Ya know, Shultzie, I may build an Avenger just to spite you.
LL~WOW~! Randy, Randy....RANDY! Waaay to razzz-n-jazz!
As anyone can tell from looking carefully at my Avenger plan....just how much I was and still am today a dedicated and died in the balsa dust, BOB GIALDINI ADVOCATE!
From the get go time I first read the beautifully written, and illustrated Olympic article of Bob's in that old AAM issue.
I CAN ASSURE YOU that article to this old Smotzie....was the ALPA-N'-OMEGA..STUNT ARTICLE OF BIBLICAL PURPORTIONS. Talk about instant SALVATION!
One photograph in a magazine showing Bob holding his amazing STING RAY above his head...and next to him was Russia's king of stunt...holding his famous "Spacehound" above his head.
At that very instant.....I KNEW THAT I HAD TO BUILD A STING RAY for the 1967 season.
How innocent and nieve' to believe that I had the skills to tackle such a project.
After calling AAM and AMA I was gave me his address and phone number. My long distance telephone bill was proof enough for Bob Gialdini to consider me (by todays standards) a rabid STUNT-STALKER!
During the process of building that first Sting Ray...I would bet I called him at least a half dozen times with all kinds of seemingly foolish questions.
He was my gurrruuuuu of stunt and believe me...when I say I took that phone and went to his mountain top many, many times.
In the air...the Sting Ray will always remain my favorite model....
rock steady on the lines and its ability to cut through dirty wind turbulance or dead air vortex on multi-loops etc without excessive rock-n-rollin on the lines.
The Ray had very little light line pull...no rudder offset except for an airfoiled vert. tail but still held out there through even the lowest and highest wind situations.
Best of all....although a really clean slippery looking model (perhaps due to the rather tight restriction on both the Merco and later on my OS 35 engines, an effective muffler pressure & a good tank design???)
I didn't have to place and position my loops too far into the wind to keep the wind from winding up model speed.
The only downside of my Sting Rays...was the trike gear & inward swept wind gear location, plus the nose gear position was quite far aft.
If you looked at the SMALL FOOTPRINT on the ground of this model...you will see that all three gears are placed noticably close together...(which perhaps enhances that great in the air flying performance but SUDDENLY NOW takes a new skill in learning how to take-off and land this trike platform with precision.
Bob mentioned that the Sting Ray should always be landed at considerable higher speeds, while the wing still has some stabilizing factors.
(Often trike gears...telegraph to the flyer and the judges EXACTLY when ground contact is made with that tell-tale wibble-wobble C.G. shift thang')
But on the Sting Ray......nothing is as beautiful to behold and watch as
that smoooooooooooooooth transision of the Sting Ray desends from the air to the ground.
Also if done correctly, is just one constant smoooooooth touchdown without even the slightest wiggle...as that small landing gear footprint and the radical inward tapered main landing gear wires , do their thing by absorbing any landing shock with that soft spring action.
BUT MISS TIME THE TOUCHDOWN...LOOOOOOK OUT!!!
BOTTOM LINE:
On my Avenger...I wanted a gear that I could fly off grass, gravel or tarmac.
The Sting Ray must have been designed and made for smoooth tarmac flying only...GRASS FIELDS WERE ALWAYS A NIGHTMARE.
Missing the wind..on landing and then trying to land that StingRay with too little airspeed...again proved often another nightmare. That inward sweep and soft springy gear would flex and rebound...causing one wing and then the other to dipity-doo back and forth until the model stopped rolling. Funnier yet..was to see my StingRays...sitting in the flight line up during contests in sizable wind. While all the models in the line up were just sitting there, still as a rock. But in contrast, that Sting Ray of mine...looked like it was litterally ALIVE...as it sat there on the tarmac...doing a little wiggleee-rock and roll thing with even the teeniest puff on wind on that tail. In the end...proving that who ever chooses to build the Sting Ray with that trike gear design, must grasp the ART OF LANDINGS AND TAKEOFFS...all over again.
However Bob Gialdini helped me improve the landing gear on my second Sting Ray. I simply slipped some tubing over the main landing gear wire before bending. This improved the stiffness and reduced the wobbleeees'
Randy and gang...Sorry for the rant tanget about trike gears! They do have their advantages and downsides. The choice seem clear as mud at times?
RANDY! THANKS! for the razz...
but after looking at that beautiful pencil sketch of your new design...THAT MODEL YOU SKETCHED IS PURE AND SIMPLE...GREAT STUNTMODEL SKYART.
Hummmm? Just for spite....I wonder if I could return the spite and build it before you do.
However...
Knowing your amazing ability to build almost as fast as SPARKY!!! THAT COULD NEVER HAPPEN TO THIS OLD TOOT IN A MILLION YEARS!
Topic: Hey RANDY POWELL..I found my photo of Lew McFarlands Akro? (Read 1546 times)