CONTROL LINE: COMBAT
Rich von Lopez, 8334 Colegio Drive, Los Angeles, CA 90045
Season overview
The 1994 combat season has seen some unexpected contest cancellations and the emergence of several new money contests. The long-running Bladder Grabber was withdrawn from the circuit, as was the Money Nats, the second longest-running of the triple-elimination contests.
To fill the gap, Steve Smith offered the June 11–12 Central California Coyote Valley Bellcranker II contest in Morgan Hill, California. (Since it's about two days after my deadline for this column, I will report the outcome next month.)
The year 1994 marks my return to the AMA National Model Airplane Championships after a long absence (I was the Combat event director at Reno, Nevada in 1984). The Lubbock, Texas site should be interesting, given Texas's long history of dominance in combat competition. Lubbock is also the home of the legendary Riley Wooten, a former national champion who designed the Voodoo, Sneeker, Demon, and Viper.
The Chicagoland Combat Coalition will continue with their third annual Duke Fox Memorial Great Plains Combatfest in DeKalb, Illinois, August 13–14.
In Southern California we've been flying plenty of 80-mph club contests. The annual Knights of the Round Circle Joust in June will mark the fourth 80-mph contest of the year.
April 24 Double Elimination 80-mph contest
This was the smallest of the three club contests for the year, with 14 entries. There were, however, some strong fliers:
- Pete Athans
- Gary Cash
- Ron Cash
- Greg Carter
- Mike Carter
- Brian Choquette
- Alan DeVeuve
- Russ Graves
- Roy Heppenstall
- John Keneally
- Rich Lopez
- Dave Rigby
- Chuck Rudner
- Frank Tomicich
Russ Graves has been a terror during the past two years, placing as high as second at the 1993 Bladder Grabber and third at the second Duke Fox Memorial. Here he continued his hot streak with an undefeated win. Ron Cash finished second, and I took third. Several fliers are showing promise, such as Dave Rigby of the Bakersfield, California area, who made it to the fifth round.
Brian Choquette made an impression by making it to the fourth round and flying well against Roy Heppenstall and Frank "Monkey Man" Tomicich.
These 80-mph club contests require that everyone pitch in to judge, set up, tie streamers, and keep things moving. It's good to train judges at this level for possible use in Fast Combat contests.
Equipment and small parts
Roy Heppenstall, originally from England and now in the Fresno, California area, is smooth and skillful at flying combat. He is also developing a number of small parts for Greg Carter's Alan Plane kits, such as:
- a bellcrank
- a leadout guide
- an elevator attachment piece
- a control horn
Roy made a mold of these items; they come out together attached by a tree. Ron Cash has been testing these parts on his models and likes them. I don't have any of these yet, but I will get a set to photograph for a future column. Modelers are clever at coming up with items to meet very specific needs; Roy's efforts are a good example.
Rules reminder
At the start of the 1994 season, I gave photocopies of the latest AMA Combat event rules to local combat model owners. These local fliers are AMA members, but not all took the time and 29-cent stamp to send back their AMA membership card backing to request a new rule book. Do you have the latest version of the rule book?
We plan on hosting many more 80-mph contests during 1994 and expect the level of competition to improve as the season progresses.
Eye protection
I received a couple of letters after the last column that dealt with eye protection. One was from my old friend Greg Wornell of the Dreaded Canadian Combat Contingent. He wrote in part:
"In a recent Model Aviation column, I was very glad to see you emphasize the importance of wearing eye protection in our hobby. This is a lesson I had to learn very painfully.
At last year's Bladder Grabber I was refueling a model during a match. In less than the blink of an eye, the entire contents of the bladder blasted directly into my eye; the tubing had slipped off the bladder. I was not wearing any eye protection.
Like everyone else, I've had fuel sprayed into my eye before without serious incident. However, in this case I took a direct hit and the damage was severe and excruciatingly painful. The trip to the emergency room was only the beginning of many visits to ophthalmologists and cornea specialists that continue to this day.
The accident permanently damaged my cornea and severely limited my vision in that eye. Worse, for months the pain was so debilitating that I was effectively unable to use either of my eyes, much less work or carry on any kind of normal life.
After resorting to a major eye operation, I have finally begun to experience some comfort once again (nearly a year later). However, my vision is not expected to recover fully, and my eye will continue to require special care and treatment for the rest of my life.
The point, of course, is that all of this could have been easily avoided by simply wearing some reasonable eye protection on the field. I'm hoping no one else has to learn this the hard way, and we can all go on having fun for a long time."
Pat Wilcox and fuel shutoffs
Pat Wilcox of Houston, Texas, is a Boeing 747 pilot for EVA flying to Taipei from Seattle or Los Angeles. On his layovers in Seattle or Los Angeles I have made my workshop available so he can build or tinker instead of sitting in a hotel room.
He has just finished a Greg Carter Alan Plane and has another six sets of wings waiting to be built. On his last stopover he started building some Steve Hills–type fuel shutoffs that are backplate-mounted units. These shutoffs use a Cox .049/.051 needle valve assembly removed from its gold-anodized housing.
There are a number of steps to follow to make one properly. If they are successful I will describe the construction in detail in a future column.
Photo note
One of the photos included with this column shows what can happen if you run an engine too hard. Steve Kott of Wayne, Michigan, is noted for strong equipment and for being able to fly left-handed. The Fox Combat Special in the photograph was not in a collision; it simply blew its top.
Transcribed from original scans by AI. Minor OCR errors may remain.
