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Spirit of St. Louis
Designed & built by Alan Covel, shown SBMC Oct 1997.
Photo taken by Bob Thompson at 62nd MMG Meeting March 1998.
Alan Covel’s flying machine was a massive 1:7 scale model of Charles Lindberg’s Ryan Monoplane “Spirit Of St. Louis” which flew from New York to Paris in 1927 in 33 hours 50 minutes.
Eighty-one inches of wingspan and Fifty inches of fuselage gleamed at us from the table. The model also boasted an 8 cylinder radial engine, periscope and compass.
An added difficulty in modelling this particular plane is the flat underside if the wing: not as easy to construct as a wing with symmetrical cross-section.
Alan powered up the Japanese buggy motor and we all heard the realistic sounds as various flexible plates were rapidly struck by a rotating cam.
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