[wizard]

Believe it or not I can remember when I was a teenager. Support from parents was slim, but it was a different world then. I can remember three planes that my parents bought me. 2 were cox CL planes with .049 engines. The third was my first RC. It was a 2 channel (rudder, elevator) with, again, an .049 engine. I flew the wings off every one of them. All the fuel and support equipment was on me. When I was in high school I worked two jobs, and after paying for gas, license and insurance, I didn't have much Money to play with.

By the time I graduated high school, I had 3 decent RC planes one was a 3 channel H-Ray (high wing, flat bottom) It had a .19 and was rebuilt so many times that there wasn't much of the original wood left. Next was a Gentle Lady, 2 channel glider. The last was a Butterfly, 2 channel glider that had been converted to a 3 channel with an RC .049 to get it to soaring height.

I actually had more help in the hobby from a friend. What he did for me was to sell me used equipment for way below what it was worth. He is the one that sold me the H-Ray and my first 4 channel radio. If I remember right it was about $50 for the whole works. That radio was selling for about $250 then. This man is still my main flying buddy. He has been in the hobby for longer than he would like to admit. He still talks about the first RC radio he had. It was a kit that had to be built. It was a tube radio even the receiver had a tube. It was only a one channel push button radio. Push once and the rudder went full deflection right, push it again and you get full deflection left, once more for straight.

Sorry for the ramble, Just bringing back memories.