With the antics of Shug Emery and Dan Banjock the rest of the stroy must be told.
As promised, here is a little history, as I know it, of the “Bi-Slob” development.
The first “Slob” was actually the “Big Slob”. This airplane had a nose similar to the what we see on the Bi-Slob, but it was larger, a high wing airplane with lots of wing asymmetry . This is in the picture is of John Kelly, my son Craig and Me, taken at a Garden State Circle Burner meeting. John flew with Ron Pavloer and Artie Meyers, and has helped me with some of the history.
Ron moved away from New York and many years later I visited a hobby shop in Orlando, Fl. The shop owner talked about someone flying this crazy biplane demo in the parking lot when he opened his business. This had to be Ron! I asked if I could get in touch with Ron. He immediately picked up the phone and I talked to Jim Mitchel. Jim was able to give me contact info on Ronnie, who was living in Daytona.
When I called Ron, I asked him if he had “Bi-Slob” plans and he told me that he only had rough sketches. I told him that I would like to build a “Bi-Slob” and that would ink the drawings for him. . Ron used corrugated cardboard for his fuselage, but we decided to show balsa on the drawing.
As a result I built two Bi-Slobs for my son Craig and me. These are pictured with me and Craig at the GSCB flying field.
We flew the Slobs after a GSCB contest and Dan Banjock saw them and wanted to build one too. Later on, Dan and I flew double “Bi-Slobs” performing tight maneuvers and the sabre dance in very close formation. We had a ball and as we all know, Dan became addicted to his “Bi-Slob”.
Ron Pavloer also built the “Stagger-Bi”. This had the top wing moved aft 1” and the Bottom wing moved forward 1”. Ron said it did not fly as well as the” Bi-Slob”. I have included a picture of the “Stagger-Bi”.
Enter Bob Hunt!
At the time Bob was editor of Flying Models. He asked me to write an article about the “Bi-Slob”. I wrote the article (with Ron Pavloer’s permission) and less than two weeks later I drove to Bob’s home in Pennsylvania. We took the flight pictures that appeared in the article and one of them is still used in the FM plans directory. I’ll never forget that day because it was very windy and the temperature was about 18F. It took a half hour to get feeling back into my fingers.
Things happened very fast. The magazine was available two weeks later! Bob later told me that the Bi-Slob plan was the best-selling plan that FM had up to that time.
Later the “Bi-Slob” was kitted. It is a shame that Ron was never paid royalties.
Topic: Bi-Slob History (Read 1935 times)
