Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

Hi,

My name is David Redden and I work at Sig. Even though I'm an R/C guy, I know that you control line guys are pretty hard core. Many of the flyers who come to our annual Fly-In have been coming for decades. I thought I would let you guys take a crack at a family mystery.

This picture sits on my son-in-law's bedroom dresser. It shows his grandfather John Stokes and he believes it was taken in Superior, Wisconsin around the year 1949. (There are cars in the background of the picture that may help date the picture).

Please help with any information you can about the plane, person or if you can date when this picture was taken.

Thanks,

David Redden
Sig Manufacturing

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

David,

I have no idea other than it being a well done speed plane of that era. I would suggest you also post this on some of the CL speed and/or racing sites.

Good luck.

George

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

Well, I don't know that the airplane would be a kit airplane. Most of the speed models were so simple that all you needed was a pan. There were a couple of pans available but I think only one was widely available and that was because it was used on rat racers. The pan in the picture is that size.

If you look closely, the model shows two leadouts and they come out of the right wing. That model would fly clockwise, something a lot of speed guys did. There are two leadouts so the airplane obviously wasn't one of the monoline, no expense spared models. It also looks like there are two elevator halves, another suggestion that it's a somewhat early speed "design".

The dolly looks to be decently constructed. The tires look so clean and shiny, I'd bet they hadn't rolled a single takeoff.

The cars in the background are definitely pre-50's. More exactly, they're models that were made before 1950. Can't tell the make. A lot of them back then looked very much alike and the difference by year wasn't significant. There weren't many made in the late 40s because of the war and those actually look like they could be pre-war.

It's hard to tell what class the model would be since the middle classes were very little different in size. Since the engine's mounting lugs aren't showing on the sides, through the fuselage, I'd guess that the engine was definitely not a 60. I'd bet it'd be a 40 or 45. We often filed the lugs to blend with the sides of the pan on the larger engines. The pans often had shelves inside for the smaller engines' lugs to sit on. You'd grind that out for the larger engines and then the lugs would stick out. You'd file them flush with the outside of the pan and build the fuselage around them. And you'd see them on the larger engines.

The coat he's wearing was made of a "modern" fabric for the time. It almost dates the picture into the 50s. And that's possible.

But unfortunately, I don't know any real specifics about the airplane or engine. Sorry, but most of the speed jobs were made sorta from scratch. You'd get a pan and spinner and go from there.

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

Oh, I forgot....

You could buy solid wing blanks in a good hobby shop. They were bass or such and roughly airfoiled. You'd make the airplane with "hardwood" wings and stab. And use a couple of "hardwood" sticks for the fuselage sides. Pine worked ok. The engine cowl could be balsa, but there was no real push to make anything light.

You built the plane starting with two hardwood sticks. You built a "crutch" and added the rest. The pan would bolt to the crutch.

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

Isn't that a Dooling decal on the cowling? That would make it a .61 or a .29, the only sizes they made, and it's too big to be a .29.
The airplane actually looks a little large for that class from that era. My dad had a lot of success with one about that size, but most were much smaller. Also, most of the designs from that era had already dispensed with the rudder.
I can't tell from the pic if that's a cast pan or not. Those were pretty new then, mostly custom made. The step in between maple crutches and engine bearers and pans was an aluminum or steel engine mount that bolted to the crutch. I have one of those in my collection.
It seems to have a plug-in type dolly, which had fallen out of favor by 1949. I think the cradle type dolly was most common then and some early versions of the mouse trap arrangement were coming along, too.
So, my guess is that the photo is from a couple of years before 1949, or the builder has done a nice job on an older design.
I like the way he's put a little hatch over the glow plug.......attention to every detail!

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

It looks a lot like the "Snowflake" as shown in the attached drawing from SAM 1066(UK), Dec. 1989 issue.
The drawing comes from an Italian source, and says it is the fastest model in the world by Bill Viets, at 231,406 km/h (143.82 mph)
Differences from the drawing are a cleaned-up tailcone, a more pointed spinner and a slighly different cowling. The engine indeed is a Dooling 61, and a 22,8 x 22,8 cm (9" x 9") "Super-Scru" prop is shown. Maybe the AMA has records of this world record, which could help confirm dates.
Hope it helps.

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

It sure looks a lot like that Snowflake plan, doesn't it?

Interestingly, the plane my dad had so much success with was based on the Snowflake. I'd never seen a plan for one before and there are many similarities to the plan I have from his plane, especially the size, wing shape and wing structure. The idea was to have a model that flew, rather than hung on the prop.
He eventually got up to 151.1 mph, which exceeded the record for about 2 hours.

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

Couple of small details:

In the late 70s, the Control Line speed record was over 200mph. Not by much, but over it. It was held by a Jet and was something like 205 or 210mph. The fastest piston model was a D Speed class model and it's record speed was tenths over 200mph. BTW, D Speed at that time was only flown by Open members if I remember correctly.

It's real hard to identify a speed model by looks. They really did all look alike. They'd discovered early on that the event was all about the engine and the prop. And the deal was to get the fuel right for the pressure, temp the day your were flying. The flyer would mix it right there on the line. Seems that the amount of nitro versus alky effectively changed the timing.... when the "explosion" happened. And of course, the other deal was to get the needle right for that run.

I CD'd a portion of the UnitedStatesC.L.Championships that were in North Carolina in the 70s. We had some small problems sorting out where to put the speed circles and dealing with the "posts". If you've not seen speed flown, there is a steel post at the center of the circle. The flyer takes off with the control handle in one hand, and usually with the other hand on the post. His first priority is to get the airplane out of the dolly. Then to not crash while getting the handle into the yoke that's on the top of the post. The yoke would swivel while holding the handle. And lastly, to fly the airplane without falling down.... grin.

Around that time, FORMULA 40 (a beginner's event) was clocking over 150mph. The class A's were doing better than 170mph. An .049 is a 1/2A because it's half the displacement of an A class engine. The half-A's were doing better than 110.

I think Doolings were gas weren't they? If I remember correctly, the spark plugs didn't give much trouble, but most speed runs ate the glow plug, so that hatch on the pictured airplane would have been quite functional for a glowfuel engine.

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

The latest world records is topped by a pulse jet (reaction motor is the class) at about 395 kph (245 mph) then 10cc at 345 kph (214 mph), open FAI (2.5cc) at 335 kph (208 mph) with the video of the record flight at http://www.flyrc.org.uk/record/control_line.htm then FAI in a competition at about 325 kph (202 mph).

The video is interesting because it shows everything that darock mentioned about using the pylon. It's main use is to stop any whipping and to keep a constant line length to get an accurate speed. I think timing starts one lap after the handle is in the pylon. I remember where someone did an analysis of the engine speed from the soundtrack and the Irvine was 4 stroking at 19,000 before release and got to about 40,000 in the air when the pipe cut in.

The Doolings started with the .61 and the first ones were all spark ignition but came in 2 types, a 7 fin and 9 fin, but I don't know which came first. Some time later they were pure glow. The .29's were only glows (and IMHO the best looking engine ever made :)).

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

Yes, the original Dooling .61s were spark ignition, but they ran fine on glow after that came in. My dad's was one of those.

Speed was evolving rapidly at that time and if you read the old magazines you'll see that the record went up almost monthly. Pylons weren't always used, and in the immediate post-war period whipping was still legal and I've even seen an article by Harold Debolt explaining how to do it!
The techniques of fuel blending and matching fuels to atmospheric conditions were still in the future for most guys. There was a fuel additive called "This is It" which turned out to be 30% nitro and a few brave souls used it straight. Some of the engines wouldn't take it.
It was an interesting time, when ordinary modelers could compete. Things like propeller selection and fuel tank design were still the hot tweaks and the real pros hadn't yet figured it all out and pushed the amatuers out of contention.
The early days of a new event are always the most fun!

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

I think we are getting on a tangent. David said that the model is circa 1949. That is before Monoline, not when they went back to two lines. The plane looks very little like the "Snowflake" IMHO. Note the rake on top of the cowl, the empennage more forward, assymetrical wings. Also note that the dolly is drop-off, not the later ones that released from the ground. Nice model.

George

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

Yes, off on a tangent, but that's half the fun, isn't it? ;)

My point in mentioning that my dad's airplane was based on the Snowflake was that the plane in the picture might be something like that. Lots of guys would see what was working at the time and do their own take on it. The similarities I see are the general size, shape of the wing, shape of the rudder, cowled in glow (or spark) plug, clockwise flight and a general similarity of airfoil. The shape of the cowl, needle nose spinner, streamlined tail cone and apparent asymetrical wing are different, so I still think it's a Snowflake-based original.
The 151 mph flight I mentioned took place on June 11, 1949, so an airplane of that size and configuration would have been competitive. Also, John Stokes appears to be about my dad's age at that time, he was a WWII veteran and an engineering student in Indiana at the time. If he were still living, I'd ask him if he'd ever run across John at a contest.

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

This is all very interesting information, but unfortunately the link doesn't work. Are there any photos of the setup used for speed flying? Also, I am wondering what a pan is. Is it an actual saucepan used for cooking, or is it something made for these planes specifically, and called a "pan"?

NorfolkSouthern

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

A pan is a metal bottom, aluminum or magnesium, which the engine bolts onto. A half pan has the back half cut off to reduce weight. There were a number of different kinds. The most common was the Harter's pan used in their line of CL kits, Royal Rodent rat racer, Count Clipper combat, Regal Raider proto speed, etc.

Try the link again. It works for me.

RE: Vintage C/L Picture - Please help identify.
 

Thanks for the info, Jim. The photos on the sight explained things better than words could, and the video was a great illustration of how it's done. I've watched combat planes with fast engines, which would turn at increadibly fast speeds, they certainly didn't sound like a Cox, the RPMs were considerably higher. But I've never heard an engine turn as fast as this one, in video or real life. That is one fast little critter! So did that guy have to learn karate or something before flying that thing?

NorfolkSouthern