Control Line Model Aircraft.

During the late forties a new form of powered model flight had been introduced from USA, tethered or control-line flying in which the pilot had direct control over the attitude of the model flying around him on thin wire.

And so it was that the 1947 and 1948 national contests held by the Council could boast an entry of over a hundred and warrant a two-page report in the model magazines. They were also covered as bonafide sporting events by the national newspapers; this exposure, together with the annual exhibitions of model aircraft that were held in the Mansion House and other central venues, gave local aeromodelling quite a high profile. In fact, Mr. Alfie Byrne, the then Lord Mayor of Dublin, presented a special trophy for the best performance by an Irish designed model in the international Wakefield class, which was considered to be the epitome of model aerodynamic design.

World and European Championships.

Our entry into the scene of world aeromodelling left us somewhat surprised that we were not completely outclassed, and scarcely a year has passed since then when we have not been represented at some event abroad. We have yet to win an event, but we have certainly established our national identity on the circuit both as competitors and as international judges.  We also have a major input into aeromodelling committees of the F.A.I. and M.A.C.I. is always represented at its annual conference.

By the end of the fifties, membership had passed the four hundred mark, spread over some twenty clubs throughout the country.

Radio Controlled Model Flying.
Experimental remotely controlled model aircraft had been flown as early as 1916 but with limited success; now, with increasing reliability and miniaturisation of radio gear the cost of this ultimate aspect of model aircraft control fell from the exorbitant to the merely expensive. Within a five year period came a falling off of interest in the traditional free flight model with its intricate lightweight construction.

By 1963, when the Council held the first Radio Control Nationals, the knell of the free flight competition model was already sounding in Ireland By the end of the seventies even the layman’s idea of a model airplane automatically assumed that it was remotely controlled by radio.

From 1970 onwards radio control aerobatics led the way with radio control scale (miniature replicas of full-size aircraft) and more recently radio controlled helicopter following.  The numbers attending competitions has never reached the all time highs of the 1930’s but has steadily grown over the years. 

Johnnie Carroll led the way at international level in scale model flying, attending and judging at numerous scale world championships.  Radio control aerobatics first flourished in Belfast where Howard Menary represented MACI at a few world championships, but more recently the focus has switched to Cork where Noel Barrett and Ray Keane, together with tem manager Finbar Constant have been on the Irish aerobatic team almost continuously since the early 1983.

In scale model flying the names of Johnnie Carroll, Jim Clarke and John Shortt cannot be forgotten.  And control line model flying has made a new comeback with John Hamilton, Kevin Barry and Maurice Doyle representing Ireland at quite a few recent world champs.

In those days, the clubs existed mainly in the centres of population – mainly Dublin and its surrounds and also in Belfast, Cork, Limerick and Tipperary.  Nowadays there are clubs in every corner of Ireland from the far northwest of Donegal to the tip of Wexford.

Equipment and Construction
Originally model aircraft were constructed from balsa wood frames covered in tissue; the tissue was shrunk with water and painted and sealed with dope. In the 1970s tissue was superseded by plastic heat shrunk film.  Later balsa wood was superseded by fibreglass and polystyrene foam.  All forms of ABS and PVC plastics followed and nowadays modern composites are mainly used including carbon fibre, Kevlar etc.
Power first came from wound rubber bands.  Miniature diesel engines in the up to 2cc range came in the mid 20th century.  Then the two-stroke glow plug engine (up to 20 cc) was developed in which a small coil is heated by a ground based battery for start-up and remains hot from stroke to stork once the engine is running.  Four stroke engines in the 20 to 50 cc range gave still more power.
But the latest forms of power include miniature gas turbines engines and electric motors.  Gas turbines are very powerful and require electronic controls for start-up and running.  They normally started using electric starters, then transfer to gas supplied from a small ground tank and when they are up to speed (150,000 r.p.m.!), they transfer to aviation fuel.
Electric motors are powered by 42 volt DC on board high capacity battery packs.  This is converted to high voltage variable frequency 3 phase AC to power a variable speed three phase motor.  The advantage of this is the lack of any need to carry fuel, fuel pumps, filters etc.
Radio control equipment has changed greatly from the early single channel pulse radio transmissions to multi channel proportional control and then to digital FM and PCM transmission.  Nowadays spread frequency transmitters can lock on to a particular aircraft receiver and so very large numbers of aircraft can be controlled by different transmitters without the risk of interference.
The miniaturisation of equipment has led to the increasing popularity of indoor flying.

Radio Control Aerobatics World Championships, Cork 2001
Our exposure to international contest have taken members as far a field as Japan, South Africa, Australia and Argentina and we are regular attend contests in Europe.  While at the Aerobatic World Champs in Pensacola Florida in 1999, we found that the 2001 event had not been requested by any country and so Ireland put a bid to F.A.I. to run it in 2001. 

Accordingly in August 2001, Finbar Constant the event director and a small committee of just seven from the Cork Club hosted 42 countries and over 100 pilots (the largest entry ever) to Mallow Racecourse where perfect weather blessed us and we ran what is still regarded as the definitive F3A aerobatic World Championships to which subsequent ones are still compared.

Trans Atlantic flight by Model Aircraft 2003.

In 2002 Maynard Hill from USA made three attempts to fly the Atlantic with a radio controlled model from Newfoundland to Clifden in Ireland; all three ended in failure! However a year later in August 2003, his model, Trans Atlantic Model 5,  succeeded  and M.A.C.I. stewards appointed by the National Aero Club of Ireland  acting on behalf of the FAI to certify the timing and location of the landing. This was subsequently ratified as a World Duration (38 hours 23 minutes) and Distance (1,888.3 miles) Record. The model was 6 foot span and weighed 5 kilograms at take off!