There's an F-11 sitting in the parking lot at Strickland's Surplus in Wilmington, NC ever since I was a little kid. It's still there far as I know. You can see it here:

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&sour...01706&t=h&z=20

Andy

I already did predict some volcanic activity about Mr. Ka in my thread on 5 May 2010.

LOL

Cees,

Not sure if I understand your question. What I’m calling the early plan is not the first Blue Angel kit plan. The very first kit was done only by Kato. Yoshioka built his first Blue Angel from the first Kato Blue Angel kit with the short rudder. But Yoshioka made his changes to that kit design. After Yoshioka won the worlds the first MK kit design with the short rudder was changed to include Yoshioka’s Blue Angel Modified changes and had what I’m calling the early plans. Both names are on these plans and the later plans.

Is my question, is this fact?

I think this is right , it was also my story!


Cees

There is one in the Navy Air Museum in Pensacola and I looked at it when I was there two weeks ago. Great Museum! Here is the link http://collections.naval.aviation.mu...efirn=16006471

OK, I understand. As luck would have it we don’t have any pictures of Yoshioka’s Blue Angel in a shipping crate! :-)

8178,

No that will not happen, that crate, only we know the plane did not drop from the air.
Mr Kato did make several prototypes to generate the first kit. The kit Mr. Yoshioka did use to make his champion plane.
That very first plane of Mr. Kato, that very first Blue Angel I compare with the Oldest Taurus on Earth!
Or do you believe there was no period of development, Mr. Kato did take the drawing board on a nice day and draw the plane to kit, Mr. Yoshioka did use?


Interesting story, continue

Cees

Wrong post, deleted.

From what I have read in the articles posted in post number 1133 Kato spent about three years drawing out his plan and building the first prototype Blue Angel.

Moving forward on the fusalage, the early plans have wing fillets only on the back area of the wing and the late have fillets the full length of the wing. The early is on the left and the late on the right.

8178.

So you believe on a nice day Mr. Frank Myers (a draftsman of Ed Kazmirski) did take his drawing board and make the drawing of the first Taurus? without any moment of development?
This was the reason why I was interested in the history of Mr. Kato and did compare the two airplanes and designers, the two Mr. K's.

Success with the thread on I will read the posts with interest

Cees


Edit: Name Frank Myers

Mike,

this is a fitting thread for Blue Angel history. thx for your time (again) in posting this.

On the left is the early plans and on the right the late plans showing the nose areas. The most notable item that is different, is the canopy. The canopy on the late is about 2” longer so it extends forward 1” and to the back of the fuselage 1”. It also has its highest point along its top line moved forward in the canopy shape. For me the late canopy is more appealing. When you compare the canopy in the picture of Yoshioka’s aircraft (third image) you will notice that his canopy extends forward like the late canopy but is shorter on the back like the early plans. The plans show a pretty clear view of the differences and explain why the late canopy has a pronounced peak that starts about 1/3 of the way back and along the back area of the canopy to blend in with the fuselage sides. The early canopy is more rounded and looks like the first Blue Angel kit seen in the fourth image. The late canopy can be seen installed in the fifth image.

It might be hard to see in the images posted but the early plans show a firewall that is well back from the engine making the fuel tank touch the wing. The nose gear mount is changed from the early firewall mount to a belly mount in the late. Both plans show a beam mounted engine and on the late the nose ring is tied in with the beam mounts.

To be continued…

You are welcome David! Got to pay my dues for the free plans!

Cees, be reasonable. Mr. Myers didn't design the plane, he drafted it. The model flew on Thanksgiving. The designer had been worked out the design prior to that and implemented it without drawings. That's not uncommon, we all do it all the time. Nothing special there. Earlier designs (like Orion, which changed over time too) contributed to it, as likely did other planes flying at the club. That doesn't contradict anything anybody has said anywhere.

Why do you say something like this? Sometimes I think you say stupid things just to get a reaction from certain people. That's quite childish.

Andy

So, if I'm following all this correctly, a short version of the history of the Kato Blue Angel should go something like this:

1. Initial Kato version with long nose, sweepback and wing fences.
2. Revised Kato version with short nose and reduced sweepback, still with wing fences.
3. First MK kit, based on the revised Kato version, but without wing fences.
4. Yoshioka modification with full height rudder and dropping the "jet outlet" tail, 1973 World F3A Championship winner, referred to in the literature as "Blue Angel Modified".
5. Second MK kit, based on Yoshioka's 1973 World Champs winner, plans marked "World Champion".
6. Third and final MK kit with flush fitting built-up fin instead of sheet fin and fillets, revised canopy and other detail modifications, plans no longer marked "World Champion". This was probably the version of the Blue Angel flown by Yoshioka to 4th place in the 1975 World Championships.

And Mike is now examining the detail differences between 5. (the second MK kit) and 6. (the third and final MK kit). Am I getting this more or less right?

Best regards,

George

Yes George, good overview. The extra somewhat off topic comments added to the thread makes it a bit hard to follow.

Hey Mike,

Thanks for your reply.

In your post above comparing the nose of the second and third series MK Blue Angel kits, I think you have the wrong photo in one place. We are missing the photo of the nose area on the plans of the second series kit. I'd really like to compare the profiles of the canopies.

Based on your observations, what do you think Yoshioka did with the canopy on his '73 World Champs winning machine? Did he use the asecond series kit canopy and move it forward, or did he use a different canopy? And how does Yoshioka's '73 canopy relate to the revised canopy MK eventually included in the third series kits?

Best regards,

George

Right you are and I fixed it!! It is hard to tell what Yoshioka used for a canopy because it doesn’t look like any of the variants. It looks most like the first image in post number 1136. That image shows the prototype of the first (kitted) Blue Angel before being kitted (I think).

I’ve been comparing the plans looking for differences. On the early, the top line from the nose to under the canopy has less angle than the late. The left image below is the early.

Here is a RCU link to the early variant that is not covered and shows a lot of the details http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/fb.asp?m=8885366

To be continued…

mike, how many thousands of times have we looked at these plans? i'm back on mine, polishing the clear at the moment.

When you build from plans you tend to spend a lot of time analyzing them but that is part of the challenge and fun. It is great to have the plans from Sound-barrier though, and be able to compare them with mine. It is pretty wonderful that Sound-barrier would go to the effort and cost to copy them and then send them to me all the way from the Netherlands.

Glad to hear that you are working on your BA!

Mike,

I'm happy to see that you enjoyed the Blue-Angel drawing!
Your explanation concerning the differences between the plans was outstanding again, and the whole thread starts to read like a book.
Thanks for all your efforts in clarifying the Blue-Angel story!!

Regards,

Gert

The next variant of the Blue Angel was the kit produced by the Japanese company FK, and was distributed in the United States by Mutchler’s Hobbies. The kit was a knockoff of the Blue Angel design and looks more like the later Blue Angel but with a smaller and thinner wing and stab. The kit had a fiberglass fuselage and pre-sheeted balsa covered foam wing and stab. FK named the kit SBA Speeda. SBA, apparently short for Super Blue Angel and I have no clue what Speeda means.

Mutchler’s Hobbies started importing them around 1986 and they were available into the early 90s. I had one on order in the early 90s but the production stopped before I could get one. I continued searching for a kit but was not able to locate one until 2008 through RCU member “casniffer”. Here is the link to my build thread on RCU http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_7510820/tm.htm

The images below show the Mutchler’s Hobbies ads and the contents of a kit.

To be continued…

The September 1988 RCM had a product review of the SBA Speeda. The only negative was the thin wing! For the review they powered it with a Rossi 61 RE and pipe. With the thin wing I bet it was a rocket!

To be continued…