back in the day ....

[saguy]

my dad was a keen modeller and whilst he built a few plasticy ones (i fondly recall a zero 1/32 and an mtb) was very keen on the balsa wood stuff .... many a fine hour was spent flying his prop driven models or gliders using a fishing rod and line to launch them and then haring off down the vlei to retrieve it ... cleaning out our shed on the w/end and i found this .......

do folks still build them?

lindsey

 

[Airborne01]

Haven't made one for decades Lindsey - remember them with affection though - as well as those with tissue covered framework!
Steve

 

[PaulinKendal]

Here's a rubber band powered VMC Sopwith Camel I made last year. Lots of fun to build, I've not yet summoned up the nerve to fly it!

 

[Jakko]

“KeilKraft” … funny name if you speak Dutch and German — in the former, keilen means “to chuck” (as in throw) and I read Kraft with a K as the German word for “force”, not as the intended variant spelling of “craft”. Seems somehow appropriate for a flying model you launch by hand

 

[Jim R]

Many years ago when I was but a child my dad worked for Blackburn Aircraft in Yorkshire. The firm had a model aircraft flying club. They would fly tethered model planes round and round in a circle. The 'pilot' stood in the centre of the circle. Sometimes they would have two flying in combat which entailed each plane trying to cut a streamer attached to the tails. As an eight year old it was very exciting.
Happy days
Jim

 

[saguy]

Here's a rubber band powered VMC Sopwith Camel I made last year. Lots of fun to build, I've not yet summoned up the nerve to fly it!

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Lol ... I had no such qualms with taking my dads stuff to fly ... With his permission of course. They were tough little buggers .... Any tears in the fabric would quickly repaired ... Eventually they wud suffer catastrophic damage but what fun!!

 

[Dave Ward]

My father was a keen modeller - he used to build boats & slope soarers - biggies, with about a 3m wingspan he even built the radio controls for them ( single channel rudder control only! ), and was an eager subscriber of Aeromodeller . My brother made a few control line aircraft ( like Jim mentioned ) - it made me dizzy, just watching them. I used to build Keil Kraft Eezebilt, Jetex powered planes & graduated to r/c powered aircraft. Sadly my piloting skills never matched my building, and I don't remember any lasting more than a few flights ( I'm still rubbish at video games as well ). The smells still are in the memory, balsa cement, dope & 2-stroke exhaust..............
Dave

 

[Airborne01]

My old man made several large scale ships using the 'bread and butter' method of hull construction; the two I actually recall him sailing were HMS Ajax (8' long) and the Praetoria Castle (about 6, long). He also made balsa wood gliders and some plastic models including the State Coach and a Roman chariot - both about 1/72 but I can't recall the manufacturer. Seems many of us have parental influence in our backgrounds!
Steve

 

[Dave Ward]

My old man made several large scale ships using the 'bread and butter' method of hull construction; the two I actually recall him sailing were HMS Ajax (8' long) and the Praetoria Castle (about 6, long). He also made balsa wood gliders and some plastic models including the State Coach and a Roman chariot - both about 1/72 but I can't recall the manufacturer. Seems many of us have parental influence in our backgrounds!
Steve

Steve,
I would think that the limited TV service in the 50/60's meant that other hobbies were common. In the winter evenings, when my father couldn't do any gardening, he was usually making a model ( and mother was knitting ), and as kids in the 60/70's, we followed suit - no computers, or video games then. My father was never an avid reader ( unlike myself ), and would spend hours over his building board
Dave

 

[Tim Marlow]

It’s also a useful side effect of radio listening, which was still common then. You don’t have to see radio, so you can do other things at the same time.

 

[Airborne01]

Steve,
I would think that the limited TV service in the 50/60's meant that other hobbies were common. In the winter evenings, when my father couldn't do any gardening, he was usually making a model ( and mother was knitting ), and as kids in the 60/70's, we followed suit - no computers, or video games then. My father was never an avid reader ( unlike myself ), and would spend hours over his building board
Dave

Totally agree Dave!
My (youthful) wife knits like an automaton as a release mechanism from school management induced stress- producing top quality end results (and shed loads thereof), we also listen to the radio (Wireless, surely!), we don't do video games - perhaps we are stuck in a virtual world (Cue 'Time Warp' from the Rocky Horror Show!) and the companionable silence of co-existing whilst engrossed in our individual hobbies is a pleasure to endure! Plus, we relish the joy of conversation - which seems to be a fast-fading skill! (Sometimes I get a word in edgeways!). The downside is that sometimes I have to endure Strictly ....
Steve

 

[Gern]

Aaaahhhhh! Married bliss! Alas, that seems to have gone the way of balsa wood kits amongst the young nowadays. Wonder if there's a connection?

I never got involved with the balsa generation even though I guess a lot of my youth was spent in it. I went from Lego straight to Airfix. I remember seeing balsa kits on the shelves next to the Airfix stand, but they were waaayyy beyond my pocket money, and I wasn't prepared to save for them.

I got 2/6d per week back then, and for that princely sum I could either buy a box of Lego spares or an Airfix kit.

Anybody else remember the Lego stand with the accessory boxes? Back then, Lego pieces were all fairly basic with no specialised shapes or kits. Everything was based on the idea that you created your own designs. I remember quite vividly trying and failing to get an advance on my pocket money the first time I saw a set of Lego wheels. They were 5/- - two week's pocket money - and I was practically wetting myself for a week in anticipation of getting a box which contained four wheels and two axle bricks. I can't remember ever anticipating any other event in my life with such eagerness - how sad is that?!

PS Note I did say "amongst the young" - I don't want you folks wot 'ave bin wed for donkey's years 'avin' to petition the mods to get rid of this impudent young upstart! From what I've seen on here there's still plenty of married bliss between some of the older members here. Good on yer!

 

[Airborne01]

I'm not sure I mentioned 'married bliss' - the peace and solitude of the Man Cave can sometimes be ' a price beyond pearls', especially when The Boss is insistent on watching 'Virgin River', the 'Gilmore Girls' and other dross of that ilk! Having said that, the beatific smile when I ask if she wants a brew is all worth it!

 

[BarryW]

I was a child in the 60’s and I had a routine to feed my Airfix habit. I would get a shilling a week pocket money from my dad. I would jump on my bike and ride 2 miles to the other side of town to see my grandad who gave me 6d. In the meantime I gathered up pop bottles from home and various places where I knew I could find them and take them to a shop to get the deposits (yes kids, we oldies did recycling way back then). With this cash I went to a second hand book shop and bought a pile of books, making sure that they were good quality, I separated the ones I wanted to read and swapped them out for those I read the previous week and then went to another second hand book shop that paid me double for the books than I paid. …..

So not only did I get to double my pocket money including what my grandad gave me, I doubled what I got on the bottles as well, read a couple of books essentially for free and funded my models!

Needless to say I was well cut out for business when I grew up.

 

[Ian M]

“KeilKraft” … funny name if you speak Dutch and German — in the former, keilen means “to chuck” (as in throw) and I read Kraft with a K as the German word for “force”, not as the intended variant spelling of “craft”. Seems somehow appropriate for a flying model you launch by hand

Fun fact. Edward Keil was directly involved in the production of the Mosquito aircraft. He was the founder/owner of a reproduction furniture makers, It was his son that had the idea of model aeroplanes after a visit to the States.

 

[boatman]

WELL i spent wks back when i was young about 15 building a keil craft f86 saber
an i covered in in tishue paper an doped it an i fitted a jetex motor in it but never painted it as i could not wait to see it fly so took it out in the feild an held it above my head an got out my ciggy lighter an forggetin that dope was highly imflameable when i struck my lighter the plane just went up with a whoof an i was just left holing the jetex motor that had the fuse burning down to start an i let go of that qiuckly as well as these motors went red hot when running an boy was i sick all that work of building the plane only to have it go up in a bang but well we live an learn an i certainly learnted but what fun times they were the young now a days dont know what they are missing
chris

 

[Tim Marlow]

Not funny at the time, but pretty hilarious now Chris….

 

[boatman]

Not funny at the time, but pretty hilarious now Chris….

YES Tim like a young idiot i forgot to line the planes bottom with tin foil to give it heat proection around near the jetex engine an well what a bang that made an yes i look back at these times an think well at least i took up the challenge of doin it an have a really good laugh myself an think god i was niaeve then
chris

 

[Jim R]

Hi Chris
As Tim says it's funny now but at the time you must have been scared stiff.
Jim

 

[Dave Ward]

Ahhh Jetex - https://www.jetex.org/ I had several successful (free ) flights with a small plane - It finally ended up stuck in an unclimbable tree! I had a jetex car - it was tethered & just went in a circle ( boring ). I saw several fancy Jetex models, including a form of helicopter ( one engine at the tip of each rotor ). I seem to remember the Jetex engines were numbered, 50, 100, 150 depending on size & number of fuel pellets.
Even more specialist - microfilm aircraft

I remember seeing these as about an 8 year old in an aircraft hangar in Sheffield ( very fragile )
Dave