RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

At least with a tether car you don't get dizzy and toss your cookies!

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

Me and a friend had been sport flying C/L for about a year and heard about combat. We went to a big regional contest to see what it was all about and decided right then and there that we would not just compete, but also show those "clowns" how it should be done.
We spent the next 3 months learning about hot wiring foam, build planes and how to make the FOX .36s run competitively. We worked every spare moment to get ready for the biggest local contest...actually the biggest contest anywhere...The Bladder Grabber.
It was at least 95 degrees the day of the contest and I was as nervous as Hell. I wanted everything to go smoothly, but I just wanted to get that first match behind me.
Being as nervous as I was and already sweating in the shade...it didn't help my confidence when one of the flyers in the match right before I was due to fly, stumbled over to the sidelines and blew lunch after his match was over with.......[:-]!!

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

It all sounds like simple supply and demand economics to me. You better suppy what she wants as soon as she demands it.

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

Or properly train her.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kaeTQJ3EHaI

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

Way back in the late 70's I went to the C/L regionals at the Eugene Or. airport. I was about 16 or so. I crashed my stunter in practice, so I spent the whole weekend as a spectator. There was a fellow there named Rich Porter. His Precision Aerobatic plane was powered by a TD 049 on bladder pressure mounted at a 45 degree angle to the centerline. He used 60' lines in wind and 70' lines if it was fairly calm. The airplane was called the "Ridiculous". One evening with a bunch of us watching, he flew the entire pattern on 70' lines beginning and ending every maneuver at ONE FOOT from the ground. Needless to say, I've never forgotten that flight or Mr. Porter. A lot of people thought he was nuts, but he was my hero that day. A couple of years ago I was offered the chance to fly a "slow combat" type C/L plane. I hadn't picked up a handle in 30 years, but it came back like I'd never stopped. It was actually fun! I abandoned C/L as soon as I could afford RC and never looked back. I still have no desire to go back, but it sure was fun at the time.

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

I met Rich Porter some years later, it could have been at that same airport [Maylon Sweet?] in Oregon. He had updated the Ridiculous to a piped OS.10 and put on a great show.
IIRC, the plane was covered with chrome colored helium party balloon material somehow, instead of monokote [which would have been much heavier].
I've held on to the construction article for that plane...it has 2 million bits and pieces.

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

Sounds like he simplified it later on. He loaned me a Zerox copy of his hand-drawn plans that year and they showed at least 3 million parts. The "fuselage" was a cardboard rocket-tube with balsa around it. He used all sorts of materials one didn't usually associate with model airplanes. He was a VERY creative guy with his own unique drummer. The whole concept began a few years earlier with a double-scale Voo Doo powered by a Fast Combat-type .36 on bladder pressure. It might have been a .36X but I don't remember for sure. He tuned his engines using a pitch-pipe as a reference. I think he wrote a magazine article about that. I wonder if he's still around.

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

A few years ago, [maybe a few more than that] I made some kind of reference about The Ridiculous here at RCU.
It wasn't much later that he PM'd me and we talked about the NW C/L scene for awhile.
Being involved with combat back then, I never made time to do much roaming around to see how the other half lived. Spent a wee bit of time at the speed circle...but there were plenty of times you didn't want to be anywhere near that place.
Fondest memories of Eugene was cutting Willie Namura's plane loose with a full tank. It flew way off into the clouds and all you could do was hear it....then it shot straight down back towards us and shutoff just in time to land harmlessly just outside the fence. It had enough fuel to make it to Grants Pass if it flew straight.
There were so many fly aways that year that the airport banned us from coming back.

Type in "Ridiculous Rich Porter" on a google search and see what you come up with.
He used to pass out Xerox copies about Uncle Sam conspiracies to squelch 100 mpg automobiles and stuff like that. Who knows how prophetic some of his "rantings" were....?

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

I was just gonna mention the Ridiculous construction article. One thing that might help you as well CP, is a lot of lead out rake. Good luck with your project.

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

VG, I nailed the leadout rake option down and should have made it available before recovering / repairing the plane. The plane is back in one piece now. The force of the plane snapping the lines ripped the entire wing loose as a unit from the fuselage, but thanks to thin CA it was possible to reposition everything and just saturate all the splintered damage.
There is something real big rattling around inside the fuselage now.
I made a peep hole to look at the bellcrank mount before doing the repair and gave it a pull test.
I think a taller stooge will help. I'm going to place a tarp on top of my Jeep and set the stooge on the car's hood.

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

CP, your crash and repaired look better than most planes I see around here, even before maidens!!

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

Andrew, That's why I like this cheap camera so much..!
It's really just a "schlock job" that'll get me by till I do something else that is stupid.

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

Hey CP - ya got any pics of your "stooge"? Being a C/L noob, I can honestly say I haven't a clue as to what one looks like let alone how to use one. I bet I'd have better success with a more controlled launch method. Don't get me wrong, I love my wife dearly, but she can't launch a plane fer crap! :D Most of our launches ended up looking like this:

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

Joe, here's The Stooge.
If your plane can take off from the grass or asphalt then all you really need is a flat board with the spring loaded release. Pound a couple old screwdrivers into the ground to anchor the board. I use a spring loaded release for piece of mind. It's a pretty weird feeling to leave a 2HP Nelson .36 running on this stand and then jog back to pick up the control handle and the release string.
A Nelson .36 combat engine is powerful enough to drag this "ramp stooge" while the plane waits it's release.....[X(]
The problem with this ramp is jerking the control lines before the plane clears the ramp...you have to allow a second after you release the plane before you take a step back and establish line tension and full control...or else ruin a prop.
I suppose the ramps could be made out of contest grade balsa slabs, [to help save props] but then this contraption would cost more like $100...;)

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

Thanks for setting up the pics CP - that's exactly what I needed, the ramp (or board) makes perfect sense now!

Got a anutter question though, how'd ya know my wife was looking for an old Chevy C10?

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

Wouldn't ALL women love to have an old C-10 pickup more than anything else...?

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

Hi CP,

Thanks ![8D]
The 'leadouts' on your 'Marauder' got me thinking...

Now, I am a Balsa Beaver ! (Awesome Talent to learn from...[X(]:D:D:D)

I'm not dousing R/C or giving up on it...
But, CL, is frigging cool !:)

Plenty of events to have fun.[8D]

My goal is to fly 80mph Combat with them. (Doah !, the Canadian FAI team is who I will fly with !:D)

I hope to snag an F2D 'broken in' engine... and support our Canadian Team at the Worlds...;)

Some of my R/C friends have never heard of CL, never mind FF...:eek:

Could be some 1/2A Proto Speed events too...:)

Woo Hoo ![8D]

Thanks CP !

Take care,
Have fun,
Dave'crosscheck'Fallowfield
Maac 6437
Unabashed Combat Team

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

CP, neat plane,

I am intersted in the lines you used. Spider wire? Is that the same stuff they sell for fishing line? In light of the fact that they snapped, will you use bigger lines or was that just a function of how violent the snapback was when she got to the end of the lines again?


Also, this plane reminds me a littel of the 1/2a pathfinder by Brodak, I have long wondered how that plane would fly on an 074.

Any input you have would be helpful.

Thanks

V/R

Digger

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

Digger, This stuff is the green colored fishing line that looks like sewing thread. It's either called Spiderline or Spiderwire..I forget.
In a perfect world control line planes should never have the lines go slack...but it happens. When it happens you need to get on your horse quickly and get that line tension back. The standard steel cable sizes for the various weights and classes of aircraft is usually up to the task in this case.
But.....if any C/L plane does a severe turn into the circle and then back out to the end of it's leash, I've never seen a full recovery from that. Usually 1 or both cables will snap if that happens.
You try to get away with an adequate safety margin, but not overkill. The weight and drag of the lines is a damper on performance. So far I've had quite a few flights with this line at the 52 foot length but only time will tell if this weight of line will be acceptable. This plane is actually pretty heavy for a .074 powered model and I should try to figure out how much strain is exerted at whatever speed it is flying at.
I just took a guess that these lines would be up to the task to withstand "normal" flight, which should take into consideration the occassional slack lines episodes.

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

Back in the day, way, way back before my time control line plane used flat bottom airfoils, some had dihedral and of course none of them were as aerobatic as a symmetric foiled plane could be. Many years went by like this before some renegade was bold enough to try a full symetric airfoil and then all hell broke loose. Control line became a really big deal with demo teams and combat, precision stunt routines, etc.
Some wildman thought up a couple stunts that to this day I've never heard of anyone else performing. One stunt was to have the planes' lines go from the handle, around a big round post and for the pilot to launch the plane himself and let the plane fly around the post, then just when the plane's lines cleared the post he would fly it back inverted around the post until it was almost ready to take off his head, then he would repeat the cycle over and over.
This stunt was called the "Reverso".

A variation of this stunt was to perform it while standing on a bridge..! I wish I could remember where I read about this or who the nutcase was who did it, but it was published in one of the mainstream model mags I would have had access to.

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

I watched R.F. (Steve) Stevenson Fly THREE C/L airplanes at once many years ago. One in each hand and one attached to a helmet. It didn't last long, but it was a hoot to watch him try. He would also fly a slow-combat type model and as soon as the engine quit, he would start cranking like a madman on the U-Reely and catch the model with his left hand without it ever touching the ground. When he walked up to you and said "Where's the noise?" that was your cue to start his engine so he could fly. Anything he didn't like was either a "crock" or a "Nixon-deal".

RE: .074 MARAUDER !!!
 

I've heard of that stunt done by Jim Walker. Just flying 2 planes at once would be harder than riding a unicycle.
If you could ride a unicycle and fly 2 planes at once, you might get some invitations to perform at airshows..!
I remember watching my first combat at the fairgrounds down your way in Spanaway. That was also the first time I drove through that neighborhood where everyone owns a full scale airplane.