Additional Kudzu photos. June 1-2, 2012 From Bonnie and Glen Simpers, and Julie and Wally Farrell.
Comment from Glen —
“Bill Bell had built a beautiful Gee Bee Sportster of about 30” wingspan. It is a work-of-art. Even the spark plugs on the back side of the engine are painted and have ignition wires (you can just see them by peaking through the back of the cowling). Bobby Russel, who recently moved from Southern MD to North Carolina, was extremely interested in seeing such a lovely model in the air. He had the model after Randy Kleinert helped to deal with the large Bill Bell legacy by passing to other modelers such models for inspiration and contemplation.
So in the calm of the day after the first day of Kudzu – after the official flying – Bobby put in a new motor of the same size as the one Bill had in it and we prepared it to fly once more. We had no way of knowing whether it would crash or fly – although we should have expected that Bill had it well trimmed.
The model flew beautifully. We had not put in many turns and it gracefully climbed up, did a bit of a turn, and gently settled back onto the grass. It looked like the actual airplane in flight. It landed like a real airplane, first the wheels touched, it rolled with tail high on the grass, and finally came to rest. It will now go back on top of Bobby’s refrigerator to remind him of a great modeler.”