've seen for this great old design has shown almost no decalage. My model needed over 1/4 inch positive under the wing with the 40% balance point. Now with the 33% balance it is much better. Thanks, Harry!
Five Flags meet, Pensacola
I don't enter many contests, as I once did, but one I truly enjoyed was the Five Flags meet put on by Tom McLaughlin and the rest of the great group in Pensacola, Florida. The reason I liked this meet so much was that it was fun! Flown on two square miles of mowed grass, there were only the standard safety rules to follow. No hard regimen—just enjoying the company of great people and flying when I wanted to. Great flying and great bull sessions; now that's modeling! And that's fun. Thanks, Tommy and gang!
Visit with Don Still and preserving design history
On the way back from Pensacola I passed through Beaumont, Texas and just had to stop and spend a short 30 minutes with my old nemesis and friend Don Still. Don has operated a fine model shop for 40 years now, and unlike me, he's just as trim and slim as ever.
He also kept a lot of clippings and rules from our prime years of competition. During our short visit it dawned on me that there are a number of great designs from that era that are not legal for competition under our present OT Stunt guidelines. This applies not only to Don's 1949 Nationals winner, but Russ Snyder's third place design as well, both in the Sr. division. Looking back over the scores for that Nationals reveals that Don would also have won the Walker trophy had the scores for the Novelty Stunt event not been merged with the precision points.
In Free Flight, S.A.M. has a design committee that receives data and can approve an unknown or unpublished design. Not only is Don still alive to supply all the important details of his '49 winner, but Russ Snyder lives only four or five miles from me and could give me like data to assist in an accurate drawing. Surely it will behoove us to enjoy such available history while the originators are still with us rather than to wait until they've left us to sit and wonder.
Chicago Nationals, 1954 — a painful memory
Chicago, 1954. So many of you have written or called to voice your appreciation for my reminiscing about Stunt history, that I will continue with my most painful memory, the Chicago Nationals of 1954. This Nationals could be called my Lost Week. I was still at Temco Aircraft, then, and I'd been pretty active in our company club—building Wakefields with the likes of Dick Rioux and Bo Robinson. (Dick was an old pal of Carl Goldberg from Chicago.)
I had built a new Nobler that had gained too much weight, and at the last minute I dropped it, deciding to fly the old original. I always was one to burn the candle at both ends in those days, but by staying up all night for a couple of days I had it ready. This time we travelled in Leo Holiday's old Dodge, and I promptly fell asleep and stayed that way most of the way.
Shortly after our arrival, I ran into my old friend the late Ralph Yount, and we headed to the practice circle to see how the old bird would manage the new pattern. I haven't found a 1954 rule book yet, but as I recall, this was the first year you had to climb vertically at the intersection of the horizontal eights, and there was a special maneuver of your choice at the end of the pattern. Mine was a square horizontal, diving in the intersection.
I had engine-run problems right away. I'd get as far as the overhead eights and the old Fox .35 would act just like it had gone to low throttle. It had too much power to land but not enough to do much of anything else.
Eventually, the problem was traced to a piece of solder that was loose in the tank. As soon as the tank got low enough, centrifugal force and/or suction would clap the piece of solder over the pick-up tube and starve the fuel supply. That night I cut a rectangular hole in the permanently mounted tank and flushed out the tank with fuel. I didn't see the solder come out, but it didn't rattle anymore, so I soldered the tank shut. You guessed it; on the next flight, the engine went to low speed and the rattle was back.
Here I was again, not much practice, and a grooving model with an engine that couldn't run. Nothing to do but cut into the nose, remove the tank, and get the solder out. To this day I don't remember much of that night, but I woke up the next morning sitting on one of those Navy benches. The Nobler was on my lap, and a dope brush was stuck to the nose—right where it was when I fell asleep!
It must have been 9:30 or 10:00 a.m. before I got to the Stunt circle. It was normal for Don Still and I to rush like mad to put in the first flight of the day. Rest assured that Don had put in his first official with his spinach-and-sand Stuka and was sitting in first place. I don't even recall my first pattern, but it was enough to eventually earn third place behind Don and Rollie McDonald.
How well I recall my second official flight, though. Fully awake that afternoon, and really laying in a knockout pattern, the engine suddenly went to low speed when I started the overhead eights! I was crushed when the same judge from 1953, a Mr. Sharp, came by and showed me my score sheet. "Too bad," he said, "you were two or three points better on every maneuver." So much for the 1954 Nationals and my first year in the Open class.
The "what if" and slow-pattern ideas
Call it the results of an overactive, fertile, or corrupt mind, but a conversation I had not long ago got me thinking in the "what if" mode. What set it all off was my statement to the effect that they were telling me that if a model does the pattern at, say, a 6.5 to 7 second lap (40 to 45 mph) and makes absolutely no mistakes, it will not receive as many points as a faster pattern because it isn't spectacular. The reply I got was something like, "Oh, that's just too slow!"
Well, when I hung up, the hackles were really up, and I immediately started to think of ways to fly the pattern at a 20-second lap rate! Let's see — an ST Mag IV carb/throttle, one little servo, and a tiny receiver, the small transmitter on my belt ... all of a sudden I was drawn up short! Hey, that could be fun. Then I thought of watching the late Art Scholl doing maneuvers right on the deck. It reminded me, at the time, of a big CL Stunt ship doing a great, slow pattern.
Warming to this, I could envision all sorts of neat ways to fly Stunt more like Art did. Come around downwind at about 20 mph and gradually add power to start a maneuver. I'll bet with practice you could come off the power with just the right timing on outside loops. And on and on. Anybody ever try any of this type of thing?
Vintage Stunt Championships IV
A recent note from Mike Keville sets the date of March 21 and 22, 1992, for Vintage Stunt Championships IV, Tucson, AZ. Send Mike a S.A.S.E. at 6109 E. Iveylen, Mesa, Arizona 85205. Like Mike says, this is not a high-competition meet just for hot shots. This meet is for enjoyment and for exhibiting the "Trailing Edge of Technology."
The latest I hear is a technique for judging authenticity, and the deduction of points for variations in moment arms, gear location, etc. Even the loss of pattern points for design deviation would be a good thing. Seldom a week goes by that I don't hear from three or four lost souls who have never heard about the Vintage/Nostalgia Stunt movement, and want to do it again! CL and FF are far from dead, from all indications I get. Perhaps we got so high tech that it was no longer fun.
Remember when we started a new model on Monday, and flew it the next Sunday? No million-dollar finishes, but they flew great, and it was fun. When the fun became more work than pleasure, perhaps there were many who decided there was a better way to have fun. I repeat, "If we forget what brought so many old friends together, they will go where we can no longer find them again!"
Randolph dope tests and cyanoacrylate concerns
I've been doing some tests with the Randolph dope problem mentioned a few months back. We still don't have a zero-shrink butyrate that can be sanded, and their butyrate clear still will not stick to their colored dope. But I think some of my problems with the cracking and curdling can be attributed to cyanoacrylate glues. That is, I experienced the problems when I put butyrate over areas that had been glued with a cyanoacrylate adhesive—particularly those areas covered with fiberglass that had been adhered with cyanoacrylate. Since these glues are not fuelproof, perhaps they would be more compatible with a coat or two of nitrate dope or clear epoxy enamel over the area. Anybody tried any of this?
What got me to thinking about this was a letter from my old pal Joe Wagner. Joe says that he uses Randolph nitrate and butyrate interchangeably with only the butyrate thinner being the same. He did not say what thinner this is, but I would assume it is Randolph also.
Joe says he can put butyrate over nitrate and nitrate over butyrate! This last is really perplexing to me, for my worst experiences in 54 years of modeling have come from trying to put butyrate over nitrate or vice versa.
Tulsa, Top Flite, and finish problems
I well remember one Sunday in Tulsa, Oklahoma when I was trying to finish my display Jr. Flite Streak so it could be sent to Top Flite. Part of my contract stated that I had to supply a finished model of each design Top Flite was to kit. It was a Sunday, and no shops were open. All I had in high-contrast colors (for good photographs) was some dark blue butyrate and cream nitrate. All went well until I masked off the Flite Streak design and put the cream nitrate over the butyrate. The cream started splitting before it could dry! I eventually got it to cover the splits, but it wasn't easy. My standard routine has been to use one type from start to finish. I'm willing to learn, but my tests will be on small panels, not on an entire model.
Contact
For those of you who have written and sent SASEs, you know I answer my mail. You're welcome to write or call before 10:00 p.m. CST, and I have added a FAX machine at 512-656-2021. It will answer after six rings, hang up after five and you won't be charged if I'm away. My address is 12822 Tarrytown, San Antonio, TX 78233—just like in the logo at the top of my column.
Transcribed from original scans by AI. Minor OCR errors may remain.
