Originally Posted by Larry Jolly

Econoaline,
The model is a Bob Smith " Sea Breeze" that featured profiles designed by Hi Johnson which is where the additional catalog originated. LJ

I was going to say the same thing. I had a Sea Breeze as my second model about 1979 or 1980. I used to live up Foxen Canyon in Santa Barbara County as a kid and tried teaching myself sloping on the hill that overlooks Firestone Winery. There were some experienced guys who flew that hill and I used to hang out with them to watch, but when I showed up with the Sea Breeze no one was around. Of course, as a teenager, I couldn't wait so I gave her a toss and had a nice flight but the landing was another story. Thanks for posting the photos.

<moved over from he "Shuttle" thread becasue it's not Shuttle related..>

Originally Posted by ChuckA

Maybe Frank or someone will tell what happened to his design that should have won best original design at the 74 SOAR Nats.

That must be his and Milt's Windsong 1500 (for 1500 square inches). Big, big airplane. Super-thin undercambered crescent of an airfoil. I think it fluttered at something like 15knots of airspeed...

He had the radio fail in it a year or two ago and damaged it pretty badly, but its still in the basement awaiting rebuild. The wing was so thin that it needed three separate I-beam spars to handle the launch loads. He's talked about reengineering the spar system with more modern materials, don't know if he'll get around to it or not.

Thermaler. I think you have a Legionair 140 so I have a question for you. Mr. Kite posted a group of adds for legionairs and shuttles. #19 in the shuttle thread. On the 140 Legionair add
there was a list of comp. wins. 74 ama nats,75 soar nat, 75 us fai team, & 77 world fai speed record. I am trying to find a little infro. about these wins. From Chuck Andersons post we
find that rdeis"s dad Frank Deis won the 75 soar nat and I remember well Skip, LeMon, and
Dale winning the team championship F3B in S.A. in 75. What I am searching for is details
about the 74 ama nats win and the 77 world speed record. In the soaring history thread a lot
information has been posted. Do you recall any post that had details about the 74 & 77 events.
Tnks for any help you may be able to provide. Bill

Frank's original design that placed second for best original was a pod and boom sailplane that looked very much like a Legionair. I thought it should have won best original. Afte the contest was over, Frank sat it on the ground behind his car while he opend the trunk only to have a woman drive over it. Here are the 74 SOAR Nats results as posted in the October 1974 Sailplane.

Frank sat it on the ground behind his car while he opend the trunk only to have a woman drive over it

I always wondered why there was a spare tip panel for that airplane in the wing rack. It seems that the rest of the wing was crushed as her tire rolled over it span-wise so that tip panel was all that remained. They built a complete new wing and kept the remaining tip as a spare.

Hey, Chuck, there's a story from that event about a bunch of pilots getting together to rebuild a damaged airplane overnight so it could compete the next day, do you remember that? I thought it was Frank's Windsong after it having been run over, but maybe it was something different? I keep getting the stories conflated together. (I'll look for a Windsong picture...)

Milt was telling me about him snatching a model out of the air to save it from spinning in after a radio failure, too...

Tnks Chuck. You are the "go to man". From the 74 Soar Nats data you provided, I see that LeMon Payne won the Precision Duration Unlimited Event and I bet it was with a 140" Legionair. Do you have any information about the 1977 world fai speed record? Bill

I will check my issues of Sailplane but I don't remember any thing about the 1977 world fai speed record. Sailplane was primarily about thermal soaring in the US. I will check my Sailplane file tomorrow but I only remember comments about the speed record in the other magazines. (We did have several back in 1977). : )

At the 1974 SOAR Nats, the Hunsville Alabama Junior team was trying to repeat their 1973 Junior Team championship but one of the team members wiped out on the second day. Everybody pitched in and rebuilt the basket case overnight. It wasn't quite enough and they had to settle for second place in 1975, It was a remarkable rebuild using five-minute epoxy. No CA back then.

L-R, Mark Smith, Otto Heitecker, these two Gentlemen were my hero's back in the day. Awesome pilots and great contributors to the RC Sailplane movement.
Their standing in front of the SOAR clubs score board, where would we be without Dan Pruss and his fellow SOAR club members.

Ray
Sky Bench ... Woodys Forever
WWW.Skybench.com

The SOAR Nats scoreboard never posted the results of the last round so we had to go to the banquet that night to find out who won. 1974 was Otto's last year in sailplane competition because he switched from flying models to the real thing. He did come back to the 75 SOAR Nats because he was last year's champion. I did get to spend an enjoyable 1974 Thanksgiving weekend talking to Otto when we both attended the Silver springs Maryland that established Soaring as an official AMA event. I don't remember if Ray attended that meeting.

A touch of Cal.

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BzNP...WEk/edit?pli=1


Joe

Ray. Is Otto still on the green side of the grass? Bill

Originally Posted by wlm

Ray. Is Otto still on the green side of the grass? Bill

Otto and Mark are both gone.

Ray
Sky Bench ... Woodys Forever
WWW.Skybench.com

What a loss!! Tnks Ray. Bill

Chuck. LJ suggested to me that the 1977 fai speed record may have been set at f3b trials in Pensacola, Fl in 77. Do you have any infro on this ? Bill

Originally Posted by Larry Jolly

I did fly an Avatar, it belonged to the designer if I remember he was Willie Richards and was a SULA regular in the late 70's. It had a stepped fuselage that kind of hid the tow hook. This was a familiar layout in the early days showing influence of the RCM Snipe and would later lead to the Questor and others.

Just a few word on this fun history lesson, the avatar was designed by milton swan, he is a better golf that willy was also