Going to introduce my 5 year old daughter to the world of balsa kit building with this model. It's special to me as my dad built the same airplane for me when I was about the same age, 37 years ago. I built several RC kits years ago as a teenager, so this shouldn't be too big of a challenge but do the FF experts have any tips or advice? I'm sure the rubber band will need replacing, any good online sources for these?

Thanks!

ps: This is the original Cloudbuster with the box shaped fuselage and polyhedral wing. Around 30" wingspan IIRC.

http://www.oldmodelkits.com/index.php?detail=12862

I remember when I first started free flight. The old guy expert would always say, extra weight is the enemy. Make your joints as close and accurate as possible. Keep the weight down.

Have a supply of pretzels, etc. and make it fun. Let girl look over the plans and kit contents and talk about how it's going to fly. Show girl how to hold X-Acto safely, how to cut sticks and how to apply glue. Expect short attention span. Let her actually do some/parts of the steps. Explain basics of what makes planes fly and concept of balance/CG in very simple terms.

The original Cloudbuster is now sold by Guillow as the Fly Boy. Why they rearranged the name to this and named the ROG with stick fuselage to Cloudbuster when Comet had it the other way around beats me. I remember the Cloudbuster as an 11 year old. It was smaller and the Guillow description of 21" wingspan matches what I recall. I bought and built the larger Ed Lidgard's 30" Comet Sparky. It is the largest rubber powered I ever built, an ambitious project for an 11 YO. (I think I paid around $1.25 back in 1965 at the Cornet department store, I built over a half dozen other smaller Comet stick and tissue kits, so I was ready.)

Guillow (Comet) Flyboy (Cloudbuster)

Great

Thanks

What a coincidence. We too built this model at the beginning of my hobby.
Just noticed that it's been a while since you've posted, Bijan999. But how did it go?

It's has been a while since I've been on here but thanks for asking. We got it built years ago and actually turned out great! It's now hanging up in my son's bedroom along with about 20 other airplanes, some RC, some free flight and several plastic models. We still have never flown it! Maybe one day...