Flying for Fun - 2004/08
D.B. Mathews
909 N. Maize Rd., Townhouse 734, Wichita KS 67212
IN THE JULY 2004 column I provided a quick look at Reginald Denny's theatrical career and tried to connect it to his involvement in the early days of modeling. Performing in more than 200 movies and stage plays between 1919 and 1966, he played comic and dramatic roles alongside the greatest stars of the day.
However, less well known were Reginald's hobby shop, his kit production, his mail-order business, and his involvement in developing and distributing one of the first reliable ignition engines for model-airplane use.
A Clever Promoter
As I mentioned last month, Reginald was successful in placing his Dennyplanes in the hands of the prominent child actors of that time. This was a clever marketing move because it exposed young people to gas-powered models and subsequently generated good publicity and a positive image of model airplanes. This was in a time when many parents were concerned about the safety of "gas" models for their children.
Additionally, the late 1930s was a time dominated by dreams for most youngsters, since most families could not afford model airplanes, gas engines, or many of the other nonessential things of the era. We dreamed of someday owning an engine. There were even popular rubber-powered kits available with dummy cylinders and devices to make "engine" sounds as the propeller turned, thus creating the illusion of a gas engine.
While dreaming of models with real engines, we put our maximum craftsmanship and efforts into rubber-powered models in preparation for that "someday." In some ways, the real gas model was the carrot dangling in front of many young modelers of that era, and it motivated them to keep building in spite of some poor-quality kits.
I'd be remiss if I didn't mention one of the ironies of those dreams. As I noted, very few young modelers could afford gas engines in the 1930s. However, as the nation recovered from the grips of a major recession (depression, really), disposable income increased, allowing families to splurge a bit in the 1940s. Unfortunately, when we finally had the money, the wartime shortages made it impossible to buy that dream engine, kits, or much of anything else.
Well, not quite impossible. Some engines and kits were available during the World War II years, but they were mostly junk. I can recall some of my contemporaries' awful, crushing disappointment when they scraped, saved, and sacrificed until they had enough money to send off for a GHQ engine, only to quickly learn that their money had been stolen from them. These engines were available because of a bureaucratic mess-up. The War Production Board was advised that the future US mechanics and aircrews would need model airplanes on which to train. The bureaucrats decided that a manufacturer should be selected and provided with scarce and strategic materials to continue building model engines, and the way to determine which unit was the most "popular" was to check sales figures.
Since the GHQ sold for less than half of the other brands, it did indeed sell more. However, they didn't bother asking the opinion of anyone who knew anything about model engines, nor did they set up performance criteria. Had the government conducted even the most rudimentary test, it would have quickly learned that the GHQ wouldn't run. Many young people of the 1940s were misled by those who sold these engines. They were so poorly built that they seldom produced more than an occasional "pop." And if by some miracle they did run, they wore out immediately. Consider how many potential modelers were driven away from the hobby, never to return, as a result of this grossly dishonest marketing.
Reginald Denny recognized this "build rubber power until you can afford gas" phenomenon; his ads featured several attractive rubber-powered models. I've reproduced a couple of the ads to give you a feel for them.
Notice that the Bullet was advertised as "crack-proof." This sort of falls into the same category as other ads of the era that claimed a model was "guaranteed to fly." What was one to do if a model cracked or didn't fly?
The Dennymite
When Reginald introduced the Dennyplane, it featured wing halves that plugged into the fuselage top, a rather complex undercarriage, a solid-sheet empennage, and wire wingtips.
As I wrote last month, early on Reginald sold an engine made for him by the same factory that was producing the Baby Cyclone. For whatever reason(s), only a few were produced and sold.
In 1937, Reginald conducted a bidding contest seeking an engine that was suitable for the Dennyplane. Several backyard shop machinists/entrepreneurs (who were likely unemployed at the time) entered engines for testing.
An engine of .573 cu. in. displacement that Walter H. Righter designed and built was selected as the most reliable and easiest to start. Walter built the prototypes in his back yard and then in a small shop at 4695 San Fernando Road in Glendale, California, but soon moved to larger facilities at 800 South Flower Street in Burbank.
Marketed through Reginald's shop and mail-order business, and at least postwar through jobbers, the Dennymite proved to be a fairly successful seller and went through several modifications to its outside appearance and shape. It all led up to a teardrop-shaped cylinder head and exhaust stack called the "Airstream," which was the final version and sold postwar for a while. A total of slightly more than 10,000 of the engines were sold.
This and many other engines of that era utilized a cam on the crankshaft to open and close the ignition points as the piston traveled up and down. This sent an impulse through a coil, which magnified the amperage from the dry-cell battery to produce a spark in a miniature spark plug.
These engines ran on two parts white (unleaded) gasoline and one part SAE 70-weight oil. Heavy oil was needed for lubrication and to fill in the loose fit of the parts.
Once the engine was started, one advanced the ignition timing by raising the lever on the points while leaning the air/fuel mixture with the needle valve. I described that much faster than the starting process usually was. One could identify gas-engine fliers by their enlarged deltoid muscle from flipping propellers. We had no electric starters until much later.
I've included photos of the Dennyplane and the Denny Jr. this month to clarify the differences. The model presented to Robert Montgomery is a Dennyplane, as is the flight shot. It featured a two-piece wing, functional wing struts, and (not visible in the photo) an undercarriage which was internally sprung. Some variation of the vertical fin's outline is also apparent.
This design was available in a standard and a deluxe kit. Both were well equipped with hardware such as a pre-bent aluminum tail-wheel bracket, but the deluxe kit also included air wheels, silk for covering, and dope.
Roughly a year after the Dennyplane's introduction, a simplified version called the "Denny Jr." was introduced. Fred Hardy designed it. As can be seen in the picture, it used a one-piece wing with balsa tips and a plain bent-wire undercarriage.
However, this model was not cheaply done; it included a spun-aluminum cowl and a metal aft of the firewall. I may have added to the confusion on this matter by publishing a Denny Jr. but identifying it as a "Dennyplane." The extra-wide fuselage, round cowl, etc., are reminiscent of one of the Howard DGA series or perhaps a Fairchild 24W.
The Dennyplanes are undeniably far more attractive than most other gas-powered kits of the era. If you want to construct one, my drawings and construction article from the January 1977 MA are still available. A short kit (cut parts only) is available from Klarich Custom Kits, 2301 Sonoma Dr., Rancho Cordova CA 95670.
Next month I'll take a look at the virtually unknown major contributions to full-scale aviation that Reginald Denny and Walter Righter made.
MA
Transcribed from original scans by AI. Minor OCR errors may remain.
