A Tale of Two Old Timers (new short kits!)

Over the winter, The Flying Aces Club reviewed their Rulebook and (among other things) extended the eligibility for the “Old Timer” events (Old Time Stick, Old Time Fuselage, and 2-Bit-plus-One) from the end of 1946 to the end of 1950. This opened the doors for many new designs and I am going to present two here – the Baby Toots and the Ace of Diamonds.

First up is the “Baby Toots“. I’ve had my eye on this for ages. It was published in the April 1950 Model Airplane News. It is a cute little Peanut-sized Stick model with a 12.5″ span. I had thought about modifying it to an Embryo-size, but things would just be too distorted, so I let it sit.

When the news came out of the date extension, I just had to build it. It has a Ritz-style under-cambered wing and came out at just over 11 grams without rubber. I tried to fly it indoors, but just couldn’t get it right (under-powered). I had basically trimmed it in my back yard, but couldn’t pour the power to it until our (Cloudbusters) first outdoor contest this past Sunday (27 April 2025).

I put in a couple test flights, hitting about a minute, and then set it aside for other models. Later in the afternoon, I got it back out and really poured the coal to it – high torque and high winds on the loop of 1/8”. The little model went up and just kept climbing. It had a small touch of power stall, but it overcame that with ease.

I picked the wrong moment to fly. It was a perfect day with low breeze, but when I launched the variable conditions had the thermal I hooked going across the road, across the houses and yards, and over the woods. I lost site of it above the woods at 1:50. That was the end of my fun with that one!

You can find the short kit HERE.

the 11-gram, 12.5″-span Baby Toots Old Time Stick model.

The Baby Toots on its way out. A photo from its last flight on a perfect day in April.

I could write a book about the second model – the Ace of Diamonds. Again, after the 1950 news broke, modeling friend Archie Adamisin scoured Outerzone for eligible models and he found many. But this one attracted both of us and he started tracing the plan. It is from the July 1950 Model Aircraft magazine, a British publication and it is labeled as a “lightweight”. I am not sure what it originally meant, but it seems that “lightweights” are a smaller endurance/sport class in England at the time.

Archie shared the tracing with me and I got busy finishing the drawing and setting up parts for the laser cutter. This model has some distinctive characteristics: It has a diamond fuselage (really just a square set on edge), a pylon that sets the under-cambered wing up high, a single wire landing gear (the twin tails create a 3-point stance for ROG), about 145 square inches of wing area (!) and a mere 26″ wing span (!!!).

With the 26″ span, not only does this qualify for Old Time Fuselage, but also the 2-Bit event (2-Bit-plus One comes from the old term “2 bits” meaning a quarter of a dollar or 25 and 25 plus 1 extends the eligible wingspan to 26″). 145 square inches is more than most full sized Old Timers and squeezing that into a 26″ span (thanks to a 6″ chord) means this “should” be dominant in 2-Bit – or in Fuselage!

Again, I built mine up and did what I could to test in the back yard. Glide tests were literally going across the yard. 100 hand turns on the motor went ever farther – with a climb-out! Oh my! This was going to need some serious space to fly. I took it up to our field last Sunday.

The first test on about 300 turns had a big right circle and landed on the roof of a hangar (we fly at a small airport). The second test with 500 turns climbed nicely but the glide was straight – straight for a jungle of brush at the edge of the airport. This also was my first test of a Remote DT – button pushed and model saved!

A gurney on the right fin to impart right turn and a little counter-acting thrust adjustment and this thing came alive with successive 2-minute time-DT’d flights, the last getting sucked up into one of the mild thermals that were out all day. The DT went off at 2:10 and the model landed – on the field – at 3:17. It was WAY up and took its time coming down.

This model seems to be ready to do some flying for me this season! And you can get your short kit HERE.