Christchurch and District Model Flying Club
 

Diary of a flier, episode 15

The Story so far—B Leonard Wise is a Trainee model pilot and has bought himself a High Wing Trainer Kit. When he got it home he found that the instructions were in GERMAN

I was sitting at my Desk looking at the instructions and the box of bits wndering how I would ever make a plane out of it when in came my son Crispin. We rarely communicate. I cannot understand his language and he certainly does not try to understand mine. What are you up to Dad he asked. I hear you bought a Kit from the show. How did you know that I asked. Mike told me, we are in the same class at School. Mike said that you are getting on well with your flying, for an old man. It was on the tip of my tongue to say that I was not an old man. But of course to people ofhis age anyone over 30 is old. I could not believe the way he was acting.

When you have built the kit do you think you would be able to teach me to fly? Mike says it is a cool hobby. I replied that the chances of me being able to complete this kit were very remote because the instructions are in German. I fear that I have been done. It’s not like you to be done Dad he said. I cannot believe this is my Son he is not being sarcastic. I am doing German for my GCSE exams so I will be able to translate it for you. In fact I have to do a project in which I translate something from German to English, so it could be these instructions. So saying he went for a Dictionary and we started to unravel things. There were some good diagrams and between us we managed to make sense of things pretty well.

He suggested that tomorrow I should go to a local shop and get the plans copied so that we can stretch them out on the table and pin the wood to the plans. An excellent suggestion. Just then Clarisa my wife put her head around the door. I could see by the look on her face that she was astounded to see us joining forces in a project. Dinner is ready she said, so we sent to eat. I was one of the nicest meals we have had for years.

Next day I took the plans to a local shop and had them duplicated with two spare copies. In the evening when he had done his homework, or said he had done so, we combined forces to get started. The wings looked to be the easiest. We decided to make them first and he thought it would be a good idea if we did half each. So we looked at the instructions, now translated, and set too to press put the ribs, and get the right spars from the bunch in the box. It was a bit crowded in the sturdy with both of us trying to do a wing so we agreed that he would take some ribs spars and a copy of the plan and make it in his bedroom. It all looked pretty simple just pin the spars to the plan and get on with it. He said that both halves of the wings look the same which is pretty obvious if you think about it.

For the next few days we were both busy and it was two weeks before I had managed to complete the frame of the wing. I looked at it with some modest pride, took some sandpaper to rub it down a bit and it looked like a real craftsman's job. Crispin brought his completed half wing and we both felt pleased with ourselves. We looked at the two halves of the wing and tried to fit them together but they would not go. He seemed to have the bottom where the top should be and it was all wrong. I told him so and he got angry and said the same to me. We looked at the plan again, and after a long struggle realised that we had both made the LEFT HALF OF THE WING.

To be continued—BLW

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