Seventy-four-Year-Old In Glow Emergence - Ken Cashion

I used to be on this group and then I got busy in my music and such, but a lot of modeling has changed for me over the last few years. I was into e-flight big-time.

I will spare you the story ? but basically, I had to back away from all model competition, and that meant that I lost interest in model development, the associated testing, and even sport flying. Of late, this has changed and though I will still not be competing, I would like to do some sport flying...which I do understand is the principle form of model flight.

I have taken a little time to figure out how I should "get back in." And no, it does not include going out and jumping into 2.4 gig,

4-cycle gas, and planes costing three-times my first car. I am returning to where I was when I checked out. My last glow flight was mid-June, 1998 ? at a Houston contest (naturally).

I remember when I was maybe 24 and all my modeling things were kept shiny and new, and then some real old codger would come on the field and his flight boxes had a 1/4" of gunk on them, his planes looked like trash...so did he, now that I think about it...and I would think, 'Hey, guy! Have you no pride for the hobby?!!!'

I am getting back in and I do not want to be that old guy...well, I will be 74 but I mean about the other stuff.

So, I have just this a.m., put new coats of gloss polyurethane on old flight boxes and will start checking my parts supplies...if I can figure out where they might be. Just a month ago, I gave away a ton of fuel tanks and wheels and accessories, so you can see how recent this decision is.

I am amassing an order for model stuff now. (I had to call an OFB to ask if my Sullivan starter was 6 volts or 12. Obviously, I knew this at one time.)

So there are other things I used to know, and I will be asking about them around here. Bear with me. I am a fast learner...or re-learner in this case.

And by the way...some things haven't changed in all this time: I still feel violated when I pay my AMA dues, and I am reminded of this each month when the magazine comes. This comment is not meant to start another long debate, but it is just a statement of my (and the AMA's) consistency. Ken Cashion, AMA 69222.

P.S. I did not go back and read every posting since I was here last because there were 12,654 of them. I apologize for this slight to the group.

I will go back and read all that were posted since my birthday in October. Selecting that date seemed arbitrary enough.

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Ken Cashion
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On Sat, 24 Jan 2009 10:02:01 -0600, Ken Cashion wrote in :

All is forgiven. ;o)

Welcome back!

Marty

Reply to
Martin X. Moleski, SJ

Welcome back.

But _he_ kept it up -- you burnt out. Hmm.

(yes, I'm pulling your leg)

I always showed up with a nice model and all my tools in a bucket, 'cause I didn't have the money for a nice flight box. Now I've graduated to one of those orange plastic tool bins, because I'm a cheapskate.

So did you get a new number, or were you just active since your 50's?

Tim Wescott, 47, AMA 64232

Reply to
Tim Wescott

Didn't you have some hurricane damage? mk (who misremembers)

Reply to
MJKolodziej

Yes, Sir. In 2005, Katrina decided that three oak trees to our southeast should be on top of our house..and that broke the back of the house...lots of other stuff came down. We were very fortunate. We had about a $35,000 hurricane and Allstate treated us so good, I wrote a letter to the CEO and I took two boxes of candy to our local agent's office.

We have no complaints...as we all said around here, "If you weren't in New Orleans; you were blessed."

Ken Cashion, 69222

Reply to
Ken Cashion

Thank you...

Not exactly correct even in jest. These guys would show up once a year to complain about the field and the club...and most everything else as I can remember...and they never changed planes...anything...one was still flying on 27.095. I only minded when I needed that clip.

They gave a completely new meaning to "Ugly Stick."

I have been flying but just e-power. I have flown a 12' sailplane of my design until it was a speck at the base clouds..the same model today would go out of my focus at a 1,500'. (It would slowly disappear if I stared...and blinking the eyes and staring are mutually exclusive. )

When competing in duration, each fellow's volume of competition is the range of his vision. A bloke who can see his model at 3/4 mile, has a volume of 2 pi with a radius of that 3/4 miles...and that is a 1.5 mile diameter at the base.

When he is competing against "those other sort of eyes" with a 1,000' radius...guess who will have a greater chance of finding lift in their respective arenas of competition?

I have always made my own boxes with custom compartments for whatever I might be needing that day. I had one for sailplanes, one for glow, one for 1/2A glow, one for e-flight, one for just general flying...plus I had a folding table with ways these boxes would nestle.

That is why I have so many. I was often told that it was too bad my models didn't look as good as my flight boxes. I never understood their point exactly...

That is the only number I have had and I got it in maybe 1962 when I started flying r/c in competition. I was 28. They recycle numbers. I had been building models since the 3rd grade and flying them since the

5th. I wonder if it was as much fun as I remembered.

I started with rudder-only escapement and moved up to Galloping Ghost

-- and then the big time: two-channel, simultaneous and proportional brick in a powered glider.

I am thinking about gutting that transmitter except for the sticks and putting semi-modern electronics in it. I did like the way it felt...it was a World.

I still have the escapment but I don't want to go THAT far back!

Ken Cashion, 69222.

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Ken Cashion

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