CrossFiles I
think that club newsletters are the true backbone of our hobby. It used to be the local hobby shop where we gath- ered to “hangar talk” and compare kits
and plans while we bought a few sticks of balsa and some rubber. These local shops are mostly gone and, I for one, miss them a lot. Now, flying fields require a ½ hour car ride or more and indoor sites are also disap- pearing. Much of this is replaced by the club newsletter. The DC Maxecuters club is a prime ex-
ample of that genre. Published monthly, it carries pictures, stories, plans and news of local modeling. This month, unfortunately, there were no captions with the pictures but the one I chose clearly illustrates the mod- elers, their models and the “joy of modeling”. Scale freeflight modeling is a very de- manding aspect of modeling. Scale models must carefully follow the exact scale of the real aircraft with only prop size and tail feather dimensions allowed to change. Then, the model, without any pilot at the controls, must achieve a stable flight pat- tern and as much duration as the builder can manage. The unknown builder of the Bell Airaco-
bra (one of my favorite airplanes) is right- fully proud of his model. If you look closely, you can see that the stab has been mounted so it can be adjusted for better flight. Looks like the rudder is movable too. Now, the modeler will wind, launch and trust his pro- ject of maybe 80 hours to the gods of hung. He looks pretty confident to me. Another picture from a newsletter is Vic Nippert’s Albatros. Vic is certainly a mod-
PHOTO: DC MAXECUTERS
by don ross You can reach Don Rossat 817 Ames Hill Drive, Tewksbury, MA 01876, or via e-mail at
flywords@comcast.net
PHOTO: VIC NIPPERT
Most of us have seen Vic Nippert’s models fly at one meet or another. Here’s his Albatrosat a recent FAC meet, possibly at Barron Field in New York.
eler who deserves lots of recognition and re- spect. He builds and flies almost every type of freeflight model and competes success- fully with all of them. I have seen Vic win events ranging from Hand Launch Glider to Small and Large Rubber Stick to WWI and WWII Rubber Scale and more. With his wife as spotter and timer, Vic is a threat in any contest from Maine to Florida and a genuine nice guy who will stop to help any- one with a model search or a trimming problem. The next picture is an unusual one. It’s
the Hiller Commuter kit from Copter Con- cepts. As you may have read in several pre- vious columns, Ray Kierna has been devel-
oping a series of laser-cut helicopter kits for F/F. Ray has had several setbacks in his de- velopment process but now tells me he is ready to ship the Commuter kits. More un- usual kits are in Ray’s pipeline and I think they will prove to be a lot of fun and inter- esting at the field. Ray can be reached at: Copter Concepts,
21 West 215 Tee Lane, Apt C, Itasca, IL 60143,
flyguyandgal.1@netzero.com, 630- 891-2520. The Commuter dimensions are: 20-inch rotor diameter, 16-inch length and 10¹⁄₂-inch height. The rotors are preformed sheet balsa so you don’t have to mess with rotor pitch or placement. Jack Sarhage wrote me a while ago ask-
PHOTO: RAY KIERNA
The flyer and photograph are unknown but the happiness of the builder and quality of the Airacobraare obvious (at left). A new entry in the unusual model category is Copter Concept’s Hiller Commuter for rubber power (above). Ray Kierna plans a whole series of chopper kits laser cut with pre-formed rotor blades. Laser cutting has made such models as this possible.
50 FEBRUARY 2012
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