The Builder Chapter 5

Airplanes again


I think I mentioned airplanes in the second post of this series but this post will be about a few more airplanes that were prominent in our life in the 50’s. As I said, my dad was a prolific modeler and sometime in the early 50’s he got into flying control line airplanes. We had two acres and the back half or more was mostly open. We mowed a circle of about 140 foot diameter and that was where we flew. Mostly dad and I did the building and flying, I don’t remember my brother getting into it much. These planes used a glow plug engine and flew in a circle with 60 foot control lines that allowed the pilot to control up and down as the plane flew. The rudder was installed in such a way as to drive the airplane to the outside of the circle and keep tension on the control wires. Dad built many airplanes and flew them all on Sunday afternoons and occasionally at other times if someone wanted to see them. I remember 2 particular models that he built that were twins. He built them from scratch using plans from a magazine and he labored on them for months. Parts were cut from balsa wood and glued together and the plane was covered with a silkspan paper and then painted with airplane “Dope”. This was a special paint that would resist the alcohol, nitro and castor oil fuel mixture used in the engines.

These planes were finally finished and were perfect. Dad invited some folks to watch the maiden flight. My job was to mow the flying circle and viewing area. I did that and on Sunday afternoon all was ready. The engine was started, the controls were checked and all was ready. As the plane started the takeoff roll it encountered a weed about a foot high that I had missed in my mowing. The control wires caught on the weed and the aircraft swung around and headed straight for the pilot, who was Dad. Of course with no tension on the control wires, there was no control so the airplane was pretty much in free flight. Dad stayed out of the way but soon it began to climb and then from an altitude less than 50 feet it dove for the ground on the other side of the circle. I don’t know how fast it was going when it hit but it was totally destroyed. There was not much to identify the pile of balsa as an airplane. Dad was a bit upset to say the least and I was well scolded for leaving one weed in the circle.

We did remove the weed and were able to successfully fly the twin airplane and in fact it lasted several years and endured several crashes that were more violent than the first plane had encountered. I think I finally did it in by running into an asphalt parking lot at a fairly steep angle.

These were memorable times spent with dad around the model building table and learning to fly them. Dad flew these airplanes for only a few years but I kept at it and even owned a hobby shop for a while in Austin Texas.

There are a few more of these stories and I will get to them as time goes by. Thanks for reading.