I read about this many years ago but I can't remember where. The maneuver (okay, more like a stunt) is called the Reverso and it sounds VERY dangerous!

First let me say right away that I'm not contemplating on an attempt at doing this, just want to know if anyone here has ever seen one performed.

I'll try to keep the description short. Basically you fly your lines into a pole that's solidly fixed in the ground, the pole I'm guessing is halfway between you and the plane. If done just right you should now have a plane that is pivoting around the pole and on a collision course with your head.

Okay, next step is DUCK!

Fly around the pole another half lap, do a half loop to inverted, fly back at your head, duck again etc. Make sure you fly OVER your lines as your plane approaches your head inverted! Then exit from the maneuver.

And Bob's your uncle...

It makes me flinch just thinking about it but this is EXACTLY the type of thing I would expect a group of unsupervised teens to do 50 or 60 years ago.

That was one of Davy Slagle's tricks back in the mid to late 1940s; I never met him, but George A. told some stories about Slagle. Inetrestingly, Slagle turned up on one of the Yahoo model plane forums last summer. He didn't stick around to tell any stories about himself, at least not to any great extent.

He also used to back up against a building and fly out his entire fuel load on just half of the circle.

His use of a convenient light pole did produce a convenience for solitary CL fliers. It requires very short or non-existent grass near the circle's center. Stick a long spike into the ground halfway from the center of the circle and the outer edge. Unroll the lines from the center to the spike, and around it clockwise, back to the airplane in the center (or if you attached to the plane first, go around the spike counterclockwise back to the handle and the plane).

Fuel up and start the plane (with this system, you have to always put the lines away untwisted, and might be best off winding up one at a time on separate reels). Holding the handle in one hand, and the plane's tail in the other, let it taxi away, stand up, give it a little time to pick up some speed, and pop it off the ground before the lines can snag on a weed or anything.

You don't have to wait for it to completely unwrap the pole while taxiing. You don't have a LOT of control, so step back to tighten the lines, apply some up, and neutralize as soon as it breaks ground.


Kiwi

Thanks Kiwi, relieved to hear your confirmation, was beginning to think the whole thing was imagined.

Kiwi must know everything about CL!

Originally Posted by tigreflyer

Kiwi must know everything about CL!

Marvin's been doing it longer (Big Iron), and he's the one I'm learning from, and Jim seems to remember more of the stuff, even if he waited to start modelling past when I started (myself, as a pre-teen, in the early 50s when I actually met some success), Jim wasn't a kid any more when he started a few years later.

But when Dave Slagle won stunt in the Nationals flying the Chekala Roma, he was about the age I was when just learning to fly, so he's only a few years older than I am.


Kiwi

When I was a kid and couldnt get anybody to go with me to fly, I used a 55 gallon drum trash can from the flying field. I actually had pretty good control of an old flite streak. Felt a little funny launching my own airplane that I was piloting. I put the trash can in the pilot circle and looped the lines around it. As the airplane took off I just walked toward the center. The biggest trick was not gaining so much altitude too quick that the lines would pop off the drum. Did that only once!

There is a guy selling a thing that does this. I did it in the 1970's with a fuel jug in the middle of the circle on pavement . It dragged the jug a bit when I walked back but it did work on the little mouse racer. It needed a lip on top and a secure mount.