Lake Elmo 21D Hangar

My Icarus V was scratch built in early 1970's. It was day and night working on the project for probably a year.  I flew hanglider once off a long sloping hill in McKnight Park across the I 94 freeway from 3M Corporation.  I added en engine and took off from the Lake Elmo airport crashed it.   I rebuilt and recovered it with a new paint scheme you see here hanging on wall.  I have a broad based interest in aviation.  As you can see in the photo there are R/C airplanes hanging up.  My first R/C,  a 1930s Trixter Beam and smaller balsa model I built from a kit.  My Tin Mistress, a 1946 Ercoupe has the 65HP Continental engine off for painting and also allowing me to polish the firewall.  That's tedious work but worth it making it an award winner Ercoupe at Oshkosh and other National Airshows.

The two Icarus V wings are hanging up on back wall (looks like art) with a second new paint design after recovering from the last crash.   Lot's of painting; lot's of newspaper and tape and personal touch.  A new gold hang cage can be seen lower left behind the propane heater awaiting assembly for future weekend powered hanglider flight.  With all you see in this picture - where is the time to fly?   It's too cold to fly and it looks like there is snow on the ground.  My Dad will be back soon from flying one of his Beechcraft Bananzas.  I'll open the frig. have a beer and think about where to focus my interest in this hobby.  I am too old and fat to foot launch the Icarus V so my 2020 project is to make the IcarusV into a Drone Ultralight with the capability to lift vertically, hover and fly.

 

Flying R/C models since early 1960's, Hangliding started in 1972 and bought Ercoupe in 1974