Thanks for the compliments. Doing that kind of thing to photos is my business (vocation). The model is free flight and that's about all I do these days. Have some radios sitting around but haven't touch them in quite some time. We have a very active free flight club around here so that remains my primary interest.
Searching for more Laumer information led me to this forum and it has been extremely helpful.
Even learned of the name of a design I never knew before. Thanks guys.
David B

Love the model but hate walking, not good at it. My models fly better without radio, problems with interference.
My interference with the sticks that is.

Without radio how do you stop flyaways?




old git - - - - aka John L.

Don't mind walking way out in the countryside where I fly. I hate to have to mess around with excess details (meaning the radio). Plus I like to build and want to have a lot of models which I couldn't afford money or storage space or time-wise if they were radio. Most people love their radios so this is just me. That not liking details is also why I gave up scale modeling. Too many details that don't hold up to the rigors of free flight.
Anyway, as to flyaways, I don't have many because my models very seldom want to catch thermals. But to be on the safe side the motor runs are limited and most of the models have a good old pop up tail or wing called a Dethermalizer whidh puts the model into a severe stall and brings it down like it's on a parachute. That being said, if not planned right or it fails to operate a model can and does fly away. Most of the time if you have a good line of sight on it the model can be found. Serious competition flyers also add an additional expense (not an expense if you want to get your costly competition machine back) a radio beacon to help you track down the model. Man, if I keep writing this is going to sound much more complicated than R/C

The BMJR Twin Lizzie kit looks very nice but I wonder why they thought they had to add that strange tall landing gear.
The original has the top of the wheels level with the bottom of the fuselage, which matches the tubby design very well.
The BMJR version is a Lizzie on stilts.

Good question. Makes it appear a bit odd unless you have never seen the original plans.

My best guess is that it would be for extra prop clearance if one were to power it with geared, brushed electric power units or outrunner brushless motors that use larger props compared with inrunners or internal combustion engines. A nice touch if you ask me but If this were the reason then there should be an option for a more original LG if one were to decide to use the higher revving power choices.

The taller gear could provide a more stable taxi for it appears to have a wider stance but from my experience wider gear tends to ground loop more often than a narrow LG.


Maybe someone else can shed some better light on this.

Thanks gollywockdave, yuu and others who offered me dethermaliser solutions. I am familiar with them from modelling in the 1950s and earlier.

What I was wondering about was that the model had ELECTRIC power. I assumed that it would have an extended power run. My only experience of electric power was from a Matell geared unit with attached Ni Cd batteries. It had a longer power run than I want, too far to walk and that was thirty years ago.

From what I have read about Electric power it does seem to have much a much longer power run than I could face due to the walking.

Is there a method of governing the length of power run of a modern electric model. I really love the Laumer designs, WITHOUT RADIO, the simple approach is appealing.

I also fancy the Roy L Clough and Ray Malmstrom designs.



old git - - - - aka John L.

Old Git
Check out <http://www.eft-inc.com/models/> They have an electric time in the free-flight section.
Gene

John,

A very good source for timers (flight profiler) for electric power fF models is

http://www.atomicworkshop.co.uk/catalog/index.php

They have one called the Zombie. Very capable, with many features. Have a good look through the website. Lots of articles and a good faq. Some of the articles have videos as well (I seem to recall).

A bit pricey perhaps. I have one and think the world of it.

There are a couple of electric FF categories flown world wide. E30 in the UK E36 in the US and F1Q is a developing FAI class. These are competition classes but if you search out some details on them you will find lots of good info that you can transfer to sport electric FF.

John, if you have questions about electric powered flight I would be more than glad to try and answer them. I have been messing about with electrics for longer than I care to remember. PM me through this forum or email direct to planophore @ aei . ca (remove the spaces)

cheers, Graham in Ottawa

Thanks to Graham & G-Rock for the links.

Very interesting, I was thinking of using 1/8A IC motors but wondered if the "current" electric enthusiasts were very fit.

I begin to understand why electric flight is becoming so popular.



old git - - - - aka John L.

Thanks for bringing that little fact to my attention. I always thought my model sat a bit high. So, I looked at the originals from the magazine and darned if there wasn't a big difference. There is also some changes to the deck at the center top of the wing.
Anyway that explains why I've had trouble with the L/G in steep hard landings. It has been knocked out a couple of times including just this week. When it is replaced I'm going to use the original design. That configuration should lower the leverage problem that knocks it from it's mount.

Take a look at the photos of my model. The close-up with me standing against the airplane. Look to the right and you'll see a small box sticking up in front of the windshield. That is the timer for the electric motor. It is available from Hi-Line in North Carolina a company owned by Dave Rees who is a well known scale free flight modeler. Anyway, this timer is adjustable and is energized by the touch of a 9V battery across two wire contacts that serve as an instant on switch. They are relatively cheap and work every time. The only disadvantage is that once it's on you can't shut it off unless you wire in a separate kill switch.

GWD, I thought I had posted to complement you on the superb 'Lizzie but I see it went astray. Anyhow, once again kudos on a sweet looking bird. The only thing it needs is a fake OK Cub or Spitzy cylinder glued to the motor casing...

Thanks, and you are right about it needing a cylinder, mainly to fool Keith Laumer as he looks down upon it. I was reluctant to power it with an electric motor as I have always felt it to be sacrilegious to power one of his models with anything but a weak running IC engine.

Perhaps so. But it opens up a lot more field options. Since Kieth was so keen on these low performance style of models I'd guess that he was also enthusiastic about flying in any sort of site that would support these low performance designs. And that fits right in with flying electric power in tight areas using the timer to control the climb and duration.

Reviving this old thread to see if any of you Laumer fans have the Dec. '59 issue of Flying Models that featured the Curvette.

cheers,
'beat

Wingbeat, now you have no excuses to not build one!
The .pdf file is the plan.
Dave

It's been 50 years this month since this was published; an interesting Laumer article on home made retracts.

BFlyer and all of you..
Thanks for the threads on all of the Laumer stuff, his designs are time tested and still have that certain charm that is so infectious. Keith was was truly "The Man" and because of his efforts, how many of us got a start building models when our grade or middle school libraries had his book? BTW, it's "youse guys" fault.. I just found my T Lizzie drawings I had enlarged to 42" years ago but had gotten stumped on a neat way to drive the twin rudders... then I saw the thread one of you had posted.. I have put this off since I first saw Twin Lizzie in 6th or 7th grade (60's) in Laumers book so it's time to start cutting wood as soon as the current project is done in the next week or so. (pics are on the seaplane side of the house). While I am reluctant to power 'Lizzie with anything other than a diesel, elec. is clean and the airframes last forever and a dummy cyl. is easy enough..

("Not bright but trainable" )


Al

(12' Telemaster on floats in progress)

I'm starting to build a Twin Lizzie. Is this thread dead ?

Not if you'll post some pics and build comments. The Twin Lizzie is a classic little plane.

andrew

OK then, but my Twin Lizzie is gonna be free flight. I have a brand new Pee Wee 0.020.

I've downloaded the tiled plan and glued together the pages.
I've cut out some parts drawn on the plan and glued them onto cardboard.

I am now in the process of cutting out the balsa parts.

This is going to be a slow build.

Paul

I am now building the fuselage sides.

A Little Red Twin I built a few years ago. Yes, it is a FF. Tough little plane and the cute factor is high as on all of Laumer's designs.

Cute, really nice, well built. [8D]

Does it fly well ? Doesit requirea lot of space to fly ?(It's my first FF plane).

The Little Red Twin flys okay. It is not a slow flying plane. Build it light and warp free. Limit your engine run.