Kit Bays.

[gos]

I see the latest member here is Kit Bays. Welcome.
I built 3 of his 1/2A Laser Chaser’s in the early 70s.
Still have one here that’s not flown for a few years.
Was a fine model in it’s day with a Cox 049/051 up front. 🙂

[Kit Bays]

gos,

Thanks. Still have the original Laser Chaser. Wing and stab have been recovered a time or two and the fuse is a little fuel-soaked, but everything is still intact. Maybe it will be nostalgia legal in another 35 years or so….

Kit

[gos]

Hi Kit,

What year did you actually build and fly it as a matter of interest.

I built the first one just after the plan came out in the mag. I think that was ’72????? Still have the mag. here somewhere?????? Must look for it.
Had a TD049 in it. It trimmed out well then I lost it a few weeks later when it did not DT……was using fuse in those days.
Bought a TD051 and built another straight away (Our rules were 1ccmax).
Lost that in ’73…….Same problem, so built the 3rd one that I still have.
This time with a KSB DT timer plus the squeeze off KSB……I always ran pen bladder tanks.

Fond memories of flying those models on a great field where I used to live and winning a couple of State Champs etc. with them.

[Kit Bays]

I built the first Laser Chasers about ’61 or ’62. Over the next few years I cleaned up the design a bit (smoother lines and an auto-rudder) and eventually published it in Flying Models in 1970. I used the TD .049/.051 combo on a Taibi tank mount faired into the cowling. Added a disc to a “pinch-off” Tatone timer for the auto-rudder.

I also built a slightly smaller version with the same engines stuck to a fiberglas boom fuse to decrease frontal area. This version showed real promise but I had to put it aside when I started grad school. Now I would use one of Galbraith’s bad boy Cyclons, a folding prop, and lots of CF to take the loads.

Maybe someday…

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