Not sure where it came from, but I got an Alpha for my birthday in 1978. I think it was the Deluxe Starter Outfit that was in the 1977 catalog, but I also got my Big Foot pad in the X-Wing set that same birthday. (I still have both the Solar Launch Controller and the Big Foot.) I built the Alpha on Friday night, painted it on Saturday, and dragged Mom, Dave and Jen out to NKU for a few flights after church. I kinda remember Mom taking pictures, but nothing has ever shown up. Not unusual, because Mom had a habit of finishing a roll of film, then letting it sit around for five, ten, fifteen years before she took them to have them developed. As a result, we have a lot of film damaged by light seepage. They have a purple tint to them. Sometimes she just found the film canisters and tossed them out, and I think that happened with the launch pics and a football movie I had her film for us a couple of years later.

__________________
Bill Eichelberger
NAR 79563

http://wallyum.blogspot.com/

I miss being SAM 0058

Build floor: Estes - Low Boom SST Semroc - Marauder, Shrike, SST Shuttle

In paint: Canaroc - Starfighter Scorpion Centuri - Mini Dactyl Estes - F-22 Air Superiority Fighter, Multi-Roc, Solar Sailer II, Xarconian Cruiser Semroc - Cyber III

Ready to fly: Estes - Solar Sailer II Semroc - Earmark

I do not have many pics from my earliest days. This is one of my oldest. North Georgia Regional Meet (NRGM) in 1971, near Atlanta. My first NAR contest. I am standing 3rd from right, just left of the guy with the headwear. The "kid" second from left, looking down, well, he owns Estes. John Langford.


NGRM the next year, 1972. Front row, 3rd from left. John Langford. Me, 2nd from right. Won an Interceptor, my favorite Estes kit that's not a glider or 1/45 Little Joe.



Polaroid of most of my contest models for NGRM in 1973, I think. Among them, Dual Egglofter (Staged D12's), Payloader, Flex-wing Gliders, Slide-pod Rocket Gliders, 1/4A Swing-wing rocket glider, flex-wing glider, parachute or streamer models, and a converted Plastic Model Lunar Module. By that time, I was more into shooting super-8 movies than doing photos.



Jon Robbins' Groundhog series of Swing-Wings had an effect. I built a series of Swing-wings of 6 foot span or more that I called Great Dane. This is the first one, 1972, only one to use a pop-pod. I'm at right, a friend at left.



Here's an image of another Great Dane, one with a "K" type tail.


One of my best was Great Dane 15, built by 1976 and flown in F Rocekt Glide. I built a clone of it in 1992, here it is shortly before launch on a D12 test flight (flew best on an F10). It had a pop-=stab DT, like the 1976 model had.


And.....same model in 2007 or so. I added some small radio gear to make it steerable by rudder, no elevator. It flew and handled VERY well. Ended up crashing a couple of years later when the wings did not deploy. I really miss that one.



More, later.

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Contest flying, Sport flying, it's all good.....
NAR# 18723 NAR.org
GeorgesRockets.com
Georges'CancerGoFundMe:
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Nice vintage pics, George !

__________________
When in doubt, WHACK the GAS and DITCH the brake !!!

Yes, there is such a thing as NORMAL, if you have to ask what is "NORMAL" , you probably aren't !
Failure may not be an OPTION, but it is ALWAYS a POSSIBILITY.
ALL systems are GO for MAYHEM, CHAOS, TURMOIL, FIASCOS, and HAVOC !

Some Rocket Cars, around 1977. Mine is in the middle. BT-60, over 3 feet long.


Some "X-planes" in 1978, all three scratch-built. I tried to make the big X-wing at left glide. The upper wings deployed up into a "K" type arrangement, but it would not glide. The one in the middle sacrificed accuracy for glide. It had a swing-out scissor type clear plastic canard, and did did glide (Nose ejected off to let the canard deploy). And the X-15 used about a 2.6" tube, and glided pretty nicely for its size and mass. It was a "profile" type model, and I never got around to trying to create decals for it, as that was not very practical in 1978.


I got into making shuttle models. A crude 1/80 orbiter in August 1977. And by 1982, having gotten into R/C, a piggybacked orbiter at 1/72 scale, with wings a bit oversized.


By 1984, a 1/72 full stack shuttle prototype, with scale sized wings. There were a lot of tests, and a lot of setbacks along the way. Heck in 1984 I was not even trying to do a "serious" scale shuttle for contests, I did not have the skills.


So, by 1999, 22 years after the first crude orbiter, with skills and technology I never dreamed of having then....


Backtracking, once I sort of started to get serious about scale in the early 1980's. a Delta 3920 model. BT-70 with Centuri #8 tubes for the solids. This model got me into doing vac-forming, for all those booster noses and nozzles.

__________________
Contest flying, Sport flying, it's all good.....
NAR# 18723 NAR.org
GeorgesRockets.com
Georges'CancerGoFundMe:
https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-geo...ay-fight-cancer

Got into R/C Rocket Boosted Gliders in 1980. This was a great one, Avatar-1, using Cannon Super-Micro radio gear. 34" span. Boosted on a D12 or staged D12's. Lasted for 49 flights.


One of the boosts. This was 2-staged, and I was not ready to control boosts by R/C much, so used a big long pod for staged boosts.


A rudder-only model, a 2-channel Avatar, and Gentle Lady sailplane in 1981.


Circa February 1988. Preparing for first test flight of "sunguidance" project. At that time it only had control on the pitch axis, which led to a pretty wild flight due to a bit of a roll. By the second flight it had 2-axis control and went well from there.

__________________
Contest flying, Sport flying, it's all good.....
NAR# 18723 NAR.org
GeorgesRockets.com
Georges'CancerGoFundMe:
https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-geo...ay-fight-cancer

In the photo of the Maxi-Brute Honest John on an FSI F100, I am standing 4th from the right. To my left is Bob Koenn in shorts & t-shirt . . . The year was 1975.

Dave F.

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Well, I knew I had some polaroid pics from 1978-1979 because I have a scanned pic of me with my FSI Mach-1 Dart in a few places on the forum that I scanned many years ago with a really crappy scanner
I have an old Epson V500 Photo Scanner sitting here collecting dust that I never could get to work with Linux ... well it worked for a while and then stopped. I now have a Windows laptop that I use to work from home and loaded the drivers on my laptop and whala now my scanner works again so I set out to find the CMR Manta picture. In doing so I found two old photo albums filled with polaroid pictures all dated 1978-1979 same time frame as the FSI Mach-1 Dart picture so I may try to scan a few of the better ones. I haven't looked through these albums since before I moved in 2008 so pretty stoked that I actually located them yesterday. Some of the stills look okay but the slow shutter speed of that old polaroid camera caught mostly blurry shots of anything already off the rod and in flight.

Maybe with the scanner and some sharpening I can get a few decent scans of these pics. I probably need to scan some of these pics anyway because I don't think these polaroid pics will last forever

BTW great thread Bill. GREAT posts everyone ... keep the pictures coming.
I LOVE looking at old rocketry photos!
.

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__________________
Steve Naquin
TRA# 677 L2
NAR# 85518 L2
SAM# 0052

🚀 In Construction: Der Blue Maxx/Minie-Magg 5.5” & Vander-Burn MDRM Clone w/Stickershock23 Custom Decals
🚀 In Paint & Detail: USR Banshee
🚀 In Build Queue: Estes Doorknob w/Vander-Burn Rocketry Upgrade Kit [Sport Decor], Semroc Centurion-F, Semroc Egg Crate
🚀 In Repair: SLS Lil’ Hustler, SLS Aero-Dart 1969 Trim
🚀 Stay Tuned For Fall 2021 Launch Dates

Wow, Steve! Looks like you have lots of vintage photos there! Looking forward to seeing what you are able to scan. I have some Instamatic photos circa 1978 in one of my rocket photo albums that contain tons and tons of LDRS photos, but all the LDRS stuff, even going back to 1991, seem almost like yesterday still, even though my first LDRS — LDRS10 — is almost 30 years ago now! But, I may try to post some of the old Instamatic images from the late 70s, if I can find them.

Looks like you got some good coverage there of your ‘golden’ years!

Earl

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Earl L. Cagle, Jr.
NAR# 29523
TRA# 962
SAM# 73
Owner/Producer
Point 39 Productions

Rocket-Brained Since 1970

This would have been 1986 or 1987. Flying a NASA Pegasus near my parent’s house.

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Ah, back in the day when young kids could build a good looking scale model using common household materials

Frank

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RC Rocket glider kits
www.dynasoarrocketry.com