Santos Dumont Peanut
IT WAS ALMOST an Old World version of the Wright Flyer. While not quite a match for the pioneering achievements of the American brothers' famous plane, this zippy little European biplane with the long, exotic name achieved a few records of its own, back in the first years of this century. On September 13, 1907, the Santos-Dumont 14-bis became the first heavier-than-air machine to make an "official" flight under its own power on the European continent, albeit with a negligible distance of seven meters. The following month, on October 23, 1906, the spunky biplane covered 60 meters, winning the Archdeacon prize for a flight of over 25 meters. But the coup that earned renown for the 14-bis and its builder, Santos-Dumont, came with a series of flights on November 12 of that year-of which the longest, at 220 meters, captured the Aero Club of France 1,500-franc prize for the first flight of 100 meters.
AMA Nats: FF Power
ANY FREE FLIGHT CONTEST is dependent upon three components-quality contestants, adequate siting, and acceptable weather. A Nationals contest, in particular, depends on a healthy representation of each of those three elements. It is safe to say that at this year's Lincoln Nats the contestants were there, both in quality and quantity, as over 850 FF event entries were tabulated-302 of them in Power. The second component, adequate siting, deserves some expanded commentary, however. From conversations with numerous contestants, the mental image of the Nats FF site that brought them to Lincoln was not borne out by what they found. Situated some 17 miles west and south of Lincoln, near the village of Denton, the site was on high ground overlooking rolling hills to the north and east.
Scorpion 60
A BRIEF GLANCE at this year's AMA sanctioned contest calendar is sure to point out a definite trend that began a number of years ago-an increasing number of low-pressure competitive events generically thrown together under the heading of "fun-fly." From a pressure standpoint, fun-fly events are to Pattern con-
Champlin Fighter Museum
A chance to see the stuff that legends are made of doesn't come around all that often, especially when those legends are the deep rumbling, piston-powered flying machines. There's a museum in Arizona that will let you vicariously live with some of the greatest aviation combatants the world has ever known.
AMA Nats: FF Indoor
THE YEAR 1987 has proven to be an exceptional one for Indoor model flying. From the Johnson City experience under the 122-ft. minidome to the rebirth of true Nationals competition at Lincoln, 1987 has marked a renaissance of micro-gram models and those who fly them. Literally returning from the near-oblivion of Lake Charles, Indoor became the crown jewel of Free Flight at Lincoln. We witnessed a larger turnout, a better site, and more records set than at any time in recent history of the National Contest. Pershing Auditorium was a very user-friendly site this year. Although Indoor has been held within its confines on two previous occasions, this contest was marked by a noticeable absence of the large suspended scoreboard, a usual feature of the building. This lack of center obstruction gave fliers full access to the 49-ft.-plus arched ceiling and recessed lights. Hanging up on obstructions, a usual concern of Indoor fliers, was not a problem. As a consequence, ceiling scrubbing was commonplace.
