Here is an article I wrote for our local R/C club newsletter hoping to educate the newbies whose model airplane knowledge goes back to the start of the LiPo era.

   "In the good old days, free flight was the only game in town and the planes and engines were large. 8 foot wingspans with .60 size engines were the norm. The planes and engines had to be this big to carry all the extra weight of the engine's spark ignition system which included a coil, batteries, condenser and engine timer.

   Then around 1948 the world changed, Ray Arden invented the glow plug. This new innovation now allowed a much smaller engine design and manufacturers started competing with each other as to how small they could make a working engine. K&B Manufacturing in California was the first to market what we now call a 1/2 A engine. In fact, what they brought out was even smaller and this was the K&B Infant Torpedo with a displacement of only .020 cubic inches. Working capital was tight and the risk was high, but they decided to make a run of 10,000 “Infant Torpedo” engines. They announced the product after the first 3500 were assembled and one week later they had orders for "280,000 engines." They spent the next year feverishly trying to meet the demand for this engine and never did catch up. They also introduced a .035 and .049 engine that eventually became more popular than the tiny .020.

   I have always wanted one of these engines and a local friend came to the rescue. He still had one of two Infants he bought in about 1949 or '50 and offered to let me have it if I promised to build the plane that flew away with his other engine. I couldn't let that deal pass so I built the plane, a Berkeley kit design called the Profile Powerhouse (the blue and white one in the photos) which was specially designed for the Infant. In fact, all the major kit manufacturers jumped on the Infant band wagon.
   A couple of years ago, Ed Solenberger in California produced a number of reproduction kits of the Testor's Baby Zephyr and flogged them on Ebay. I bid on the last one he had but lost out; although he said that if he made any more, he would contact me. I forgot all about it when lo and behold he emailed me this last winter to say that he had made another run and would I like one; 39 bucks for a kit that originally sold for $0.95 in 1950, but hey, you only live once... send me one. This cute little ship (15" WS) (the green and yellow one in the photos) is painted just like the box art.
   The Zephyr is powered by a late Infant reproduction engine (manufactured by my friend in NY, Bob Langelius) of which I have two, for a total of three in all with my local friend's original. I have one more unused repro Infant but I have the plane for it, a Guillow's Pixi kit which I will soon build.
   Recently, I have been successful at Ebaying the Infant's big brother, the .049. I still have to find the K&B .035 and then I can have a family reunion party. "

Orv.