MAAA Wingspan

09 MAAALogo. AUGUST WING SPAN MAAALogo. FEBRUARY CHARLES STRYDOM FLYING HIGH CHARLES STRYDOM SHOWS THAT AGE IS JUST A NUMBER WHEN IT COMES TO FLYING SKY HIGH. Having built his first model plane in the 1940s, Charles Strydom is a retired engineer and passionate aeromodeller. His first plane, a rubber powered plane, flew so successfully that he never saw it again. When he’s not building his planes, Charles can be found hard at work building replica Chippendale furniture. At 88 years of age, he still builds without glasses and has an incredible eye for building straight. Over the past year, he’s been building the Eindecker, the Nieupor, and a B24J Liberator static model. The B24J Liberator is a tribute to his brother, who served on them and was killed in one during the Second World War. The Nieupor has been a rather finicky build, but, with the help of his son Vaughn, Charles has equipped it with an electric setup, a 1300ma 3 cell battery and a tissue covering that weighs 547grams all up. It flies beautifully in light breezes. His current work-in-progress is a 1/6 scale RAF SE5a. As usual, it is as straight as a die. Charles is an inspiration to us all to carry on building models and to enjoy the thrill of flight. Vaughn said he is a very keen modeller as a result of his wonderful father and that his son has been inspired as well, becoming a commercial helicopter pilot. Three generations of pilots, all taking flight due to a little rubber powered aeroplane.