A friend passed along a hanger queen Smoothie to me and I'm going to have to replace the hinges, covering etc.  My question is did they make more than one version of the Smoothie ?  I've seen some with an upright engine, my is inverted.
thanks
Brian

Ty,

The "planes" look great..........

Hope you're feeling better.

Jim

There is loads of information about the history and various versions of the Smoothie. Check the archives here and on Stuka Stunt. The quick answer is that it can be built with upright engine or inverted cowled engine. I have built a Brodak kit Smoothie and currently fly an ARF Smoothie. Both are excellent flyers. I also have an unbuilt Dumas (same as Veco) kit from the 1950s that is a very different airplane, especially in the odd pointy airfoil. The Dumas/Veco plans show three versions of engine mounting, including an inverted mounting that removes through a hatch in the top of the nose. That one didn't catch on, apparently. The Brodak Smoothie reportedly flys much better than the Veco/Dumas version.

I fly an electric powered version of the Brodak Smoothie arc. At the Signal Seekers Stunt Contest (Michigan) in August I was comparing mine with a Veco inverted engine kit Smoothie. As the pic in the last post shows, the fuselage is considerably wider than the one on the current Brodak version.

bob branch

Hi Pete & Clint:

How can there be an "argument?" First off, Pete's Smoothie is the prettiest seen anywhere. Second, the photo on the cover of the Veco kit shows a cowled, inverted engine, while the plans show three varieties (though calling the paper that comes with the kit "plans" is very questionable; "guidelines" at best). Most early pictures in the 1952 period show Palmer with the inverted engine version.

The comment about width sent me to the garage with a caliper. The Veco/Dumas fuse is 2 5/8 at the widest part; the ARF Brodak fuse is 2 3/8. I sold the kit Smoothie so I could not measure that one, but the ARF may be a little narrower as it takes a special tank.

As far as the differences between the Veco and "Original Smoothie" certified by Bob Palmer, they are really different airplanes. The Veco is 51" span and 501 inches, while the Brodak is 52" and 540 area. Length is different, tail section is different. And rather famously the airfoil is wildly different, almost a supercritical airfoil on the Veco kit. Palmer worked for Lockheed in the early 50s as a model maker and was familiar with the supercritical airfoil. The story is that Palmer used the rear high point airfoil on the first Smoothie, but found it flew badly and he abandoned it. The familiar normal airfoil was used in all succeeding Smoothies and then the T-Bird. Veco perversely kitted the first version, over Palmer's objections apparently.

Pete, have you got that ceramic gila monster yet? I was in Half Moon Bay today and walked by the Cunha store, a local legend. Told my daughter, "I know somebody named Pete Cunha!"

Mike, don't worry. It's only a friendly "argument" anyway. It's just that the first Smoothie I was familiar with was my dads built in about '63 from a Veco kit and had the engine upright. Or as I like to say, "mounted correctly".

You know, I made some of those but never did put them on....my bad!  

Mike, wow, them's some words, but I think Rocky is the banded type. I'll post a pic along with my latest project if I can get my digital camera to work, in the meantime I think I had better make another set of exhaust stacks. 

Since we all have a love for this curvaceous design and its history, I pulled out a biography of Bob Palmer by Steve Sobel (an L.A. modeler I met at the 2007 Palmer meet in England). He recites that the first Smoothie had the odd airfoil, which Palmer had discussed with a designer at Lockheed. This was 1952. It did not fly well, as we could have predicted with another 57 years of hindsight, and Palmer redesigned it with a conventional airfoil. According to Steve (who I believe had access to Bob Palmer for the story) Palmer argued with Veco but over his objections they went forward with the weird airfoiled smaller prototype rather than the better flying successors. (I don't know what the 1952 magazine published but that would be interesting to see.) Palmer took second at the 1952 Nats with the redesigned larger version, missing first place by only a third of a point! Thus, the Veco version is not a winner in Palmers hands, but the one Brodak (and Palmer) call the "original Smoothie" is a winner, even though it plainly is not the "original" version. The article has a 1952 photo of Palmer holding an inverted, cowled Smoothie that looks like a photo negative of Pete's (the Palmer is mostly dark with light trim). By 1953 Palmer was working on the Thunderbird and development of the Smoothie stopped, or more accurately continued as the T-Bird. If anybody wants a copy of Steve's article send me a pm.

Just to add my own comments regarding Bob and his Smoothie.

When I was asked to draw the plans to be used for the Brodak version, I was put in touch with Bob via mail and phone. We spent a lot of time talking about the design, and it's variations. He relayed to me his reservations over the Veco and the M.A.N. versions.

He told me that he got the airfoil from asking the Lockeed engineers what, "in their opinion", was a good airfoil for windy weather. The showed him the airfoil they were using for the Hercules horizontal stab, and assured him that it was a good airfoil for turbulence.

He built the first Smoothie using that airfoil, and in normal weather he felt it was lacking in some of the areas we need, like cornering. He did say it flew fairly well in the wind though.

Since he wanted a better flying design for normal weather, he built his second one using the standard 4 diget NACA airfoil. Now, he had a plane that flew in most conditions the way he wanted it to.

He told me that he had finished them with identical trim schemes, and would go to a contest with both of them in his trunk. If it was windy, he would fly the first one, but that he most often flew the second version.

He wanted the second version as the one to be kitted, and published, but as he was traveling at the time, Henery at Veco submitted the first version to be published and kitted. He was pretty upset about that, and you could tell that even in later years, it upset him.

So I could have as accurate as possible information to use for drawing the kit plans, Bob sent me the original drawings, on "Butcher" paper for his preferred version.

I returned the originals to him after I finished the plans, but not before I made a copy for my records. The kit sold by Brodak is as accurate as I could make it to the original.

I did do a modification a year ago, that showed the changes needed to make the Brodak version into an inverted engine version. It's a jpeg and is down loadable from my web site. www.cadclassics.net   

Santa's little Elf, Mailman, just delivered a new Dumas Smoothie kit. Pic is one I built about 1975. Anyway, My old one flew good as best as I can remember, and am flying a Brodak ARF right now that is great. My question is about the airfoil. Should I use the ribs as they come in the kit, or try to shift the high point back by cutting new set of ribs? Other pic is arf Smoothie and RSM Ringmaster if they go thru. Being a C/L retread I am enjoying C/L much more than when I was younger.
Thanks for your opinions in advance.

DAVE
AMA 39847
BPA 6X

Hello Dave

You may want to consider hanging onto that Dumas kit as a collectable. If, on the other hand, you decide to build it, it should be built IMNHO as it was kitted.

Changing the airfoil on the kit model could be done, and Brodak will sell you a wing kit for the Original Smoothie, but there were a few other changes in moments that you might not want to over look.

If I was to be wanting to build a Smoothie, I'd start with the Brodak kit myself.