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Balsa USA Stick #2
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This is the second plane I ever built. It, too, is an original Balsa USA Swizzle Stick, and is not much younger than my
first one.
I built it because I had so much fun building the first one, I just had to build another. Plus, I wanted to
improve my building skills. This plane either sat in storage or hung on my wall for many years and hasn't flown nearly
as much as my first one. However, in November, 2002, I revived it by installing new servos and an O.S. .40 FP engine
converted to diesel and flew it on the day before Veteran's Day. It felt good!
For some reason, the paint on this airplane is still sticky to this day. I'm actually not sure it is the paint, as it
does not appear to rub off on anything, but it has been this way as long as I can remember. After I flew it with a diesel
engine for the first time and cleaned it up, it seemed as though it was no longer sticky. But later, after I got it home,
it was sticky again. It is a very strange mystery that I cannot explain.
This plane has suffered a few mishaps, but nothing serious. The only major patch on the wing was added in November, 2002,
after ripping a hole in it during transit. Blasted hangar rash! It has suffered some of the same notorious
landing gear problems that I experienced with my
first airplane. In fact, I made my very first landing, ever, with this
plane...without the landing gear! It was a day that changed my life. I knew then that if I could land a plane without
landing gear, I could certainly land it with landing gear!
Let me explain how this event transpired. You see, back when I was learning how to fly, my flying buddy and I would fly
wherever we could find a place (school yard, clearing in the desert, new roads, etc.). On this particular day, we
found ourselves in an area of new housing development where the roads were in place, but no structures, yet. In fact,
there was still virgin desert land bordering the roads, teaming with desert foliage. Therefore, take-offs and landings
were limited to the asphalt. And this particular asphalt was lined with concrete curbs.
Take-offs and landings were my most feared maneuvers in my early days of flying. I had gained enough confidence to take
off by myself, but had not yet conquered my fear of landing. On this particular occasion, there was a cross-wind blowing
over the road, which tested my imperfect take-off skills. My take-off run was anything but straight down the line. The
wind turned my airplane directly toward the curb, and I couldn't turn it away. I thought there was enough room and speed
to take off before hitting the curb, but it wasn't quite enough.
The plane lifted up into the air, but just a moment too late. The wheels hit squarely on the face of the curb and the
landing gear came right off. Miraculously, I didn't break a prop. The engine almost stalled, but roared back to life,
and before I knew it, the plane was airborne. I knew it was safe in the air, so I decided to just fly it until it ran
out of fuel. I rather liked how the plane looked and flew without the draggy landing gear hanging off the bottom. It
was fun.
But then the unexpected happened. The engine died. The tank was still nearly 3/4 full, but I did something to cause the
engine to sputter and puke. Unfortunately, my friend was also flying his plane at the time, so he was occupied.
Fortunately, my plane was in a nice approach position. My friend asked if I wanted him to land it while I kept his
plane airborne, but I refused this time and kept my focus intently fixed on my descending aircraft. My thumbs pressed
firmly against the control sticks - so hard, it made my thumbs ache.
It was a picture perfect landing. I couldn't believe it! Not only that, I landed it on the relatively smooth sidewalk
and not out in the middle of the street! It was my first solo flight from beginning to end, and I was finally free of my
fear of the ground. Or, well, I now had the confidence to land the plane on my own in future flights.
One addition I made to this airplane was a much-improved "bomb drop" mechanism. It was actually a box with a
servo-actuated door on the bottom. I was all set to drop all kinds of things from this contraption!
Probably one of the funniest things I ever dropped was this large, rubber gorilla. I took the plane up as
high as I could see it, and let it drop. I was getting pretty good with my accuracy. In fact, I almost dropped in on
my car one day...although I wasn't aiming for it...but it was not too far from where I was standing.
The gorilla would drop with its arms and legs flailing in the wind as it tumbled from the sky. Then it would hit the
ground and bounce back up into the air (usually) - one time it bounced back up about 30 feet! I don't know whatever
happened to that gorilla, but I am determined to find another one someday.
Another slight modification to this airplane was the addition of a 1/4" plywood block beneath the engine mount. Actually,
I think this was done as a result of a crash in which the engine was ripped from its mounts (I think I hit a tree).
This turned the nose into a reasonably industructable ram. The days of splitting the wooden motor mounts on
crash landings were over. But then, I don't think I ever "crashed" hard enough with that plane since then to really put
it to the test.
The thing I like about the Swizzle Sticks (and the Stick 40s) is that they are tanks. They can take a few rough landings
(even a ground loop on a couple of occasions) and keep on going. I remember one day I hit a tall tree on landing approach.
It didn't really hit the tree, it just sort of came to rest there. The hard part was getting it down. Actually, it was
easy for me, because someone else got it down. But it barely had a scratch on it.
I believe it was this plane with which I had a very profound experience that will remain forever etched in my memory. I
took the plane down to Mexico, just south of the Arizona border, to a beach where my family camped a lot while I was
growing up. While my plane was airborne, it attracted the attention of a huge crowd of young Mexican children that, I
assume, had just been released from school for the day. This crowd of children gathered around me on the beach, leaving
no place for me to land. I became very worried, especially since I did not speak their native language.
My mother was sitting on the beach nearby - she couldn't speak Spanish, either - and she had no ideas about how to deal with
the situation. I figured I had about 5 minutes of fuel left, but thought I better figure something out *before* I needed
to land. There were at least 40 children randomly scattered about me.
I looked at the children for a moment and saw the most incredible look on all their faces. They were in awe. They were
in awe of me, and they were in awe of my airplane. And not one of them was speaking. They had probably never seen
anything like it, living under the poor conditions they faced every day. It was then that I had the idea that maybe I
didn't need words to communicate to them - perhaps I could just make a gesture or something. What happened next was so
incredible, I thought I had to be dreaming or watching a movie.
I stuck my arm straight out in front of me, which immediately grabbed their attention. I then slowy swept my arm to the
side, indicating to them that I wanted them to move back. It was as if I had a long pole extending from my hand down the
length of the beach, for the scattered children coalesced into what looked like a perfect line, all of them backing up as
if I were gently nudging them with my imaginary pole.
I got goose bumps just then and became worried that I might become too distracted to land the plane safely. But that
wasn't the case. I lined up for a perfect landing on the beach, and the plane rolled right up to me, and I quickly
killed the engine. The children all gathered around the plane, and every one who was close enough, reached out to
touch it. It was like a magical thing to them - as if it was not real.
I think it was then that I really gained an appreciation for the things that I had and for the freedoms I enjoyed
growing up in America. I wanted to fly the plane some more, but in the interest of safety, I thought I better not.
I'm sure they could have watched it fly all day long. But seeing that the flying was over, they all eventually migrated
back up the hill and out of sight. To this day I carry the hope that I had somehow inspired at least one of those
children to find a way to rise up out of poverty and make a better life for himself or herself and his or her family.
One can only hope.
Copyright 2002
11/20/2002