94 MODEL AVIATION
THE “WORLD’S SMALLEST” Air
Show is held each year on Memorial Day
weekend at Brian Ranch Airport in Llano,
California. This event typically features
ultralights, sport aircraft, general aviation
flying, static displays, model exhibits, and
children’s activities.
I love airshows—especially when they
feature models alongside the full-scale
aircraft. The Brian Ranch Aero Modelers
club was involved in the “World’s
Smallest” Air Show this year, so I drove
out to the Palmdale, California, desert to
see it. Fate intervened.
The airfield is located near Edwards Air
Force Base, in an area known for
inhospitable weather conditions. On this
particular spring day, it was cold, with an
icy wind that blew dust across the airstrip.
Dave Gee | Safety Comes First [email protected]
Ultralights and desert wind don’t mix
my wife, Sweet Diedra. She held up well
considering that she had been rousted from
a warm bed to visit a freezing, dusty,
windy airfield with no airplanes. I owed
her for this one.
At the model aircraft display, I met
Stanley “Stan” Garren and Wes Parmeter.
They told me how their club reclaimed an
overgrown taxiway and use it as a runway
for their models. When the wind dies
down, the RC pilots fly gas- and electricpowered
fixed-wing airplanes and a lone
helicopter. The airplane in the picture is a
RichModels Yak 54 with a DA-50 engine.
The swirling, freezing sandstorm
outside didn’t faze these tough pilots. The
RC pilots were happy to host a genuine
Academy of Model Aeronautics (AMA)
ambassador, although I’m not sure how
Also included in this column:
• Desert modelers meet lousy weather
and Dave
• Invisible fire extinguisher
• Good things come in small tubes
• Fail-safe feature as an arming switch
• An aircraft-identification quiz
A lone Piper Tomahawk shivered on the
ramp, thus qualifying the event as an air
show.
Later, a Cessna made a short landing
rollout into the biting wind, with the
show’s skydiver aboard. His performance
consisted of stepping from the aircraft
door to the ground, grateful to have made
it under the circumstances. He wisely kept
his parachute furled.
Ultralights are to general aviation what
indoor models are to our hobby; if the
weather is harsh, they stay in their boxes. I
had hoped to take a ride in a two-seater,
but weather conditions dictated otherwise.
In a chilly hangar, determined
volunteers clung to their windblown tables
and greeted the crowd of attendees—
which consisted of me, my son, Jeff, and
Stanley “Stan” Garren and Wes Parmeter of the Brian Ranch Aero
Modelers club braved inclement weather to promote aeromodeling
at the “World’s Smallest” Air Show.
Karl Gies helped a group of middle school students build and fly
Denny Darts. Gies photo.
Identification quiz! Identify the craft
shown here and get a digital copy of
a rare model airplane plan. See text.
09sig3.QXD_00MSTRPG.QXD 7/22/11 10:55 AM Page 94
September 2011 95
the AMA would feel about me
representing an otherwise respectable
organization.
It is fun to be recognized, but the CD
always has some excuse for why I can’t fly
at each event. Once, it was “because there
are women and children present,” which
was unfair since my reputation as a bad
pilot is based on nothing more than
rumors, eyewitnesses, and debris patterns.
Anyway, the Brian Ranch Aero
Modelers club leaders described how their
models share the runways and airspace
with full-scale ultralight and general
aviation operations.
They said the sport pilots could not be
nicer or more cooperative, and that “see
and avoid” works great at their field. The
modelers always fly with a spotter, and
suspend their model operations for
ultralight events and group flying.
It was great to hear about such
cooperation between branches of aviation.
Our airspace is getting more crowded
every year. These pilots are supporting the
AMA’s lobbying efforts in Washington by
showing how various types of recreational
aircraft can share the air safely.
While I was busy talking, Sweet Diedra
entered my name in the raffle. A few days
later, I got a nice prize in the mail. The
odds were in my favor, since there likely
were no other tickets in the jar.
Mark Crabtree sent me a link to a video
that was both funny and sad. Mark is a
firefighter/paramedic and he says the video
shows why he has job security. In the
video, an RC jet model catches fire in the
pit area of a flying field. Nobody panics,
but the fire-fighting efforts include
covering the model with a blanket (which
soon caught fire) and pouring beverages
on the flames. As the model burns up, the
camera pans across to an unused fire
extinguisher a few feet away. Oops!
I call this the “Invisible Fire
Extinguisher Syndrome.” We get so used
to seeing the familiar red bottle on the wall
that we forget about it when the need
arises. At my workplace there are three
dozen of these things, but in a safety
meeting game my coworkers and I
couldn’t name more than five locations,
other than the ones in the room we were
in.
I try to remind my family of the
locations of fire extinguishers in our home.
There is one in nearly every room, and we
go over the locations as part of our (oh,
not again Dad!) emergency-preparedness
meetings.
Mark’s video showed a costly model
airplane being destroyed by fire. I
recommend spending $20 on a fire
extinguisher and putting the fire out
yourself—if you can remember that you
have an extinguisher.
For a safety columnist, I sure use many
pictures of kids with airplanes. The photo
with this column is courtesy of my friend,
Karl Gies. He helped some middle school
students build and fly their first models.
The airplanes are Mark II Denny Darts,
part of a series developed from the classic
Delta Dart by Neil “Wombat” Dennis.
Karl said, “This group of kids ran from
the sixth grade to the eighth grade. The
high time was right at 50 seconds. I
brought a lot of extra wings, fuselages,
etc., to replace ones that got broken. They
had so much fun, that we almost had to
drag three or four youngsters out of the
gym. All of the kids in the picture got their
models to fly well.”
Modelers such as Karl give our hobby a
big boost by working with new recruits.
Many modelers never have the chance to
be mentored by someone with so much
experience. The knowledge passed along
can include the importance of safety, such
as correct tool use and proper respect for
airscrews.
I especially liked hearing that Karl
taught the kids how to repair their models
instead of just discarding them. The “tossit-
and-buy-another” mindset bothers me on
several levels. Besides the environmental
angle (foam doesn’t grow on trees, ya
know), I think life should not be
approached that way. A bit of perseverance
and sticking-to-it can be a good thing.
Sticking to it is what Gorilla Glue does
best. The company introduced a new line
of CA superglues for modeling use, and
generously provided some to my club for
09sig3.QXD_00MSTRPG.QXD 7/22/11 10:56 AM Page 95
96 MODEL AVIATION
Virtual Editorial Board
Visitors at a 1906 County Fair were o ered a handsome cash prize if they could correctly guess the weight of a prized
ox. Eager to win, more than 800 guesses were submitted, but no one accurately guessed the true weight. A statistician
later looked at all the written answers and discovered that the average was only one pound less than the actual weight of
the ox! e take-away, sometimes a crowd can help yield the best results even if not formally working together.
As digital and social media evolve, this form of
surveying has become known as crowdsourcing. e
New York Times, Starbucks, and Procter & Gamble all
use crowdsourcing. Even Iceland is making headlines by
forging its new constitution through crowdsourcing.
We, too, want to hear from you as we evaluate and
design Model Aviation. Visit ModelAviation.com’s version
of crowdsroucing through the Virtual Editorial Board.
Share your thoughts aboutwhat products to review, plansbuild
articles to write, and covers for future issues!
As the editorial sta designs the next issue, it will be
reviewing all comments throughout the production
process.
e questions will change throughout the development
process of the magazine, so check ModelAviation.com
o" en as we ask for your input. MA
www.modelaviation.com
our make-and-take projects at the AMA
Expo. I like their products very much, but I
was surprised at how particular a modeler
can be about glue choices. Some like
thinner and some like faster or slower cure
rates, etc.
The donated glue came in small tubes
that I found just right for inexperienced
builders. Using CA takes a bit of practice,
and a smaller container limits errors. I
thought that the viscosity of the samples
was just right.
Sweet Diedra supports my club’s efforts
at the Expo by helping dozens of kids build
their first models, but she said the small
glue tubes were annoying. “Just when I get
it flowing perfectly, it runs out and I have
to open another one!” she said.
Never fear, Gorilla sells its glue in
larger containers for those who like it to
flow “just right.”
Dave Buxton wrote in with his thoughts
on my recent mention of RC pilots who
turn their transmitters off and use their failsafe
feature as an arming switch. Dave
wrote:
“I can offer some examples of why it is
a very bad idea to get in the habit of having
the receiver on with the transmitter off.
“Let’s say that an experienced pilot is
asked to test-fly someone’s new plane.
After landing, he switches off the
transmitter as he usually does. But what if
his friend’s radio is one of the old 72 MHz
systems? When he turns off the transmitter,
the airplane goes to full power! Or his
friend’s system is 2.4 but the fail-safe
system was not set correctly, which is not
unusual. Again, the result could be
uncontrolled full throttle. In my opinion,
having the receiver on with the transmitter
off is a very bad idea.”
I agree with Dave on this one. After
consulting many skilled pilots, I just don’t
feel comfortable with depending on an
electronic device this way. For those who
try it, I recommend having a good hold on
the fuselage when you turn off the radio.
I have always enjoyed aircraft-recognition
quizzes that old magazines used to run.
They would publish a cropped photo of an
airplane, and readers had to guess which
airplane it was by some distinctive feature.
I recently created such a quiz for my
club newsletter, using photos that I took at
the spectacular National Museum of the
United States Air Force, which is located
at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, near
Dayton, Ohio. I thought it was a cinch, but
nobody got the correct answers, despite my
offer of a package of genuine emu jerky to
the winner!
Anyway, since I don’t know when I’m
beat, I’m sharing a photo from that quiz.
Send me an email with the aircraft’s name,
and I will send you a digital scan of a rare
and precious model plan designed by the
late Len Marlow.
The Super Flea is a 24-inch span, twintailed,
rise-off-ground rubber-powered
airplane kitted by Len in the 1970s. I
searched for this plan for many years, but
you don’t need to wait that long; just tell
me what the photo shows.
If you can’t figure it out, but ask nicely,
you’ll get the plan anyway. This is via
email only. No printed copies are
available. MA
Sources:
Denny Dart
www.endlesslift.com/tag/denny-dart
Gorilla Glue
(800) 966-3458
www.gorillaglue.com
National Museum of the United States Air
Force
(937) 255-3286
www.nationalmuseum.af.mil
09sig3.QXD_00MSTRPG.QXD 7/22/11 10:56 AM Page 96
Edition: Model Aviation - 2011/09
Page Numbers: 94,95,96
Edition: Model Aviation - 2011/09
Page Numbers: 94,95,96
94 MODEL AVIATION
THE “WORLD’S SMALLEST” Air
Show is held each year on Memorial Day
weekend at Brian Ranch Airport in Llano,
California. This event typically features
ultralights, sport aircraft, general aviation
flying, static displays, model exhibits, and
children’s activities.
I love airshows—especially when they
feature models alongside the full-scale
aircraft. The Brian Ranch Aero Modelers
club was involved in the “World’s
Smallest” Air Show this year, so I drove
out to the Palmdale, California, desert to
see it. Fate intervened.
The airfield is located near Edwards Air
Force Base, in an area known for
inhospitable weather conditions. On this
particular spring day, it was cold, with an
icy wind that blew dust across the airstrip.
Dave Gee | Safety Comes First [email protected]
Ultralights and desert wind don’t mix
my wife, Sweet Diedra. She held up well
considering that she had been rousted from
a warm bed to visit a freezing, dusty,
windy airfield with no airplanes. I owed
her for this one.
At the model aircraft display, I met
Stanley “Stan” Garren and Wes Parmeter.
They told me how their club reclaimed an
overgrown taxiway and use it as a runway
for their models. When the wind dies
down, the RC pilots fly gas- and electricpowered
fixed-wing airplanes and a lone
helicopter. The airplane in the picture is a
RichModels Yak 54 with a DA-50 engine.
The swirling, freezing sandstorm
outside didn’t faze these tough pilots. The
RC pilots were happy to host a genuine
Academy of Model Aeronautics (AMA)
ambassador, although I’m not sure how
Also included in this column:
• Desert modelers meet lousy weather
and Dave
• Invisible fire extinguisher
• Good things come in small tubes
• Fail-safe feature as an arming switch
• An aircraft-identification quiz
A lone Piper Tomahawk shivered on the
ramp, thus qualifying the event as an air
show.
Later, a Cessna made a short landing
rollout into the biting wind, with the
show’s skydiver aboard. His performance
consisted of stepping from the aircraft
door to the ground, grateful to have made
it under the circumstances. He wisely kept
his parachute furled.
Ultralights are to general aviation what
indoor models are to our hobby; if the
weather is harsh, they stay in their boxes. I
had hoped to take a ride in a two-seater,
but weather conditions dictated otherwise.
In a chilly hangar, determined
volunteers clung to their windblown tables
and greeted the crowd of attendees—
which consisted of me, my son, Jeff, and
Stanley “Stan” Garren and Wes Parmeter of the Brian Ranch Aero
Modelers club braved inclement weather to promote aeromodeling
at the “World’s Smallest” Air Show.
Karl Gies helped a group of middle school students build and fly
Denny Darts. Gies photo.
Identification quiz! Identify the craft
shown here and get a digital copy of
a rare model airplane plan. See text.
09sig3.QXD_00MSTRPG.QXD 7/22/11 10:55 AM Page 94
September 2011 95
the AMA would feel about me
representing an otherwise respectable
organization.
It is fun to be recognized, but the CD
always has some excuse for why I can’t fly
at each event. Once, it was “because there
are women and children present,” which
was unfair since my reputation as a bad
pilot is based on nothing more than
rumors, eyewitnesses, and debris patterns.
Anyway, the Brian Ranch Aero
Modelers club leaders described how their
models share the runways and airspace
with full-scale ultralight and general
aviation operations.
They said the sport pilots could not be
nicer or more cooperative, and that “see
and avoid” works great at their field. The
modelers always fly with a spotter, and
suspend their model operations for
ultralight events and group flying.
It was great to hear about such
cooperation between branches of aviation.
Our airspace is getting more crowded
every year. These pilots are supporting the
AMA’s lobbying efforts in Washington by
showing how various types of recreational
aircraft can share the air safely.
While I was busy talking, Sweet Diedra
entered my name in the raffle. A few days
later, I got a nice prize in the mail. The
odds were in my favor, since there likely
were no other tickets in the jar.
Mark Crabtree sent me a link to a video
that was both funny and sad. Mark is a
firefighter/paramedic and he says the video
shows why he has job security. In the
video, an RC jet model catches fire in the
pit area of a flying field. Nobody panics,
but the fire-fighting efforts include
covering the model with a blanket (which
soon caught fire) and pouring beverages
on the flames. As the model burns up, the
camera pans across to an unused fire
extinguisher a few feet away. Oops!
I call this the “Invisible Fire
Extinguisher Syndrome.” We get so used
to seeing the familiar red bottle on the wall
that we forget about it when the need
arises. At my workplace there are three
dozen of these things, but in a safety
meeting game my coworkers and I
couldn’t name more than five locations,
other than the ones in the room we were
in.
I try to remind my family of the
locations of fire extinguishers in our home.
There is one in nearly every room, and we
go over the locations as part of our (oh,
not again Dad!) emergency-preparedness
meetings.
Mark’s video showed a costly model
airplane being destroyed by fire. I
recommend spending $20 on a fire
extinguisher and putting the fire out
yourself—if you can remember that you
have an extinguisher.
For a safety columnist, I sure use many
pictures of kids with airplanes. The photo
with this column is courtesy of my friend,
Karl Gies. He helped some middle school
students build and fly their first models.
The airplanes are Mark II Denny Darts,
part of a series developed from the classic
Delta Dart by Neil “Wombat” Dennis.
Karl said, “This group of kids ran from
the sixth grade to the eighth grade. The
high time was right at 50 seconds. I
brought a lot of extra wings, fuselages,
etc., to replace ones that got broken. They
had so much fun, that we almost had to
drag three or four youngsters out of the
gym. All of the kids in the picture got their
models to fly well.”
Modelers such as Karl give our hobby a
big boost by working with new recruits.
Many modelers never have the chance to
be mentored by someone with so much
experience. The knowledge passed along
can include the importance of safety, such
as correct tool use and proper respect for
airscrews.
I especially liked hearing that Karl
taught the kids how to repair their models
instead of just discarding them. The “tossit-
and-buy-another” mindset bothers me on
several levels. Besides the environmental
angle (foam doesn’t grow on trees, ya
know), I think life should not be
approached that way. A bit of perseverance
and sticking-to-it can be a good thing.
Sticking to it is what Gorilla Glue does
best. The company introduced a new line
of CA superglues for modeling use, and
generously provided some to my club for
09sig3.QXD_00MSTRPG.QXD 7/22/11 10:56 AM Page 95
96 MODEL AVIATION
Virtual Editorial Board
Visitors at a 1906 County Fair were o ered a handsome cash prize if they could correctly guess the weight of a prized
ox. Eager to win, more than 800 guesses were submitted, but no one accurately guessed the true weight. A statistician
later looked at all the written answers and discovered that the average was only one pound less than the actual weight of
the ox! e take-away, sometimes a crowd can help yield the best results even if not formally working together.
As digital and social media evolve, this form of
surveying has become known as crowdsourcing. e
New York Times, Starbucks, and Procter & Gamble all
use crowdsourcing. Even Iceland is making headlines by
forging its new constitution through crowdsourcing.
We, too, want to hear from you as we evaluate and
design Model Aviation. Visit ModelAviation.com’s version
of crowdsroucing through the Virtual Editorial Board.
Share your thoughts aboutwhat products to review, plansbuild
articles to write, and covers for future issues!
As the editorial sta designs the next issue, it will be
reviewing all comments throughout the production
process.
e questions will change throughout the development
process of the magazine, so check ModelAviation.com
o" en as we ask for your input. MA
www.modelaviation.com
our make-and-take projects at the AMA
Expo. I like their products very much, but I
was surprised at how particular a modeler
can be about glue choices. Some like
thinner and some like faster or slower cure
rates, etc.
The donated glue came in small tubes
that I found just right for inexperienced
builders. Using CA takes a bit of practice,
and a smaller container limits errors. I
thought that the viscosity of the samples
was just right.
Sweet Diedra supports my club’s efforts
at the Expo by helping dozens of kids build
their first models, but she said the small
glue tubes were annoying. “Just when I get
it flowing perfectly, it runs out and I have
to open another one!” she said.
Never fear, Gorilla sells its glue in
larger containers for those who like it to
flow “just right.”
Dave Buxton wrote in with his thoughts
on my recent mention of RC pilots who
turn their transmitters off and use their failsafe
feature as an arming switch. Dave
wrote:
“I can offer some examples of why it is
a very bad idea to get in the habit of having
the receiver on with the transmitter off.
“Let’s say that an experienced pilot is
asked to test-fly someone’s new plane.
After landing, he switches off the
transmitter as he usually does. But what if
his friend’s radio is one of the old 72 MHz
systems? When he turns off the transmitter,
the airplane goes to full power! Or his
friend’s system is 2.4 but the fail-safe
system was not set correctly, which is not
unusual. Again, the result could be
uncontrolled full throttle. In my opinion,
having the receiver on with the transmitter
off is a very bad idea.”
I agree with Dave on this one. After
consulting many skilled pilots, I just don’t
feel comfortable with depending on an
electronic device this way. For those who
try it, I recommend having a good hold on
the fuselage when you turn off the radio.
I have always enjoyed aircraft-recognition
quizzes that old magazines used to run.
They would publish a cropped photo of an
airplane, and readers had to guess which
airplane it was by some distinctive feature.
I recently created such a quiz for my
club newsletter, using photos that I took at
the spectacular National Museum of the
United States Air Force, which is located
at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, near
Dayton, Ohio. I thought it was a cinch, but
nobody got the correct answers, despite my
offer of a package of genuine emu jerky to
the winner!
Anyway, since I don’t know when I’m
beat, I’m sharing a photo from that quiz.
Send me an email with the aircraft’s name,
and I will send you a digital scan of a rare
and precious model plan designed by the
late Len Marlow.
The Super Flea is a 24-inch span, twintailed,
rise-off-ground rubber-powered
airplane kitted by Len in the 1970s. I
searched for this plan for many years, but
you don’t need to wait that long; just tell
me what the photo shows.
If you can’t figure it out, but ask nicely,
you’ll get the plan anyway. This is via
email only. No printed copies are
available. MA
Sources:
Denny Dart
www.endlesslift.com/tag/denny-dart
Gorilla Glue
(800) 966-3458
www.gorillaglue.com
National Museum of the United States Air
Force
(937) 255-3286
www.nationalmuseum.af.mil
09sig3.QXD_00MSTRPG.QXD 7/22/11 10:56 AM Page 96
Edition: Model Aviation - 2011/09
Page Numbers: 94,95,96
94 MODEL AVIATION
THE “WORLD’S SMALLEST” Air
Show is held each year on Memorial Day
weekend at Brian Ranch Airport in Llano,
California. This event typically features
ultralights, sport aircraft, general aviation
flying, static displays, model exhibits, and
children’s activities.
I love airshows—especially when they
feature models alongside the full-scale
aircraft. The Brian Ranch Aero Modelers
club was involved in the “World’s
Smallest” Air Show this year, so I drove
out to the Palmdale, California, desert to
see it. Fate intervened.
The airfield is located near Edwards Air
Force Base, in an area known for
inhospitable weather conditions. On this
particular spring day, it was cold, with an
icy wind that blew dust across the airstrip.
Dave Gee | Safety Comes First [email protected]
Ultralights and desert wind don’t mix
my wife, Sweet Diedra. She held up well
considering that she had been rousted from
a warm bed to visit a freezing, dusty,
windy airfield with no airplanes. I owed
her for this one.
At the model aircraft display, I met
Stanley “Stan” Garren and Wes Parmeter.
They told me how their club reclaimed an
overgrown taxiway and use it as a runway
for their models. When the wind dies
down, the RC pilots fly gas- and electricpowered
fixed-wing airplanes and a lone
helicopter. The airplane in the picture is a
RichModels Yak 54 with a DA-50 engine.
The swirling, freezing sandstorm
outside didn’t faze these tough pilots. The
RC pilots were happy to host a genuine
Academy of Model Aeronautics (AMA)
ambassador, although I’m not sure how
Also included in this column:
• Desert modelers meet lousy weather
and Dave
• Invisible fire extinguisher
• Good things come in small tubes
• Fail-safe feature as an arming switch
• An aircraft-identification quiz
A lone Piper Tomahawk shivered on the
ramp, thus qualifying the event as an air
show.
Later, a Cessna made a short landing
rollout into the biting wind, with the
show’s skydiver aboard. His performance
consisted of stepping from the aircraft
door to the ground, grateful to have made
it under the circumstances. He wisely kept
his parachute furled.
Ultralights are to general aviation what
indoor models are to our hobby; if the
weather is harsh, they stay in their boxes. I
had hoped to take a ride in a two-seater,
but weather conditions dictated otherwise.
In a chilly hangar, determined
volunteers clung to their windblown tables
and greeted the crowd of attendees—
which consisted of me, my son, Jeff, and
Stanley “Stan” Garren and Wes Parmeter of the Brian Ranch Aero
Modelers club braved inclement weather to promote aeromodeling
at the “World’s Smallest” Air Show.
Karl Gies helped a group of middle school students build and fly
Denny Darts. Gies photo.
Identification quiz! Identify the craft
shown here and get a digital copy of
a rare model airplane plan. See text.
09sig3.QXD_00MSTRPG.QXD 7/22/11 10:55 AM Page 94
September 2011 95
the AMA would feel about me
representing an otherwise respectable
organization.
It is fun to be recognized, but the CD
always has some excuse for why I can’t fly
at each event. Once, it was “because there
are women and children present,” which
was unfair since my reputation as a bad
pilot is based on nothing more than
rumors, eyewitnesses, and debris patterns.
Anyway, the Brian Ranch Aero
Modelers club leaders described how their
models share the runways and airspace
with full-scale ultralight and general
aviation operations.
They said the sport pilots could not be
nicer or more cooperative, and that “see
and avoid” works great at their field. The
modelers always fly with a spotter, and
suspend their model operations for
ultralight events and group flying.
It was great to hear about such
cooperation between branches of aviation.
Our airspace is getting more crowded
every year. These pilots are supporting the
AMA’s lobbying efforts in Washington by
showing how various types of recreational
aircraft can share the air safely.
While I was busy talking, Sweet Diedra
entered my name in the raffle. A few days
later, I got a nice prize in the mail. The
odds were in my favor, since there likely
were no other tickets in the jar.
Mark Crabtree sent me a link to a video
that was both funny and sad. Mark is a
firefighter/paramedic and he says the video
shows why he has job security. In the
video, an RC jet model catches fire in the
pit area of a flying field. Nobody panics,
but the fire-fighting efforts include
covering the model with a blanket (which
soon caught fire) and pouring beverages
on the flames. As the model burns up, the
camera pans across to an unused fire
extinguisher a few feet away. Oops!
I call this the “Invisible Fire
Extinguisher Syndrome.” We get so used
to seeing the familiar red bottle on the wall
that we forget about it when the need
arises. At my workplace there are three
dozen of these things, but in a safety
meeting game my coworkers and I
couldn’t name more than five locations,
other than the ones in the room we were
in.
I try to remind my family of the
locations of fire extinguishers in our home.
There is one in nearly every room, and we
go over the locations as part of our (oh,
not again Dad!) emergency-preparedness
meetings.
Mark’s video showed a costly model
airplane being destroyed by fire. I
recommend spending $20 on a fire
extinguisher and putting the fire out
yourself—if you can remember that you
have an extinguisher.
For a safety columnist, I sure use many
pictures of kids with airplanes. The photo
with this column is courtesy of my friend,
Karl Gies. He helped some middle school
students build and fly their first models.
The airplanes are Mark II Denny Darts,
part of a series developed from the classic
Delta Dart by Neil “Wombat” Dennis.
Karl said, “This group of kids ran from
the sixth grade to the eighth grade. The
high time was right at 50 seconds. I
brought a lot of extra wings, fuselages,
etc., to replace ones that got broken. They
had so much fun, that we almost had to
drag three or four youngsters out of the
gym. All of the kids in the picture got their
models to fly well.”
Modelers such as Karl give our hobby a
big boost by working with new recruits.
Many modelers never have the chance to
be mentored by someone with so much
experience. The knowledge passed along
can include the importance of safety, such
as correct tool use and proper respect for
airscrews.
I especially liked hearing that Karl
taught the kids how to repair their models
instead of just discarding them. The “tossit-
and-buy-another” mindset bothers me on
several levels. Besides the environmental
angle (foam doesn’t grow on trees, ya
know), I think life should not be
approached that way. A bit of perseverance
and sticking-to-it can be a good thing.
Sticking to it is what Gorilla Glue does
best. The company introduced a new line
of CA superglues for modeling use, and
generously provided some to my club for
09sig3.QXD_00MSTRPG.QXD 7/22/11 10:56 AM Page 95
96 MODEL AVIATION
Virtual Editorial Board
Visitors at a 1906 County Fair were o ered a handsome cash prize if they could correctly guess the weight of a prized
ox. Eager to win, more than 800 guesses were submitted, but no one accurately guessed the true weight. A statistician
later looked at all the written answers and discovered that the average was only one pound less than the actual weight of
the ox! e take-away, sometimes a crowd can help yield the best results even if not formally working together.
As digital and social media evolve, this form of
surveying has become known as crowdsourcing. e
New York Times, Starbucks, and Procter & Gamble all
use crowdsourcing. Even Iceland is making headlines by
forging its new constitution through crowdsourcing.
We, too, want to hear from you as we evaluate and
design Model Aviation. Visit ModelAviation.com’s version
of crowdsroucing through the Virtual Editorial Board.
Share your thoughts aboutwhat products to review, plansbuild
articles to write, and covers for future issues!
As the editorial sta designs the next issue, it will be
reviewing all comments throughout the production
process.
e questions will change throughout the development
process of the magazine, so check ModelAviation.com
o" en as we ask for your input. MA
www.modelaviation.com
our make-and-take projects at the AMA
Expo. I like their products very much, but I
was surprised at how particular a modeler
can be about glue choices. Some like
thinner and some like faster or slower cure
rates, etc.
The donated glue came in small tubes
that I found just right for inexperienced
builders. Using CA takes a bit of practice,
and a smaller container limits errors. I
thought that the viscosity of the samples
was just right.
Sweet Diedra supports my club’s efforts
at the Expo by helping dozens of kids build
their first models, but she said the small
glue tubes were annoying. “Just when I get
it flowing perfectly, it runs out and I have
to open another one!” she said.
Never fear, Gorilla sells its glue in
larger containers for those who like it to
flow “just right.”
Dave Buxton wrote in with his thoughts
on my recent mention of RC pilots who
turn their transmitters off and use their failsafe
feature as an arming switch. Dave
wrote:
“I can offer some examples of why it is
a very bad idea to get in the habit of having
the receiver on with the transmitter off.
“Let’s say that an experienced pilot is
asked to test-fly someone’s new plane.
After landing, he switches off the
transmitter as he usually does. But what if
his friend’s radio is one of the old 72 MHz
systems? When he turns off the transmitter,
the airplane goes to full power! Or his
friend’s system is 2.4 but the fail-safe
system was not set correctly, which is not
unusual. Again, the result could be
uncontrolled full throttle. In my opinion,
having the receiver on with the transmitter
off is a very bad idea.”
I agree with Dave on this one. After
consulting many skilled pilots, I just don’t
feel comfortable with depending on an
electronic device this way. For those who
try it, I recommend having a good hold on
the fuselage when you turn off the radio.
I have always enjoyed aircraft-recognition
quizzes that old magazines used to run.
They would publish a cropped photo of an
airplane, and readers had to guess which
airplane it was by some distinctive feature.
I recently created such a quiz for my
club newsletter, using photos that I took at
the spectacular National Museum of the
United States Air Force, which is located
at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, near
Dayton, Ohio. I thought it was a cinch, but
nobody got the correct answers, despite my
offer of a package of genuine emu jerky to
the winner!
Anyway, since I don’t know when I’m
beat, I’m sharing a photo from that quiz.
Send me an email with the aircraft’s name,
and I will send you a digital scan of a rare
and precious model plan designed by the
late Len Marlow.
The Super Flea is a 24-inch span, twintailed,
rise-off-ground rubber-powered
airplane kitted by Len in the 1970s. I
searched for this plan for many years, but
you don’t need to wait that long; just tell
me what the photo shows.
If you can’t figure it out, but ask nicely,
you’ll get the plan anyway. This is via
email only. No printed copies are
available. MA
Sources:
Denny Dart
www.endlesslift.com/tag/denny-dart
Gorilla Glue
(800) 966-3458
www.gorillaglue.com
National Museum of the United States Air
Force
(937) 255-3286
www.nationalmuseum.af.mil
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