kingaltair

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When I was visiting family in Michigan last week, I contacted Wing Mfg, (maker of kits, accessories, and foam wings....located only a few minutes away from my family members in Galesburg, Mich), and asked owner Dan Gipe to cut me two foam wing cores for the Taurus-2. Thanks to Chuck Winter, (who used to cut foam cores in the 60s and still has the patterns for many planes including the standard Taurus, the Bosch airfoil Taurus[T-2], and Perigee), I was able to give him the patterns. Dan now has the patterns scanned in his computer for all the planes mentioned above, (and I'm sure many others).

Jeff Petroski from Home and Hobby Solutions and I have discussed the possibility of (some day) producing a Taurus-2 kit, with the narrower, sleeker fuselage, and taper wing, however there are no plans for the Taurus-2, with no IMMEDIATE plans to produce the kit. In the meantime though, you COULD adapt a standard H&HS Taurus by using the foam wing, and building a 1-3/4" thick 33" span sheeted stab to approximate the Taurus-2. Just for reference, I will take measurements and post those on this thread for anyone who might be interested. The plane would be totally SPA-legal, (even for Antique Class).

If interested and you have any questions, please contact me off thread.

Duane

Free Bird

Duane, Thanks for the offer! I do appreciate it! Unfortunately I have family obligations this weekend. [:@] Perhaps in the future.....

Anyways, I came across this while looking through some old Grids Leaks magazines. And thought I'd post it to see what you guys think. The ad is from the July/August volume 3 number 3 issue. Now I'm not saying that Kazmirski invented brakes for model aircraft, only the he was involved with this undertaking from Top Flite.

FB

kingaltair

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OH NO...not brakes again. [&o][&o] All I know is what is there in plain English, "...designed, tested , and proven by Ed Kazmirski...". To me this doesn't mean he is the SOLE inventor of brakes, or the earliest inventor of brakes, or the inventor of the BEST brakes...but it says he DID design THIS ONE.

Tom Brett had a totally different system in his TBX-1, (apparently his own design as well). These pattern pioneers were probably more inventive lot than we are today in the present age of everything being manufactured for us.

Too bad you have to miss the Asheville SPA contest..I know how much you'd like to see the Taurus-2 fly, and its flight appearances will be deliberately RARE.

We DO hope to make a YouTube of it, so hopefully the video will turn out well.

Duane

Free Bird

Sorry, but I had to add this to the thread, because of the time period of the ad. I agree with what you're saying. I think that these guys more or less had the same idea at the same time, and each went about it in their own way. As I said above, this is no more than a add-on kit developed for Top Flite. Until I saw this ad, I didn't know that Top Flite made such items. But there is one interesting note to this, the kit was probably designed for the Orion, as the ad dosesn't say anything about the Taurus. Just that Kazmirski is the designer of the Orion. So does this put Kazmirski's involment with brakes back than earlier thought?

I'll be looking for the T2 video. I hope that a T2 mod kit(?) will come to fruition, as it would be nice to add another version of the Taurus to the stable. Thanks for your efforts Duane!

Will you be coming north in the fall to the VR/CS event?

FB

kingaltair

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As of right now I'm planning on it. That's the next scheduled event for the Taurus assuming everything goes as it should between now and then.

Duane

Free Bird

Excellent! I'm planning on going also. Hopefully I'll have my restored Perigee and restored Aeromaster to bring.

FB

Michaelj2k

FB,
There is an article published in Grid Leaks on the trike landing gear installation mod, using that kit for the Orion. Written by Ed K., he describes how to do it and mod the airplane for proportional by replacing the barn door ailerons with strip ailerons. An interesting side light to the Orion is that MK kitted a direct copy which was called the Hunter (with some minor appearance changes) for the Japanese market. The kit was imported by Royal and is very, very rare to find. Fortunately, AMA has the plans available.

Free Bird

I've got the article that you mention. I always thought that it would be fun to build an Orion as kitted and also a modified wing on the same fuselage to see what the flight differences would be. I never knew about the kit you mention, a very rare bird indeed.

FB

Michaelj2k

Here's a Hunter circa 1968. Note the addition of wing fillets and canopy turtledeck. The MK kit used conventional gear but this one was modified with the TF trike gear kit.

Free Bird

I saw that picture somewhere and thought that it looked like a modified Orion. I like the stance it has on trike gear. Thanks for sharing the photo!

FB

CHARLES WINTER

Hi Duane, Did you get the DVDs I sent you ? These are pictures taken in Iceland of my Original Quicker, 1968. Col. Chuck Winter

kingaltair

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Yes Chuck, I sure did. I'll be contacting you soon about some things. I'll get one out to Don Lowe soon.

This past week I've been consumed with preparation for our 4th Asheville SPA contest, which was held this past weekend. We had a great turnout, and mix of Experts, Sr Experts, Sportsmen, and Novices. It was our best contest yet, and included a flight of Ed Kazmirski's Taurus-2 discussed at length in this thread. More on that later.

Now I can relax and focus, (catch up), on other things like the Simla project, (more on that later as well), Tom Brett's TBX-1, etc etc.

Chuck, we showed the video to a housefull of SPA contestants and their wives, and it was the "hit" of the evening, with lots of comments in the background about the action on the screen. I was so glad to be able to show that video to this group of guys who appreciate vintage pattern, and the greats who were the pioneers of it all.

Duane

kingaltair

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Ed's Taurus-2 had its 6th flight on July 19th early Sunday morning immediately after the pilots briefing. SPA president Bruce Underwood had the honor, (assignment) of doing a demo flight on the Taurus. Thisngs went pretty well right up to the point where we were ready to start the engine. Let me first say the ST 56 requires a "special" (meaning different) low-nitro fuel than I normally use in my SPA planes. We were ready to flip the prop, (had the radio on any everything) when somebody yelled out "did you put any fuel in it"??? I hadn't.....that was embarrasing as I went for the low nitro fuel...(nobody's perfect)....then the hand crank pump didn't work correctly, (video cameras, some controlled by others, were rolling all this time so I really hope this doesn't make it on to YOU-TUBE unedited).

Eventually we are all fueled up and ready to go. The engine starts, the needle had been pre-tunes the week before, but somehow the adjustment was way off...way too lean. Thank goodness we held the plane up to check, and the engine died each time even though I richened it some each time....then it finally konked out.

We took her back and restarted. After what seemed an eternity, the fuel mixture was "go" and we were ready. The flight itself was uneventful, though a bit on the rich side. It was beautiful to behold as Bruce did large loops, and a nice figure 8 in-between low fly-bys.

Landing included a nice bounce as my "expo" was not the same as his set up, but the plane Taurus was back down in one piece as the crown applauded.

I'll work on putting my copy on YOU-TUBE soon.

Duane

kingaltair

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SIMLA UPDATE:

Jeff Petroski and I live about three hours away from each other, but we see each other occasionally for special events such as the Asheville SPA contest. Jeff brought with him the full size print-out of the 102" Simla wing, and two full scale drawing options for the fuselage OUTLINE for face-to-face discussions. There were also some other SPA pilots looking at the plan.

We rolled the plan out on the dining room table, (the longest in the house). Though obviously, I had seen larger planes at the field, I had never seen such a large-scale PLAN for a wing rolled out...not at my house, (I normally deal with 5 to 6 foot wingspans). All laid out like that, the plan looke truly massive...you get an appreciation for its sheer size!![X(]

As we discussed earlier, since we do NOT have a true side-view, we have to do the best we can with the 7/8 view, (below), existing Taurus plans, with the mods I made for my Taurus, and a good eye to make the best guesses we can to accurately duplicate the original Simla side view. What we plan to do now is to study what we have, and "tweak" the proposed outlines to try to achieve the best look.

If there is software that will make a side view out of an established picture, we don't have the software or the experience to use it. If anyone out there has such software and is experienced in its use, this is the time to get involved in the effort to reproiduce the best Simla we can.

Duane

UStik

Nice progress Duane, but it's basically impossible to make a side view out of the 7/8 view because the fuse is not flat. It would be possible to get some measurements with reasonable accuracy by combining the 5 big pictures in the measurement program. It would be a tedious process so we dropped that in April.

The fuse is a 3D shape and there's much optical illusion when looking at it. Even the difference between b/w and color has an effect. In the picture with Ed and Les Fruh, note that Ed's arm and hand obscure the fuselage outline (removed it but removed the right main wheel as well). But there are more pictures showing the fuse from other viewing angles, above all the big picture with Ed behind the Simla (contrast is changed to make the lower outline visible).

A special source of visual illusion is the fuse top. It's not completely round, there's a flat center part (where the canopy tips are). But there are several clues for the shape when looking at the paint scheme outlines.

You might use the Reflex model builder program RMK to view the Simla model from different angles and modify/adapt it.

AndyKunz

Actually, I think the fuse top is mostly flat. If you look at the first photo, you can see from the glare that the top is relatively flat over most of the top, rounding for the spinner and under the forward fin.

Also, getting a good outline on the canopy with a fully curved surface can be a bit of a pain, and if you look at both photos together it seems to accentuate the "flat top to rounded sides" look even more.

Just my opinion.

Andy

kingaltair

My Feedback: (4)

Burkhard.......Nice to hear from you again "mein freund". We need your posts as a valued team member.

I agree 100% with everything you've said, (how about that). I've had people tell me that such software exists, so I wanted to try one more time in case it DID, and someone out there knew how to use it., but I didn't think it could. It looks like we will be making some educated guesses, but I don't believe the end result will suffer because of it. We are taking our time.

In fact, the version Jeff likes best is a combination of your and my drawings, (which differ about 3/4 inch vertically on the fuselage side dimensions...yours is a bit on the "skinny" side in my opinion, based on your fuselage calculations earlier). "Any way you slice it", (another good Americanism), the fuselage is going to be huge compared with the standard size pattern plane of the period.

As you know, I went ahead and bought a similar system to the one you have, so your suggestion to look at your Simla simulation is a great idea if I can figure the program out. Right now I'm still trying to stay out of the orange striped "force fields" that pop-up.

I'll get back into the simulator this week sometime.

kingaltair

My Feedback: (4)

A TAURUS II KIT ???

Jeff from Homeandhobbysolutions, (H&HS), didn't fly in the SPA contest; (I'm still working on him to get him involved). What he did instead may interest many of you a lot more than if he HAD flown. I had been thinking of making a lot of measurements for Jeff to promote the possibility of a TAURUS II KIT!!, but Jeff beat me to it. Jeff is pretty "keen" on the idea of kitting Ed's second generation Taurus with all the improvements including the tapered wing, symmetrical Bosch airfoil, and longer tail moment.

Jeff brought out his impressive-looking, (to me) drafting and measuring equipment, camera etc etc and spent a good 1-2 hours measuring and sketching everything you can think of. I think he was extremely grateful he got the opportunity to pour over it before something bad happened to the plane, and there was nothing left to measure.

With all the projects Jeff has, he will have a hard time finding time someday to kit the plane, but all the fact-finding research, and measuring has thankfully been completed. I will be one of the first on the list to buy one of the Taurus-2 laser kits from Jeff when it comes out. As you can see from the original YouTube video, (and the upcoming one of it performing aerobatics in the demo flight), this version of the Taurus is really a much nicer flying, and better performing aircraft. It is completely VR/CS and SPA legal. It could be the BEST FLYING pattern plane up to 1964, and I'm looking forward to it.

The original may last a lot longer if we can build an exact replica to fly.

By the way: For coverage of the Asheville SPA contest, (including pictures of Jeff) go to the Senior Pattern Association website

http://www.seniorpattern.com/results09.htm

Thanks Jeff for all your work.

UStik

Yes, I figure the red stripes are annoying, but just use the other scenery.

The model builder program is a seperate program. Run it, import one of the Simla models (you have to go to the Flugzeug/BE/Kazmirski/Simla folder) and look at it (turn it by dragging the mouse in the grey background). F7 shows the points, and setting the mouse pointer over one will show the dimensions (the middle is the vertical one) in about 1/10 inches. You'll find that I made the fuse somewhat (0.5") taller compared to my drawing. Having the fuse in 3D is just much better than static pictures and drawings.

kingaltair

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CHUCK WINTER.......THIS IS FOR YOU!!

Chuck, I just noticed in the SPA contest coverage for the Asheville event, that someone took a picture of me as I was announcing your video, just before it was played. I thought you might enjoy seeing it. The video is tremendous documentation of the early greats in R/C pattern and their designs. Thanks again Chuck for putting it on a DVD, and sharing it with us.

http://www.seniorpattern.com/ashvill...vd%20movie.jpg

Duane

CHARLES WINTER

Hi Duane, Thanks for the TV shot of my DVD, it's GREAT. Picture of me in Vietnam "Killer Pilot" I have some GREAT stories. Col. Chuck Winter

kingaltair

My Feedback: (4)

Have you ever thought of writing a book?

Duane

friessen

Hey all-
I haven't read all the posts because it's just too long,,, however I have a Taurus I got from a guy I work with. His father made it back in the early 70's and never finished it due to reasons unknown, and just left it in his basement until he passed. My friend from work knew I was into RC, and asked if I was intrested in some old RC stuff, and of course i'm always intrested in free stuff I saw this plane and thought it was to old to fly but I'd try it out. I told him I'd take a look at it and try the best I can to get his dad's plane flying. I looked it over and found all the glue joints to be secure and strong, so i thought what better way to finish it out but to cover it in paper, dope, then painted it 60's era green and white. Now that it is finished, I have about 10 flights on it, and I must say that plane flys as good if not better than anything you can find on the market today. I put an old Thunder Tiger 40 in it and new raido gear in it, but if you didn't know better, you'd think the thing was 40 years old. (although it is) anyway, it is a show stopper at the flying feild. Most of the old timers stop and look and start telling storys of the old days when they put .60's with tuned pipes and just loved the thing. I always take it with me when I go flying now. even if I only get one flight on it, it is worth it. Just thought I'd share my story with you all.

Donnie

kingaltair

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Chuck;

For years I've wondered about the slides my Dad took of the Detroit Invitational. He took a lot of interesting, (though not the best from a technical standpoint), photos which I have used in several of the threads in the Classic Pattern forum, and in my first article in Model Aviation about VR/CS and SPA. Because my Dad took SLIDES that happened to be KODACHROME, the color stayed relatively accurate all these years.

Many slides my Dad took are dated, but unfortunately these of the Detroiot Invitational were not. I have been forced to guess what year they were taken based on how old my little brother and I look in the pictures. I've wanted to know exactly what year it was but there was no way to know; it always bothered me not to be sure, but now I'm nearly sure the mystery is officially solved. I will have to look at your video one more time to be certain.

I'm about ready to send you most, if not all of my Dad's slides in a high-res scan because of youir request for still photos of the greats to add to a future version of your video. While going through the pictures tonight I noticed something familiar-Tom Brett and the awards ceremony, (see attached). I'm almost sure the shirt and hat worn by him in YOUR VIDEO corresponding to the 1965 event is exactly the SAME shirt and hat worn in my Dad's slides, (I can't believe he wore the same shirt and hat in two different years).

1965...I would have been 14 at the time, AND I WAS THERE. Do you remember the name of the pilot who is receiving the prize from Tom?

It's nice to finally be able to solve a mystery that has been "bugging" me for a long time....and it was because of your video...thanks again.

Duane

proptop

My Feedback: (8)

How about maybe posting a few "chapters" in the Full Scale forum?[8D]