The passing of David L. Ramsey: a devastating loss to modeling
By
Mike Keville | [email protected]
With regret, we learned of David L. Ramsey’s death November 25, 2006. An active member of Society of Antique Modelers (SAM) Chapter 1 in the Denver, Colorado, area, he was the Old Timers columnist for Flying Models magazine. Prior to David’s passing he had been elected SAM 1 president for 2007. His entertaining and photo-laden columns will be missed.
I have one update and two corrections to my December 2006 column. The Comet Clipper in the lower left-hand photo on page 161 belongs to Kevin Sherman, editor of Gas Lines: the newsletter of the Southern California Antique Model Plane Society (SCAMPS) club.
He wrote:
“It’s actually the first ignition-powered model I ever built. I scratch-built it when my dad started flying free flight again with the guys in Perris [CA]. I always liked the elliptical wing and overall looks of the Clipper. Of course I had to have a cowl because I hate the looks of the Clipper without it.
“It is actually painted red and cream over Polyspan and is the original covering and finish. The model started out with a Madewell .49 but now has a Super Cyclone in it, flying well on about 90% power. I’ve won numerous contests with it and it still flies great.”
Corrections to the December 2006 column
- Hal Wightman will be the contest manager at this year’s SAM Championships — not the contest director, as I wrote. That latter task will be shared by Gene Wallock for the FF events, Bob Angel for the RC portion, and Allyn Johnson for the Nostalgia events.
- In a segment regarding lightweight Polyspan, I wrote that it weighs “18 grams per square inch.” That should have read “18 grams per square meter.” That will teach me to proofread these things with a bit more diligence before hitting the “Send” key. At least that’s the plan.
Bob Holman revamped his Web site (www.bhplans.com) during the winter and reports that now he can make in-house additions as his list of Old-Time CAD plans and laser-cut parts continues to grow. He has everything from small rubber designs to Lanzo Bombers in all sizes. Check it out.
Among photos Bill Lovins (Denver, CO) submitted was a newspaper’s public-relations feature from 1958. It shows members of the Easton, Pennsylvania, Model Airplane Doctors (MAD) club, and I’ve included it in this issue. See how many faces you recognize. In the front row are (L–R) Ray Volkert, Bob Gutai, and Nelson Itterly. The little guy in front is Jackie Volkert. In the back row are (L–R) Eli Weaver, Drake Hooke, Bobby Schillis, and Bill Andrews. Some of the club members flew CL on a concrete circle at the Easton airport. They were also allowed to fly FF at the airport, which was actually closed down for that purpose on special occasions. “Those were the days,” wrote Bill. It’s hard to argue with that.
Members of SAM Chapter 27 (Napa, CA) were victorious in last year’s Jimmie Allen postal championship with a total of 1,056 seconds. Team members were Jerry Rocha (more often known for his CL Speed activities), Mike Palrang, and Ding Zarate. In the accompanying photo Jerry is on the left. He and Ding are holding their B-A Cabin entries. Mike had to leave before the photo was taken.
As the current winners, SAM 27 will sponsor this year’s event. For an information package send a large SASE to Jerry Rocha at 3583 Ruston Ln., Napa, CA 94558.
Bill Northrop wants you to know he can scale any of his plans to meet personal requirements for projects such as 1/2A Texaco. You can check with him at 2019 Doral Ct., Henderson, NV 89014; Tel.: (702) 896-2162.
This information is courtesy of Kevin Sherman, who reminds us that SAM requires that all 1/2A Texaco models be categorized as Antiques — not just Old-Time.
Fellow MA columnist Joe Wagner, author of “The Engine Shop,” asked if I’d like to read about his long-ago eight-hour flight, and of course I said “Bring it on.” I had to condense it a bit, but following is “Veco Joe’s” tale that may sound familiar to many readers.
“Sixty years ago my friend Gordy showed up at my place around 3 or 4 a.m., urging, ‘Let’s go fly!’ I was working the 3–11 p.m. shift then and was usually still awake at that hour, often in my shop constructing a new model or repairing an old one. All my older models had been lost or damaged, and a new one on the board was a long way from completion.
“But Gordy wouldn’t take no for an answer, so I scrounged through my ‘fix-it-later’ collection and came up with a red Berkeley Brigadier fuselage with a smashed-in nose, a white wing from a Megow Zomby, and a royal blue Towline Glider tail.
“We sawed the nose off the Brigadier at the landing gear bulkhead, then glued on a solid balsa block using Testors fast-drying cement. I added a plywood facing as a mounting base for a glow Arden .099. Meanwhile, Gordy patched and doped the silkspan on the wing and tail.
“By dawn we had something to fly, though a weirder-looking free flight is hard to imagine. The glider tail was much larger than the Brigadier’s original one, and the Zomby wing much smaller.
“Plus the fact that the glow Arden weighed far less than the spark-ignition Ohlsson .23 that I’d had in the Brigadier — thus for proper balance we had to rubber-band the wing onto the fuselage some 3 inches aft of where it would normally fit.
“We took it to a nearby softball field, hand-glided it a few times, then began power flights. With no time to limit engine runs we put one squirt from my oil pump fuel can into the Arden’s built-in tank and another into the exhaust ports as a prime. This provided just enough height for the model to transition from climb to glide, then circle a few times before landing.
“By this time it was just after 8 a.m. on an ideal day for trimming out a new model: clear blue sky with no wind whatsoever. It was perfect. Then Gordy said, ‘Let’s try a longer engine run.’
“Since we figured most of the fuel had been used up, we gave it two squirts — then Gordy pumped in more. The Arden burst into full power; I unhooked the plug and launched. Our model went up and up. By the time the Arden quit, the airplane was a mere dot in the sky.
“With no wind aloft it stayed above us and would probably land nearby — or so we hoped. Sure enough, the airplane appeared to become larger as it glided downward.
“Then it happened. Apparently the sun shining on the softball field had generated a thermal strong enough to carry the model back upstairs where it soon became a tiny dot again. Though hard to believe, this same sequence repeated itself several more times throughout the morning. And afternoon!
“Gordy drove home, made us some lunch, brought it back, and as we ate the model kept flying. By midafternoon a gentle breeze arose and the model began moving south. Around 3 p.m. we piled into his ’41 Ford convertible and headed out after it.
“By 5 p.m. the model was over the downtown district and out of thermal action since it began descending steadily. We followed its path in the car, our continual upward staring attracting attention from people emerging from offices and stores. Based on remarks I heard, it seemed that some spectators thought it was a ‘real’ airplane coming down over the city.
“Around 5:15 the flight ended with a head-on impact near the top floor of a downtown business college. Our model tumbled into an alley. I retrieved the broken pieces, tossed them into the back of Gordy’s car, and we got out of there as inconspicuously as possible.
“The model never flew again. I hadn’t the nerve to try putting it back together. That one epic flight was quite enough!”
And that’s quite enough here too since I’m approaching my word limit. I’ll be back in two months.
MA
Transcribed from original scans by AI. Minor OCR errors may remain.
