Building and Flying a Rubber Powered Racer from the 1930's. The Howard Ike.

This video reviews my build and flight trimming of a 1932 Howard DGA-5 "Ike" built based on Cleveland Model Supply Company plans. A challenging project that ended up being a pretty good flyer. Kudos to my Flying Aces friend Mike Welshams for providing photos of the actual Ike in its present state awaiting restoration. Very cool! Thanks for watching.
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[@oliviera1099]

beautiful plane. it's a pleasure for the eyes

[@Colin399]

Magnificent build

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Thank you and thanks for watching.

[@mbasiletti]

I like how it tried to tighten the turn into the thermal at 8:09. Thought it was going to be lost for a moment there as it seems to begin a rapid climb. Beautiful build! I appreciate the effort not just with the build but with the video as well. Thanks!

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Thank you, Matt. Yes, this model has shown that thermal sniffing capability on several flights now. 😂 Really appreciate your kind words regarding the video. I'm still trying to get better.

[@f4udhorn]

Super, John! Nice rendition!

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Thank you Duke. Thanks for watching.

[@williamrobinson7435]

Beautiful. The u/c certainly has a bit of complexity to it, but we'll worth it! The engine cooling louvres have a hint of Mr Hallman about them. Nice one Sir! ⭐👍

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Thank you for the kind words William. Not sure I can ever rival the work of Tom Hallman but I sure do have fun building and flying stick and tissue models. Thanks for watching!

[@mjkluck]

Good stuff, Kiddo.

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Thank you for watching.

[@donlawrence1428]

very nice!

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Thank you Don, and thanks for watching.

[@DoyleBlevins]

Nice John

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Thank you Doyle.

[@paulnelson5314]

Very nice John, a real pleasure to watch your content. Thanks for posting

[@punkworkschannel]

This airplane is really cool looking and your building skills are superb on this model. Nice to see it in the air!

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Thank you so much.

[@xpump876]

Fantastic build - pretty awesome flight using only 15% power !

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Thank you. Yes, pretty happy with this build. The model looks great in the air with those wheel pants. :) Thanks for watching!

[@kentalbot4923]

gorgeous as always john! so many great details; does appear to be a challenging model that you were certainly up for the task. What do you like to use to seal your wood? the pants and cowl look great! thanks for sharing~

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Thank you, Ken, this one was interesting and took a bit longer than I originally expected. But it turned out fine and flies better than I expected. A lot of the extra time was completing the landing gear, including the finish work. I use Deft Lacquer Sanding Sealer for sealing the balsa. It's getting harder to find, but I actually found it on the Amazon webpage. I'll go with 3, 4, or even 5 coats sanding with 400 wet/dry between coats. The alternate is to tissue cover all the balsa and seal with dope. Thanks for watching!

[@MouseSquadron]

Beautiful job again,congratulations. The balsa framework with the sliced wing ribs is truly a work of art. I could build as well as you I might be tempted never to cover it!, However, its an equally impressive covering job and I love the use of the fingerpaint paper to simulate the louvres. Thanks for the inspiration that your posts provide.

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Thank you so much for your kind words. The sliced wing ribs certainly take practice but are still obtainable. Don't be afraid to give them a try! My first few were not so good but time has helped me get better. I'll be using the fingerpaint paper again! I'm thinking wing fillets. 😁 Keep on building and thanks for watching.

[@1garryrippon]

😎😎😎😎😎😎

[@MikeDoughty-gv4co]

Interested in how you apply the glue for registration numbers. Paint thru the tissue?

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Mike, the wing numbers are applied with Elmers Clear glue. I apply it slightly thinned to the area by dipping a wet brush in a bit of the glue I put on an index card, place the number on location and then use a slightly wetter brush to wet down the number and remove any creases or bubbles. The Elmers Clear is a great glue, it's slippery while wet so allows you to slide the number a bit. But you need to be careful because if you wait too long, it breaks down the tissue. Practice is important. The rudder registration was also applied with the Elmers Clear. It dries to a nice matte, clear finish and the tissue pretty much disappears. It also is friendly with the painted surface. Hope that answers your question and thanks for watching.

[@MikeDoughty-gv4co]

John - Thank you for the reply. I've been struggling with this aspect of scale modelling for some time and will try your method today. Here's hoping for success.

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Mike, you're welcome. I'm using that Elmers Clear a lot more these days. It's my go-to for covering and works great for wing fillets. Good luck. Experiment a bit and have fun!

[@stephengould9385]

What did you cover the model in?

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Stephen, Esaki Japanese tissue. Thanks for watching!

[@glennreach6930]

Another beautiful bird! Do you ever make ugly airplanes!? LOL I don't know if you have tried this, but I use Styrofoam meat trays to make the molds for forming laminated parts. It works easily, is free and saves balsa. Anyways, thanks for bringing us along on the build and fly journey.🥸 ps. Does anyone know why he went with tandem wheels? Always thought that was odd because of the induced drag on a racer.

[@Watchingthevideos99]

Hi Glenn. Thanks for watching. This was an interesting project that too a bit longer than expected. Yes, for small models I've used meat try foam as well as foam board. I like the form to be the same thickness as the pieces I'm laminating. In this case, I used some heavy balsawood that would unlikely ever be used for a model. And I have a lot of that. 😂 The tandem wheels are an interesting story. It's claimed that Howard did it as a gag to meet certain rules that were being proposed for race planes requiring shock absorbers. (which never came to be) So the two wheels were held by bungees and could float around an axle. One issue, it made it difficult to turn the airplane on the ground. The wheel pants were free to float with no way to hold them level other than air flow and friction on the axle. There's a cool photo of Ike racing with one wheel pant hanging low! Hope to see you soon on a video meeting. 🙂