Hello my Corsair loving friends. My brother Brian and I started this thread some 10 years ago in order to help other builders wanting to enhance their Corsairs with details befitting of such a great platform. After all these years, most would agree that, it is still the finest version of the Corsair available.
We made many friends and were able to supply folks all over the world with parts to scale up their Corsairs. We took longer than we would have liked sometimes, but remember, we both had jobs and families that came first. It was always fun to see our parts on models on YouTube and in the magazines, and at flying events.
Brian and I competed with the CARF Corsair (and other airplanes) and always did very well. Brian was a genius with electronics and a master builder. He did everything on and in the wings, wiring, programing, lighting, gun systems, and detail parts like the pitot tube, antennas, guns, some hatches, and numerous other things. I did the fuselages, power installs, cockpit detailing, surface detailing, tail gear and doors, basically everything on and in the fuselage, and all the painting and other detailing. We each had our own likes and strentgths, and it was a great team. Our shops were just a few blocks away from each other and we were always collaborating on all things RC.
We are also both full scale pilots and he was my buddy in our Piper Cherokee 180. We had a lot of fun flying together and had some great adventures. Brian was almost done with his instrument training and we were looking forward to many IFR filed adventures.
Unfortunately, it is with great sadness that I have to tell you all that my beloved brother, 8 years younger than me, has passed away due to complications from covid. It has been about 3 weeks now and it still feels like a bad dream that I need to wake up from. He was in the hospital one day less than a month and the doctors and staff did all they could, in fact two of his nieces, my daughters, were among his respiratory therapists. It went straight to his lungs and that was that. He was unvaccinated.
Our dad was killed in his plane when I was 13 and Brian was just 5. We both have always loved everything aviation and it made us very close through the years, sharing modeling, RC, and full scale. Brian was 6 months away from retiring with 30 years. He was looking forward to having more time to work in his shop and build part time. Now, my prop is feathered, so to speak. I can't see going on without him in RC the way we have now for many years. Brian was always ahead of me on building. He had more time than I did. I have a business and a bunch of kids and grand kids. I have kids that are now getting into flying the Cherokee with one already achieving his PPL in October. So full scale will go on.
I am proud of what we have been able to contribute in scale building. Brian and I were the first builders of the CARF Corsair to incorporate electric gear and electric folding wings. Now there are countless ones out there. We also introduced working cowl flaps, scale lighting, gun systems, our canopy system, bottom hatches, our top hatch system, strut covers, and a lot more. I am also very glad that I made those you tube videos on our building projects that we all can go to and see my brother doing what he loved.
I have some parts in stock still, and I will be collecting everything together to make a complete inventory of what is left. Much of it is still in Brian's shop and it has been hard to go over and spend the time in it I must to find everything. I will get that done. I'm still getting requests for parts. Please be patient as I work through this. I want everything still left to get good homes on Corsairs. I know I have several sets of Gear door detail panels, a couple light kits, a gun set, and a bunch of other things. I also have some partial kit parts that could be finished using the manuals that I produced (Brian never liked writing manuals) and pictures. I'll make this stuff available for the cost of material and shipping to those who would like to use the stuff. The exhaust that we developed for the Moki will continue to be available as a friend fabricates those for us.
I know this has been a long read, sorry. Maybe not as long as it has taken to type. I hunt and peck. But I wanted to thank all of you who have also contributed to this thread and kept the sharing going. It will still be here to inspire and help new owners and builders of the CARF Corsair and on behalf of my brother, keep building and tricking out those wonderful CARF Corsairs.
Have fun, fly safe, land soft
Gary
P.S>I will still be watching, so feel free to PM me or email me at
[email protected] with any questions you may have. I'll do my best to help anyone who needs it.