Stephanies Streaker (oz12380)

About this Plan

Stephanies Streaker. Rubber stick model.

Quote: "Here's a well designed model, by an expert, that should bring fun - and performance - to the beginning modeler. Hand wind it and have fun. Mechanically wind it and have a run! Stephanies Streaker, by George Perryman.

'Streaker', by modern definition, is indicative of one divested of raiment and striding swiftly through a public area. Such a title might be apt here since this is a bare bones little model, totally devoid of external covering, which moves rather briskly. 'Stephanie's Streaker' was designed about four years before the college crowd made this fad popular. Actually, the name is in honor of my granddaughter, Stephanie, age 4-1/2, and Big Daddy's pet. (God knew what he was doing when he invented Grandkids.) She and I have had a ball flying this little ship.

Frank Zaic once told me that kids don't get much kicks from watching a floating glide, but really delight in seeing their little model climb like a turpentined cat going up a tree. With the rather poor glide of Stephanie's Streaker, it can be flown in a limited area, on calm days, even after climbing quite high.

Construction is exactly like a hand-launched glider. In fact, it is a HLG with a prop hung on front. Choose light balsa for wing, stab, and sub-rudder. Use hard 1/4 inch balsa for the fuselage. Sand everything to shape and finish using L400 sandpaper. Use 2 coats. sanding sealer, let dry, and sand lightly again. Decorate it with decals, dope, or colored tissue strips, to your own taste, as the small extra weight won't hurt much. Prop bearing shown works well, but you can substitute a complete front end from something like Sig's Thermal Dart, with good results. If you use bearing as shown on plans, lightly epoxy it to nose with approximately 2 degrees down and 3 degrees right thrust. Just use enough epoxy to hold for a few test flights and then it can be firmly bonded.

Flying is the fun part, and here are a few thoughts on this. Stephanie's Streaker can be flown on one 14 inch long loop of 1/8, 3/16, or 1/4 inch rubber. The excitement factor goes up proportionally to size of rubber and number of turns wound. When using 1/4 inch rubber fully wound, it is advised to clear spectators from the area in event of a mishandled launch At 5/8 oz, each flight is filled with all kinds of exciting things! Excitement factor is somewhat reduced by using more moderate 1/8 or 3/16 inch rubber, but flights are more consistent. (Streaking flights with 1/4 inch are consistently filled with terror.)

Choose a fairly calm day with soft grass or weeds for first test flights. Be sure model, complete with rubber, bal-ances as shown on plans. Try flying with a few hand winds. Model should climb right and glide left. After a smooth flight pattern is obtained, epoxy prop bearing firmly to nose. A bit of clay on nose or tail for fine adjustment. Cut rudder TE and bend for desired circle. Don't put the winder to it until it will fly OK on hand winds. I built Stephanie a little battery powered electric winder which she uses to really wind 'em in. It is a simple thing: a gearmotor mounted on a piece of wood, 2 screen door handles, with a Frisbee screwed on front to keep her from harm by a bro-ken rubber motor. It weighs less than one pound.

Stephanie's Streaker doesn't rival a Nordic A-2 in glide, but has on occasion run into a thermal, strictly by chance. On a couple of flights, it was going up in a boomer and the rubber slipped off the prop shaft with a beautiful dethermalizing effect. (Of course, I tried to con spectators that this was a planned effort.)

For lots of fun flying with little building time, try Stephanie's Streaker. This one is designed only for young folks. (All modelers of any age are young folks)."

Stephanies Streaker, Model Builder, June 1994.

Direct submission to Outerzone.

Supplementary file notes

Article pages, thanks to RFJ.

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