Glen Poole launches his big Taibi Powerhouse(above left) at his favorite test field in Illinois. This is a big airplane with a big motor. Steve Dona (above right)
ing different glues for different things. But I’m about persuaded by Hank Baer, down on Chesapeake Bay, to stick with Ambroid in the future. Hank spent his life in the boat building industry building wooden lap strake boats. He was spending time in his uncle’s boat shop when he was 6 years old. I’ve seen pictures of some of his fine joinery and the man knows how to stick wood to- gether and make it look nice.
Hank likes Ambroid. He applies it using a piece of ¼ square strip cut to a chisel point. He puts a small dab of glue on each end of a cross piece or wing rib—presses it in place, and then lifts it out. He lets the glue dry for 45 seconds or so, then applies another dab, and fits the piece in place. After a joint has dried, he may put a small fillet of Ambroid on the joint for additional strength. He says
is shown adjusting the needle valve on his Sal Taibi Hornet, powered by a Forster .99.
he even glues in maple motor mount beams this way. He’s had spark ignition powered Scrams and Playboys that have logged 300 flights without a structural failure, and then were hung up for display. While he doesn’t use epoxy on his model airplanes, he’s used it on boats. Hank says that if you’re going to use epoxy, don’t clamp the joint too tight. You need a film of epoxy between the two surfaces to get a full strength joint. I had a lot of material that has been sent to me that I’ll have to defer until the next column, but there’s one last story I have to tell. I’ve been told more than once by mem- bers of several different families that, “building old time model airplanes saved Dad’s life”. A hobby that you can be passion- ate about in retirement—or at any other point in your life—is a good thing. But a cou-
ple of months before I wrote this column I saw a post on the SAMTalk forum to the ef- fect that, “nobody wants to be buried in an old Flying Aces Club T shirt”.
Well okay, maybe that’s right. Two days after I saw that post I had contact with the family of an old friend who’d died after being a widower for 20 plus years. He liked and enjoyed his model airplanes. His son told me that the man’s coffin contained his favorite Beaumont rubber stick model, a Tomboy that he’d flown in Europe (the Mills .75 that had been in the Tomboy went to his grand- son) and a twin pusher! The son didn’t say anything about a Flying Aces T-shirt, but I had to smile at the thought of what my old friend had wanted to take with him. There are some wonderful people in this hobby. Take the time to enjoy them.
PHOTO: ERIC GAGNON
Tom Binkley’s Liberty Belle (above left), an early R/C ship. This one is an electric R/C job, but Tom used a single servo and a torque rod for single channel rudder control. John Pomroy’s beautiful 108-inch wingspan Shereshaw Champion(above center) sails by the Superstition Mountains. He powered it with a big electric outrunner. SAM West Coast Vice President, Mike Clancy (at right), is on the contest field at Taft, holding his very high visibility Kerswap, set up for the Speed 400 event. That fluorescent orange is easy to spot at altitude, even on small Class A sized airplanes.
FLYING MODELS 55
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