fastlash

My Feedback: (7)

How many of you started out on the Cox plastic planes, as a kid verses people that started with the balsa kits, (Dewybirds, Lil' Satans, Blah, Blah Blah) that lead to your addiction to this hobby, regardless of what you fly now,

adrian-RCU

my was 7/8 when he got his cox pt19 he is now 48ich and a true rc fly man. he got me and my brother into flying rc. we as a family eat,drink and sleep rc.

adrian-RCU

oooopps my DAD was 7/8.

fargophil

My Feedback: (3)

I dont remember exactly what age I was but it was very young, If I remember right my first Cox okabe was ibe that actually flew, It was made of thin white plastic with red markings and the wing was an actual airfoil, I also rememer having a Cox Saber Jet and Pitts special with the o20. Im now 56 and still addicted to theis hobby.

BMatthews

You didn't put in a spot for "own design or magazine plan".

I was an independent sort and built my own design using the wood I had. Even to the point of making the wing design to fit around the open spot where I had cut a part out for something else. Funny that I can still remember that. Maybe because I was mad at myself for not "saving" the sheet better or something.

It took me two of my own designs to learn to fly. More because of poor piloting ability than the design's fault. My first KIT was a Goldberg Stuntman 23 that came a couple of months after that and taught me my first loop. The Stuntman was a constant companion for more than a year after that and finally had enough during a cartwheel "arrival" and snapped the fuselage just behind the wing. I buried it at that point because the wood was sopping wet with oil like a sponge that wouldn't hold any more water.

Bipe Flyer

My first plane was a CL Cox Sopwith Camel.

Dave Campbell

For my first I built a BeeTween from MAN plans, scaled up 112.5% for an OS .10FP. I had a COX PT-19, but can't remember if that came before or after. Still can't fly control line, but I'm trying!

Dave

codell

My Feedback: (217)

Mine was a Cox Cessna 150 C/L with an "autopilot", which basically just made the plane fly around your head until it eventually smacked the ground. You didn't have any control. When you got used to it, you could turn the autopilot off and have control. This was about 1975, and my dad and I started the thing up for the first time right in the living room on Christmas day. Later on I bought my college room mate one almost exactly like it. He, too, became hopelessly hooked.

phuffstatler

My Feedback: (20)

the little plastic Sopwith Camel was my first. Age 9 or thereabouts...

Started it on the front porch, roared (to me) to life, I jumped back, and it promptly ran off the porch and smacked the ground. it was a month before I had the courage to try again...



Sheesh, how the time flies...

phil in austin

C_Watkins

My Feedback: (10)

My first was a Cox CL Zero, I believe. Never got it running, but I'd loosen up the
prop and whirl it around in circles until I got dizzy... playing with the elevator the whole time.
Doesn't take too long to get dizzy, on ten feet of line, I seem to recall.
Even though it was never running, I managed to total the thing out, by getting behind
the up/down action on a particularly windy day. up...down... UUUP... DOWWN...
UUUUUUUUUUUUUUPPPP.... DOWWWWWWWBLAM! What can I say? I was 8 yrs old.
No video games or home PC's back then, so I wasn't particularly coordinated, I guess

Had better luck, at age 10, with my next one, as I'd actually seen it done once, by then.
It still met the same fate as the earlier one, however. This particular plane looked
like some sort of fighter jet, and it had a lockout on the controls, for novice/expert.
You guessed it. I decided I was an expert, about halfway through my first can of fuel.
I made a couple flights ok, but the third or fourth one was on a windy day again,
and I blasted the jet, just like I had the Zero a couple years back. Only difference is,
this one sounded WAY cooler, right up til it hit. Then the deafening silence struck

Can't forget the peewee .020-powered FF chopper, either. It was a blast, right up
until I added an external fuel tank (plastic doll bottle, 1.5-2 Oz, I guess). Never saw that one again.

phuffstatler

My Feedback: (20)

I had forgotten the chopper! Not my first, by any means, but I used to light it up in my bedroom when my parents weren't home, and let it bounce against the ceiling...

"Smell?... What smell?" "No, I haven't been running my engine in my room..."

This habit(?) persisted until my late teens, when I fired up a Cox TD .09 on the front of my Golderberg Ranger 42 in my Air Force supplied room at the barracks. Smoke, noise, and the local duty officer quickly filled the room. That was the last time.....

As a BTW, I lost that plane on Lowry Air Force Base, where it flew away from me. Never did find it... I hope someone did.

phil in austin

PCARROLL

First cox i ever had was a p-40 warhawk. First time i started it up it roared to life and scared the crap out of me. Oh those were the days!!!

fastlash

My Feedback: (7)

This poll has gotten some great stories,What a hoot!!! Well heres mine, I got a Cox P-40 for Xmas I think I was about 11 0r 12, I remember reading all the instructions, and then setting forth on my task, I set the plane up on my front porch, filled it primed it set the needle and hit that trusty spring starter, she fired and burnt the primer so I did it a gain, and again and again, till me and the plane were a gooey mess, so after this I decided I should go get some paper towels and clean things up. So off to the kitchen I went to get some towels from Mom, and may as well hit the bathroom on the way back, well as I came back I looked at the plane just in time to see the wings sag to the ground and then the canopy started to shrivel up and melt, the plane was on fire but you couldn't tell it at first glance!! The lessen was DON"T WALK OFF AND LEAVE THE GLOW CLIP ON A FUEL SOAKED PLANE!!!

Dave Campbell

"First cox i ever had was a p-40 warhawk. First time i started it up it roared to life andscared the crap out of me. Oh those were the days!!!"

Ohh, and they were! I started my first engine as a teenager. I somehow aquired a ratty Baby Bee, got some glow fuel from the hardware store, robbed a 'D' cell from my little sister's Barbie Toy (She really loved her big brother back then!) and a little wire swiped from Dad's workbench.

Never one to bother with the details, and needing help from No Man, I mounted the Baby Bee *in a vice*! I knew not to squeeze it hard enough to leave marks it, but hell, I had to make sure it wasn't going to get away on me.

I flipped the prop and squirted fuel into every orifice for about an hour. I had raw fuel all over my hands, the vise, the workbench, and the floor-Oh, and the red paint on the vise was coming off too. Frustrated and with just a few drops left in the can, I gave up. Then, I noticed the wire had come 'un-taped' from the battery. I flipped it twice, and the second time it roared to life and scared the living bejezus out of me!

I was in a closed one car garage and the noise of that Cox at a fast two/four-stroke was deafening. Somehow I fought the urge to leave, but I though it might work it's way out of the vise. After about a minute, I got the nerve to approach the running beast and slap the vise just to be safe. just as I raised my hand, it sped up and died. I stood up from my cowering crouch, eyes burning from the fuel and exhaust and ringing ears.

Then I realized that every srap of paper was blown across the room, and every spec of sawdust and spiderweb was now stuck in a gooey mess that was the workpench. Dad would be none too pleased when he got home... I cleaned up as best I could and skulked off to my bedroom. On the way, my Mom said "Uh, yeah.. That's what they sounded like." with a grin.

That motor left a hell of an impression on me at the time. It seemed so earth-shatteringly powerful-at least as much as our lawnmower. I never did try to run it again and was soon saving my pennies for a brand new Cox I saw at a real hobby shop. This one was bigger, had a muffler, and most importantly a throttle so I could control all that power.

That was in 1990 and the motor was a Queen Bee .074. I played with it quite a bit over the next two years, but never actually flew it after I learned to fly.

Dave