How long have you been flying models?

[Tony H]

On and off since 1998 about 13 years. New developments all the time!

[FWAL]

Just over a year so I'm just a baby (in my mid forties). It's been a fantastic year of slope soaring and IOM racing........ Must dash, got time to mix some resin before tea

[buster prop]

My first model that flew successfully was KK Achilles, then most of the Flying Scale series. I started in the late 50's but with a career/family break have continued ever since flying control line and later on, R/C. Aeromodelling is like malaria, it recurs throughout your entire life.

[Malcolm Element]

60 years since I got my Keil Kraft Competitor !..it did sort of fly

[IanR]

Do you mean "all together" - about half an hour. (newbie)

Ian

[Erfolg]

The data seems to be changing now.

It seems with a larger sample size that there are a significant number of modellers who have been modelling for 3-5 years (15%). Dependant on the ages of theses modellers may indicate that a significant number of new younger modellers are about. Perhaps modelling will not die out with the +50 age group.

[Alwyn Gee]

Mmmm to be realistic I voted in the 3-5 year group but it's barely 3 years. Like dozens of others I did have a dabble in the dim and distant past of my youth with a couple of KK rubber powered free flight models and a very small diesel engine in a control line model. None lasted too long. If truth be told and I'd had a bucket of phospherous I could have invented the match.and been a millionaire by now.

I then had a few years when I played with the real thing, Chipmunks, Dove, Rapide, Blackburn B2 even a Buccaneer or two plus a motley bunch of local farmers aircraft that came in for CofA certification. Once all that came to an end it was just a case of trying to survive in the rodent race and tho' I always nurtured the thought of getting back to some sort of involvment with aircraft it was never viable.

Suddenly, as I was nearing retiral, the bug bit again and my thoughts turned to model flying and here I am 3 years down the line. Finally got my pilot's licence, an SSA bronze certificate

Alwyn

[BB]

Been flying almost as long as being a member of the forum, about 4 years. Wrote off 2 frames within 10 days of each other last October 2011. Not a bad average that, 2 frames in 4 years. Compared to my clubs Mr 'know it all', who goes 'round' and tip stall's on a regular basis. Been flying he says 10 years.  Latest quote, " don't tell me how to fly.  I know how to fly."  My answer, sure, but you ain't learned to land !  - Bazinga !!

Round - meaning, that he can't land any frame within 120 X 70 metres of flight line.  There is always a problem with the wind or his now new Futaba 18 MZ.  No I am not kidding !

He's a 'B' cert.

I'm an 'A'

BB (do I feel smug.  In this instance - YES !)

Edited By BB on 15/03/2012 22:35:37

[Martin Harris - Moderator]

You've got to wonder how he got his B if he can't land reasonably accurately! I thought you had to demonstrate landing within a 30 metre area!

[Tomas Dunker]

1958-1962 C/L (linflyg)

1974-1994 RC Glow (metanol)

2006-2012 RC Brushless (elmodeller)

see pictures on my website>> http://www.tomasdunker.se/modell/

/ Tomas Dunker

[Mystar]

I was still at school when i first took to the skys, i am now 52. my fist model was a True Line Executive senior with a K&B 35 and one of those home built radios, An RCM&E one i think it was

I never actually flew it on it's first outing (it was a very windy day as i remember) because the very kind gentleman that took it up for me on its first trimming flight flew it into a tree after getting engine trouble. luckily it only creased the wing. but i was flying it a week later and have never looked back since.

This is a great Hobby. it has certainly kept me seine over the years

[Colin Leighfield]

On and off since 1956. First model was a Frog "Minx" (built up rubber powered, 30" wing span, I think). Glide tests were fine, but when I wound the motor right up the fuselage collapsed, almost certainly because of my poor workmanship. I obtained a plan recently and I will eventually build another one. Second attempt (1957)? was a Keil Kraft Cadet which I did a better job of, but before I could fly it my baby brother jumped on it. I wasn't happy, but I got over it. A couple of years ago I got a kit for a Cadet from Replikit and built it, finished with tissue and dope as the original. It was a huge pleasure and flies very well. Shame that Replikit have stopped doing these vintage reproductions, but I've got 2 (can't think why) Mercury Marauders to have a go at, plus a Keil Kraft Snipe to replace the first one that flew away o.o.s. in Sutton Park on it's first flight in 1965, complete with a brand new Cox Babe Bee. Has anybody found it yet!

[Ernie]

Since School, we had a geography teacher who encouraged us to fly control line in the playground,

so, alas, it's 50+ or 52 to be exact

[Erfolg]

OMG Colin! My first kit built model was a Frog Minx.

Although my covering skills were pants, and the model weighed down with yellow and black dope, the model flew incredibly well, in-spite of my skills, or lack of trimming skills. The wing folded whilst preparing to launch, eventually.

I recently copied the plan from the "House of Frog" as a tiled drawing. Again with a nostalgic yearning.

Brilliant model, far better than my next Veron Seamew, again, that was almost certainly me.

[StarLoc FiveStar Adhesives]

Ive been flying since 1982 , first freeflight , then control line, then freeflight........ then i got fed up with loosing freeflight models in trees and took up radio control instead

First real model i think was a KK kit of the Mig 15 , but i had a few plastic round the pole models and a cox control liner rtf before this  

Edited By StarLoc FiveStar Adhesives on 21/04/2012 12:46:42

[Colin Leighfield]

Great to hear that I'm not the only who knows that the Frog Minx existed! My lingering sense of failure from those days forces me to have another go and prove I could do it after all! The previous mention of Jetex was interesting, many memories of burning the skin on my fingers white and setting fire to the grass.

[Erfolg]

Colin

I tried to obtain a plan for a long time, thinking it was called a Witch, I eventually purchased a plan, and realised it was not the one. I then discovered there were two versions, so purchased that to, of course it was not the one.

One day on the House of Frog website, I discovered the Minx and then realised, yes, this is the one, right down to the instructions, all the bells were ringing, happiness.

I suspect theat there were a number of very disappointed Jetex kit builders.

My parents purchased a Starfighter kit for me, pre moulded shells, which were built in a cardboard jig as two separate halfs. I threw it further than it could fly, simply dropped to the floor. It did not streak into the heavens like a manned rocket.

Ever the optimist (then), I convinced my mother to buy a similar Fairy Delta 2. This would do absolutely nothing. The problem being, it was a flat plate wing, with no reflex. Never heard of reflex. then. Again, when thrown, it would dive into the ground, or zoom into a stall, then falling like a shot duck.

Yes, these models destroyed my optimism, becoming a life long pessimist.

[Colin Leighfield]

Ah yes Erfolg, these are life long traumas. It's probably why I have a tick, dribble and walk with a limp.

[Mike Etheridge 1]

Dear Erfolg,

I had the same experience as you with my Jetex 50 powered Starfighter and Folland Gnat. Neither flew and I just wonder how they ever got on the sales market. The only Jetex model of mine that worked was the Keil Kraft Cub which did a whole series of loops before it hit a tree!

We found the best performance from a Jetex 50 was to set it off in the street unattached to a model. It flew a bit like a Stag Beetle!

I still have a Jetex augmentor tube in the house, at one time it was used as a chimney on a Mamod steam engine as it fitted perfectly!

just thinking back to the KK Cub, in the kit they provided a piece of asbestos paper to protect the plane's fuselage just behind the motor. I of course sanded the asbestos paper to get a good finish and probably injested the asbestos dust!

MJE

Edited By Mike Etheridge 1 on 22/04/2012 00:11:13

[Colin Leighfield]

Dear Mike and Erfolg.

They also did profile models of a number of the then current jet fighters and I had the Gloster Javelin, with the Jetex 50. The best that I ever got was really just an extended glide with the motor hissing away. It was generally on the deck before the fuel had run out. However, I did get some results with the smallest Jetex, the "Atom 35", in a number of small own design chuck glider types of model. On one occasion I had one land on a factory roof about 100ft along a valley gutter. I remember walking almost the whole length of the roof on cracking asbestos to get it back, lord knows why I didn't fall through it.

A few (10)? years ago, Jetex became available again, supposedly much improved and I bought a 50. Nothing had changed, burnt fingers and dismal flight results. Still got it somewhere.

As an aside, I recently read a book about John Cobb and his Crusader jet boat, in which he was killed (1952)? attempting the world water speed record on Loch Ness. The boat was designed by Vospers and the model tests were all done using a large "Jetex" motor designed especially for the job by the company, which I believe was started by a chap called Henry Mansour (something like that). It worked very well and high speeds were reached. They got the boat design right that way, the catastrophe was caused by structural failure in the bow, not by striking a log as is usually claimed.

Vospers knew about the problem and wanted to take Crusader back for strengthening, but Cobb wouldn't wait and we saw what happened as a result! I seem to remember that in the original Aeromodeller Plans Service there was a plan for a model of the Crusader with a Jetex motor.

Sorry for rambling, it's my age.

[Mike Etheridge 1]

Colin,

When I was very young and before I started aeromodelling at 9 years of age I witnessed a very successful flight of a Jetex plane on the South Downs (?) off Downland Drive in Hove. It must have been a motor bigger than a Jetex 50.

At the age of 9 my first model was a balsa Fairy Firefly bought from a shop at West Croydon called 'Sportcraft'' I had two school friends that were excellent modellers and together we constructed many of the Keil Kraft 3/9 kits but the only one that flew was the SE5. We had some success with the KK small glider range and eventually at the age of 12 we constructed some small IC models,me the KK Pirate,one friend the KK Skylon and the other friend an 'own design' pylon plane. All flew beatifully at Epsom Downs,but I remember one of us had the bright idea of filling up the Mills .75 and Merlin integral tanks to the full just to see how far they would fly. We ventured up-wind beyond the Grandstand and sent all three planes up together and then raced across the downs to keep up with them but of course all three went missing. I was directed to the Pirate which had flown across all the railway carriages at Tattenham Corner station by a British Rail porter. The plane had landed undamaged by a signal box. The Skylon landed on the top of the station roof and was recovered with a long window pole but subsequently damaged. The friend that owned the 'home design' went missing for about half an hour but eventually returned with his damaged plane. It had flown through somebody's front room window and my friend's father was sent a bill for repair for 10 shillings!

For the next couple of years we built other free flight and C/L planes with varying degrees of success . One free flight plane my friend designed with a Mills 1.3 was much admired by Pete Norman at Epsom Downs but not long after both friends gave up aeromodelling in favour of motor bikes and cars.

Another friend of mine took up the hobby and at the age of 15 we both had a bash at RC. As I have reported before my plane was a Junior 60 and his was a Matador that he did not finish. However he did make a 'Sparky' that flew OK but he lost it on it's first flight as he forgot to switch the radio on! I lost control of the Junior 60 on one flight and it dissapeared over the grandstand at Epsom Downs. I managed to find it on an adjacent golfcourse by operating the rubber powered escapement . The plane had been hidden in some bushes and covered with grass. When both I and my friend returned to the Downs we found someone had stolen all my aeromodelling kit including my camera. So the Junior 60 got dumped in a shed for 10 years.

After that period I encouraged my nephew Nigel into the hobby by building him a Vic Smeed 'Chatterbox'. Nigel was very successful at all aspects of the hobby and flew C/L in the Gold Trophy and F2D/E at the Nationals.

Me I have been model flying on and off for about 56 years now but have done more building than flying and although I passed my club's field test some years ago have still not attempted my 'A' and must have a bash this year.

MJE

[Colin Leighfield]

Mike.

All those familiar names. I still have the free plan for "Chatterbox" from a 1958 Aeromodeller. My modelling career has been affected, like most others, by motorbikes, (still riding them), cars and family, but I'm still flying when I can, though I've never tried to go beyond my "A" license. On the way I got a group "A"private Pilot's license as well, though I haven't exercised that for a few years now. I built a Ben Buckle Mercury Matador a while ago to fulfil a youthful ambition. Fitted a PAW 1.49 diesel, couldn't believe how hard it was to start. (Not like the diesels I remember). I learned that aerobatics weren't a good idea when the wings folded in a loop, so that was it! You can get a kit for "Chatterbox" and other Vic Smeed models, I think from Phoenix models? Must dig out my Mills .75.

[Erfolg]

Colin

I have built a model of Crusader, I will post a picture, it is how I restarted modelling, not finished. My intention is to power it with an electric brushless motor, I have gathered a few bits, just do not know enough to instal the stuff. I have tried to find a fast electric expert (at the Trafford Exhibition), seems they are as rare as hens teeth.

I think we all started with a KK scale model at some time. I believe you have to be a good builder, with some experience to get them to fly, not a young kid. Paradoxically KK Conquest, Ajax etc. did fly well, as apparently the bigger Veron scale rubber jobbies, when built by callow youths.

I was not a member of a club, the same as my mates, so did not have the guidance and experience of some benevolent adults to tap into.

As I guess hundreds of other youth, i mixed my own fuel, ran the engines in the house. How tolerant was my mother, or perhaps she as at work, hmm. The motors I had was a 1.5 ED Hornet and a 1.5 Elfin.

[Colin Leighfield]

Thanks Erfolg.

Fascinated to hear you're working on a Crusader, I can't recall the name of the book I referred to, borrowed from my brother, but it's recent and you'll probably find it on the Internet. It tells the whole story, things that have never been revealed before, including the structural failure. Very highly recommended.

Couldn't agree more with your comments about the Keil Kraft 3/9 kits, but as you say, the bigger ones worked ok, I think the same was true of Frog and Veron as well!

[Gary Turner]

This time round or including the 8 years or so I flew for before the 12 year lay off??