QSAA '88 Fly-In
Last year it rained; this year it didn't. Instead of rain we had just the opposite: The winds blew up a genuine desert dust storm - two, in fact. Visibility dropped to less than a hundred yards. One huge gust tore the transmitter Impound shelter off its moorings and it went airborne! Undaunted, Contest Director Rex Perkins kept things moving when the weather did cooperate, and all in all it turned out to be a magnificent Giant Scale Fly-In! Altogether, the QSAA 1988 get-together was a prime example of just how to run such a show. In truth the winds held off on Friday, the 28th of October, until 3 p.m., and a lot of great flying preceded them. They showed up a bit earlier on Saturday at 12:30. Flying conditions were ideal on both days before things got murky, and the QSAA fliers and spectators took advantage of the higher than normal temperatures (85 degrees) for leisurely and fascinating aerial demonstrations.
Giant Scale at Toledo
WALKING INTO the Toledo Sports Arena when the Weak Signals RC Club is holding its annual RC Expo is just like coming downstairs on Christmas morning and seeing the tree all lit up. The colors, the lights, and, of course, the models-it's like every Christmas you've ever experienced. There's one major difference, however. Santa Claus stays around well after the arena is trimmed! He's there in the form of all the people you've read about in the model magazines-a pantheon of RC heroes and their manufacturing "helpers." Many of those Santas come to Toledo to display their new and current wares, answer your questions, and, if you're lucky, sell you the stuff that RC dreams are made of.
FlyWorm
LIKE SO MUCH else in aviation, the FlyWorm began with a dream. Surely one of the most improbable-looking aeronautical designs ever to escape the drawing board, this singular aircraft was the invention of Californian Paul Maiwurm. Maiwurm built his fantasy ship in 1928. Had he been alive to see it, Jules Verne would have loved it. It was watching the flight of a humming-bird in his San Diego garden that first set Maiwurm's imagination to work. The tiny avian, feathers flashing fire as it darted among the shrubbery, could drop to a hover in the flowers by keeping up a rapid beating (60-70 beats per second) of its wings.
The `U-ltimate Field Box
THE U-ltimate field box? It has to be-because "U" design and build it for yourself. Yeah, we know that there are a lot of field boxes that you can buy down at the friendly hobby shop. There are kits and field boxes already moulded from fiberglass available for the discerning purchaser. But, wait a minute! Are they right for you? Regardless of our modeling preferences, most of us model builders have different ideas of the bits and pieces we'll need with us at the flying field. Some of us take everything in our workshop that isn't bolted down! The field box includes enough in the way of tools and supplies to build a model, or to equip a modest hobby shop. Others of us take a can of fuel, a glow plug battery and a spare prop in our back pocket. The plywood carry-alls we load into our car trunks carry an infinite variety of "support equipment" ranging from the sublime to the ridiculous.
