To one and all;
Skyray carrier came into being shortly after Sig came out with the kit. At their contest they started have racing, stunt, and combat event requiring the use of the Skyray. Myself along with the late Brett Smith and if memory serves me right Bill Calkins came up with the rules for Skyray carrier. le sWe wanted to keep the event simple, so we patterned them after the Denver 15 carrier rules that was gaining popularity at the time. We chose the 40 sized engines for two reasons, one because of the availability of inexpensive reliable 40s and there was a movement to try and allow 40s in profile because it was had to get a competitive 36. We put a 75mph high speed point value on the event to prevent requiring the use of a high dollar high horsepower engine. We later found out that that theory was wrong. We found that you trimmed the plane for low speed and put all the horsepower on the plane you could to make up for the leadouts being to the rear during highspeed.
I find the recently published rules which states that the plane must be a stock Skyray contradicts with the rule that says that the plane must resemble a Skyray. I have been using an enlarged stab and elevator on mine almost from the start.
My first Skyray carrier plane met its demise when controls bound up inside of the wing, and I insisted on flying it anyway. The second on (the current one I am flying) has the belcrank mounted on the bottom of the wing.
I tell anyone who is interested in building a Skyray for their first carrier ship to build the plane with a line slider and to use 36 sized engine. this way you can use the plane for both Profile and Skyray carrier for skyray you just leave the leadouts in the rearward postition.
Melvin