A CONDENSED EVOLUTION OF MODELING
By Bob Angel
samrcflier@verizon.net
I’M WRITING THIS NEAR the end of 2021, when the talking heads explain to us what we’ve all lived through since January. I’ll follow suit, but I’ll stretch that short period back to the beginnings of organized model aviation more than a century ago. That’s still just a speck of time in overall history.
As with most things, modeling ceaselessly changes. All we can do about it is reminisce, while some of us try to capture and experience the better parts of “what used to be.” In the early years, modelers could pretty much be defined as hobbyists who divided their time between creating, building, refining, and flying their models. Model flying was a matter of knowledge and model adjustment rather than physical skill.
Fast-forward to today, when many model fliers might be better defined as sportsmen who buy ready-made equipment and spend the greater part of their time perfecting proficiency in its use. In that respect, it’s loosely related to golf, tennis, marksmanship, bicycle racing, etc. Scale modelers are one of several exceptions to that generality.
Modelers were a tighter-knit fraternity before expanding into new equipment and ideas. Small-engine development quickly moved modeling into a new era, often separating glider and rubber-power enthusiasts into different cliques from modelers who used gas power. The glow plug brought operational simplicity and reliability to engine power, while reducing model weight.
At roughly the end of World War II, most newcomers entered the hobby via Control Line (CL) flying. Some former Free Flight (FF) fliers happily merged into CL, while others felt forced in because of reduced flying space and changing club activities. The more resolute FF fliers remained indifferent to it all, while a few developed antipathies for CL, which was further incensed as RC matured and entered the game.
I can understand those feelings because I felt that some of the best times in modeling happened during my CL days. I was the last one to leave our old CL club field as, one by one, the members drifted away to the new RC club and field at the other end of town. At least I wasn’t a stranger when I finally joined that group.
Today’s FF practitioners continue to shun most forms of direct manual control, but AMA and FAI competitors readily accept all sorts of other modern autonomous, high-tech control equipment.
At early Nats competitions and other large contests, event champions were usually named. Large trophies, prizes, and recognition were awarded to one person who excelled in a number of genres of the hobby. Cumulative points were awarded for doing well in glider, rubber-powered, and engine-powered FF, plus in CL Speed, Aerobatics, etc., and finally, in RC flying.
As the hobby grew and evolved, the events became so specialized that it’s no longer practical for most people to even attempt to compete in that sort of marathon. An unfortunate result was that some of our group’s cohesiveness was lost, and today, many modelers have little or no interest in what others are doing outside of their specialized segment of the hobby.
Some Thoughts About Competition
There’s an instinct to compete in all of us. It’s just more highly developed in those who become experts in their chosen arena. Most of us became modelers after firsthand exposure. For some, it might have been from seeing a model hand-launched under rubber power for a short, smooth flight. Others might watch an RC Pylon race, get a sudden shot of adrenalin, and say, “I gotta do that!”
Most of us don’t have the time or ambition to engage in top-level, serious
competition, but something labeled as a fun-fly seems to attract better participation in a club setting. Fun-fly events usually last for a short while, until the group wanders away to something else.
Fun-Fly Events
I had planned to review a few fun-fly events at this point, beginning with one of my early favorites, CL Balloon Bust, but after looking at the current AMA rules for that event, I see that it’s matured so much that I’ll need to stretch the discussion into at least the next column.
Balloon Bust was a much simpler event when we flew it more than 50 years ago, but the rules seem to have gone through some sort of growth malignancy. That’s possibly why it seems to have little following today. If I’m wrong about that, I’d appreciate any reader input from a club or area where the event still thrives.
First, even the name has been changed. It’s become CL Dive Bombing and Strafing, AMA Event 333. It’s no longer simply about breaking balloons. A timed speed run was added, along with bonus appearance points, which introduces human judgment and effectively replaces precise digital scoring by adding squishy analog scoring.
Let’s first look at the rules that were used by at least a couple of clubs that I flew with before those rules became “refined.” Nearly everyone flew their general-purpose knock-about models, many being Profile aircraft in the .35 cu. in. engine range, using an appropriate-size tank. The only rule about the model itself was that you couldn’t put pins along the wing’s leading edge to break the balloons.
We used the same setup for the five balloons as what is shown in the sketch in the current rule book. Each balloon sat on top of a 1/4-inch square, 3-foot long balsa stick and were spaced 10 feet apart. However, there was no tall “barrier pole” that was 15 feet in front of the first balloon. You simply scored one point for each balloon that was broken, and only one point was given for each lap. That meant that if you broke all five balloons on one pass, you received just one point. A max flight was initially just five points and was seldom achieved at first.
After a while, too many five-point flights were being scored, so the first refinement was to require breaking the last balloon first, working your way back to the first balloon. That meant if you broke the fourth and fifth balloons on your first scoring lap, you got just one point because the fourth one wasn’t the last in line but the fifth one was. If you dropped into the middle and popped the third balloon first, there was no score because it wasn’t the last in line.
More refinements began creeping in when I lost touch with the event. There’s not room here to describe all of the added rules, other than to say that many are simply essential safety rules, but many more must have developed as a result of something someone didn’t like, such as flying a little high or stunting. Shucks, that would have ruled out me performing a little hot-dogging by breaking the last balloon while flying inverted, but those final rules might have kept a better hot-shot pilot from breaking each of the five balloons at the bottom of a series of loops.
I’m running up against word count, so I will plan to continue the discussion about special events next time.
SOURCES:
CL Special Events 2019-2021
www.modelaircraft.org/sites/default/files/
CL_Special_Events_2019-2021.pdf
Society of Antique Modelers (SAM)
www.antiquemodeler.org
Flying Aces Club (FAC)
www.flyingaces.com
