recently recived the plans orderd from the AMA plans service along with a few others. the plans say they were redrawn in 1997 with the help of bob palmer. the plans mention that these are the original wing shape and not the modified veco kit wing. been working on the plans because some of the lettering is barely readable they mayhave used another color that does not copy well. two versions are shown for the fusalage one with the engine inverted (engine not shown but the rails are positioned for this)the other version shown uprright cant read what's written above the upright version anyone know which is which? this is going to be a scratch build. still working on re inking the plans bright lights homemade light table and magnifying glass and have been able to read most of whats not there. real excited about the build. during research saw the palmer thunderbird and it appears to have the same wing assembly. hope to get into the wood as soon as i get the plans sorted out just having trouble reading the wing tip notes. more to come!






"Help! Jane! Stop this crazy thing!" George Jetson>

I had a Smoothie way back in '77. I bought it with an Enya .40 for a steal even then of $50 and never got around to finishing it. All the major work, wings, tail feathers and most of the fuselage were complete and then I got married. The plane was moved three times in 20 years, languishing in whatever basement or workspace I had, pushed further back on the"things to finish" list.
I won't say that the marriage put the halt on it exactly, but the marriage ended a few years ago and I do know that a Williamson Ringmaster that I started about the same time is just now all in one piece awaiting paint.
 I've been hawking my blog site now for a week and I'd very much like to include your efforts with the plane, so please keep us(me) apprised of your progress in words and pictures. I'm a technical writer by trade and would like to do a "follow along" piece with you.
Troy
Blog: btnflyguy.wordpress.com
E-mail: [email protected]

I am pretty sure the upright engine came first. I remember pictures from a "world tour" Palmer took to S. Africa where the plane he flew had an upright engine.
Bob

After there were 5 million Veco Smoothie's sold and built through the years, they came up with this 1997 one. There were allegedly two original Palmer Smoothies, one with a sharp leading edge, thin wing for "smooth" wind flying and another with a more blunted wing slightly thicker. According to Bob Palmer, he wanted Veco to do the blunt wing, they made the other. The thick wing wasn't much known until these plans came along and Brodak started selling kits of the "original" Smoothie, as well as an ARF. Yours should be a nice flyer.
Here's my Dad's modified Veco job with inverted ST35 and wing mounted gear at the 1967 Nats at Los Alamitos, Ca.
Chris...

Five million? And Ilet mine get away? ...(crap)
This is an ad from the September 1955 issue of American Aircraft Modeler (my birth month and year).
OK if I file that picture of your dad's plane (is that you?) for use in my Blog? I'd appreciate any background on it or how you got to be a Ukie flyer so Idon't have to guess...
Troy

BtnFlyGuy's Blog

still working on the plans and have most of what is readable re-inked. the wing tip notes are difficult to read. does anyone know if the front of the wing should have sheeting back to the spars? the drawings seem to indicate that there might be some hard to make out and i belive it should be both top and bottom also hard to judge from rib drawings. progressing along to templating i have found some additional problems with the rib drawings not matching length shown on the wing plan. the overall span of the wing measures about 53 3/4" not 51 as noted i think the wing plan might be from the thunderbird and in the photo posted of that kit it is listed as 54". the plans say that they were redrawn july of 92 by Tom Dixon. i have recently orderd smoothie plans from Bill Baxters plan service and will compare the two and decide which set to use or draw strengths from both. this past yeae i have also scrstch built a pair of s-1 ringmasters and a flying fool biplane. have yet to fly any of them. thanks for the input everyone!







"Help! Jane! Stop this crazy thing!" George Jetson.

My somewhat hazy memory recalls my Smoothie (bought in '77) had a 53" span (that's why I thought the .40 would be good) and the sheeting went tip to tip, leading edge to spar. The plane Iwas working on had the engine installed inverted. Knowing as little about the plane and its pedigree as Idid back then, it was my intention to alter the tail feathers and canopy and pass it off as a semi-scale spitfire because of the semi-elliptical planform of the wings. (I still think that was a good idea,l actually)
Ilook forward to more from you about this project!
[email protected]
and
(BtnFlyGuy's Blog)

Hi,
Yes, you can use that photo. It was taken by a pro photographer for the Navy and was used as a cover photo for an internal Navy pub. I've never seen the pub. The photo is my Dad and myself, I was 8 years old.
Dad taught me to fly C/L models when I was four. (I still have my old Ringmaster Jr. called Pinky. Mom and Dad built it when they lived in a converted chicken coop, they didn't have enough color dope to paint it so they mixed the pink from red and white on hand.)
I flew in the Navy Nats from '66 to '72.
Chris...

"Pinky"? Nice to know you were not tramatized by it all! Probably gave ya some extra backbone to go on and compete. I'd love to see some pictures of that and other things in your hanger. The P38M of your son's looks great. Nice to see detail like that on a profile plane. It's along the line of the planes I have in mind to build.

The Smoothie wing leading edge is straight from tip rib to tip rib. The T-Bird leading edge sweeps from root to tip, a couple of inches.

Original Smoothie with Fox .35
Upright engine, sharp LE , thin airfoil.

Currently replacing tank and repaint fuselage.

SuperT,
That is a damn fine looking rendering of the Smoothie and makes me think real seriously about replacing the one I almost had back in the day! If Ican get my hands on the plans (after all this figuring out which ones are which) I'll put it on my to-do list.

BtnFlyGuy

This Smoothie was built 18-20 years ago from an original kit that was given to me by a friend.
Built it, test flew it, hung it on the wall while doing the R/C scale thing.

C/L bug bit me last year after 30+ years of rare C/L flying.
When first putting Smoothie back in service a tank full of crud and on a runaway engine run the covering on the inboard top wing blew off!(cheap covering)
Very carefully flew level and low until fuel ran out. Amazed me that the wing stayed flat and it didn't roll in at all!
Recovered and flushed tank and was rewarded with one good run before the crud took over again.....dang it.

last week decided to cut it open and replace tank. now it has a removable hatch.
Tomorrow it gets new paint..thinking red fuse.

That one good flight surprised me at how quick and sharp the sharp thin wing turns!
Actually much better than the Chipmunk I have been flying.
Both are light at 44oz for Smoothie and 46oz for Chip.

Funny you mention the Spitfire as this wing almost made it onto an old Sterling Spitfire fuselage!
Am hanging on to that fuse just in case.

Dogbiteken
I try to save plans (in a coffin sized cardboard box) and looked for the Smoothie plans earlier but don't find them.

Need some good Al G Warming(AGW) weather for flying!
Have more airplanes ready than I can haul in a Suburban(SUV)!

ST,
As things stand now, Imay have my 1/2A sorta' Trojan up, and my .15 Williamson Ringmaster. Ialso have a .35 Midwest P-51 that I hope to have up by late summer. Ihave no lack for planes and engines; just flying partners up here in North Central MA. Imay be "stoogin'" for a bit.

just recived smoothie plans from Barry Baxter and have started to compare them with the set from AMA. the wings are very similar in thier construction and the discrepency in the overall wing length is due to the outboard wing is 2" shorter than the inboard wing. this was one of the notes i was having trouble reading. these new plans are the "Veco" plans there is a lot more detail with an additional plan view of the fusalage. the veco plans do seem to be based on the AMA set but refined. this set was designed by Bob Palmer and drawn by Clarence Lee. i will be contacting Tom Dixon by mail he has two smoothie plans listed on his plans site. may as well collect 'em all! thanks again to everyone for the help. more to come.







"Help! Jane! Stop this crazy thing!" George Jetson.

Doh!
Iguess Icould have saved you some confusion if I had mentioned in my earlier post that the outboard wing was shorter as was the practice of the day. My Ringmaster Imperial also had the shorter outboard wing. I'm sure it did make a difference in performance, but the purist in me believes in symmetry in my planes. (Except possibly the Blohm &amp; Voss reconnaissance plane or Burt Rutans beautiful creations.)<span style="text-decoration: underline;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">
</span></span></span>

Finished redo on the Smoothie. Came out decent enough for an old airplane.
Somehow miss read scale or misremembered the reading as when put back on the scale after painting and reasembly the thing weighs 38.5oz!!!!!! No wonder it turns so good!

If global warming would just return the field might be dry enough to fly sometime in July[>:]

i have recently finished transcribing a letter from Tom Dixon regarding the history of the variations in smoothie history. i have included scans of drawings from the letter and the picture that is referenced. hope everyone enjoys this.






"Help! Jane! Stop this crazy thing!" George Jetson.

dogbiteken

Stumbled across these the other day, Dont know if this will help with your project but they are readable.
Save to my pics and open with paint makes big enough to read.

Good luck!
David

thank you supertiga i actually got this set from Barry Baxter's plan service. they are very similar to the Air Trials set i also have and i dont know which set came first. these were drawn by Clarence Lee.






"Help! Jane! Stop this crazy thing!" George Jetson.

dogbiteken

The plan I posted is from magazine.
Have no idea what magazine.

The plan looks like the copy I have from a late 1952 or early 1953 Air Trails. I was about 8 or 9 when I bought the issue. Wanted one then, couldn't afford it till 1962. Built it with the upright engine option, didn't want to go through the work of building the inverted cowl option. I've had my third Veco Smoothie now since 1968. I've flown it with a Fox .35 Stunt, a K&B Stallion .35, and the current McCoy Red Head .35. I'm tempted to put one of my Veco .35s on it. Has a 4 ounce Veco tank,

I also still have the original kit box, with the original $6.95 price sticker on it, from the AF BX from Forbes AFB, Topeka, Kansas.

Hey 50+!
I think I got those Smoothie plans from you! THANKS!

My pleasure. You're very welcome.

I'd almost like to post a photo of mine, but after 40+ years of flying, repairs, recoverings, and hangar rash, I'd probably break the camera.

Heck Man...Post it! remember, you're the one who put those 40 plus years on it!. You both deserve to be seen!