Awesome! Good one Steve. At times plane disposal does become a bit of a quandary. I've
given away plenty of planes; in flyable condition. And, I've also found many creative ways to
dispose of them:
Let's see here, how many murderous, torturous, dastardly
methods have Doug and I used to dispose of planes; let me
count the ways:
1. Burning: When I moved back to TX from Hawaii I brought with
me a not quite finished 40 size Moonwalker. I never got around to
finishing it. So, in the interest of FUN and due to needing space
Doug and I decided to light it on fire and see how far we could
fly it. The plane was bare wood with tape over the open bays.
We doused the plane in lighter fluid, started her up, and lit it.
Doug quickly launched the plane. It made half a lap before the stab
folded and it went smashing into the asphalt, where it proceeded
to burn in a pile of balsa and ply. It was truly funny.
2. Wingover into trash can: I must admit that we got the idea
from Phil Nickles, but we were the ones who actually tried it. This
is indeed a very difficult task to accomplish. At one time Doug had
a Sig Fazer (heavy and green) with an ST 46. This plane was stout.
We took it to the Gleason's annual Fish Fry and drug a big plastic
trash can out of Dale's garage. It had been raining the previous week
and the ground was saturated. Doug put that plane straight into the
ground 6, YES 6 times repeatedly burying it to the wing root trying
to hit that trash can. We'd just clean the motor out and try again.
NO luck. I had some foam wing job plane and destroyed it on the
first try; though not in the can. We took the nasty, green, heavy Sig Fazer back the next year and finally destroyed it. We also destroyed many other
planes in this fashion. Man, what FUN.
3. Pole flying: The North circle at Hobby Park has 4 poles around it for the
netting for jet flying. We had been talking for some time about
flying a plane into one of the poles. Well, once again needing space we
decided to give it a try. I brought out my Hughes H-1 (which I just
could never get to fly right) and Doug brought his giant fiberglass
profile thing. On the first try with the Hughes I began walking out of
the circle toward the pole with Brad and Doug lining me up (4S motor).
I began getting closer and closer until I hit the pole, but it was only
the outboard tip of the wing, which actually sheared off and the plane
kept flying. It may have even been flying better! I'm laughing my ass
off, but I'm still in the game. I make a few more laps to get lined up
again and nail the pole. The wing folded and the plane disintegrates. Good
stuff and Jake was loving it. Next up, Doug brings out the profile of
doom. This was a BIG plane. A profile with a Saito 72. After takeoff we
started getting Doug lined up, and he nails the pole on the first try, just
missing the engine and hitting the pole with the cheek cowl. The motor
acutally went flying off and was still running when it hit the ground
about 25 or so feet away. Once again laughter was heard and fun
was had by all. Heathens!
4. Knife edge biplane with super outboard wing: What is this you ask?
I once built a Sig Ultimate Bipe fun fly profile RC plane converted to
CL. This plane was a blast to fly. But, it outlived it's usefulness, and
in this cruel world that means only one thing: death at the flying circle!
What I decided to do was take the top wing off (the wings screwed onto
cabane struts) and mount it to the cabane strut mount sticking out of
the bottom outboard wing. I now had a plane with a 21" inboard span
and an approx. 36" outboard span. Truly funny. Doug launched for me
and the plane immediately went into a knife edge. I'm serious, a total
RC style knife edge. The plane would fly like this, but naturally would
start to come in on me. My first reaction was to give it up; BIG mistake
as the elevator is now causing the plane to fly in on me even more. So, I
give it down and it starts to go back out. Back and forth, back and forth
I went. Of course, I am once again laughing my ass off and can barely
stand up. After 5 dizzying laps of this laughing and flying I finally piled
it in and fell to the ground laughing. It was truly spectacular. Our buddy
John Grigsby witnessed this spectacle, and to this day none of his
RC buddies believe his CL knife-edge flying story. Once again, good
fun was the order of the day.
No wonder we're known as the Beavis & Butt-Head of stunt.
Please notice that in every instance we had FUN. Fun is why we started
doing all this in the first place. If you can't see the simple, good-natured fun
in all of this, well.....come on.
Later, Steve
Topic: Getting rid of a crashed plane (Read 3336 times)
