Mercy! Mercy! That Dang Nabed PERCY!

Fixing What's Broke

How I Rebuild a Wrecked RC Model Airplane.

Recently I got a wild hair and decided to try and fly a model airplane I had bought from the president of our flying club. When there was nobody left on the field to observe the consequences I cranked her up and launched it down the runway. As the model lifted off the ground it began to react erratically and I over-compensated with the controls. It was an unforgiving design, stalled and crashed at the end of the runway. I already have the nickname “One Turn Bob” and I was glad nobody was around to see my latest fiasco.

As I picked up the pieces it was evident that I had wrecked this model “Big Time.” It was broken into four major sections. The wing had escaped relatively unscathed but the fuselage had shattered leaving the nose and tail laying in pieces.

In my shop the next day I took what was still good of the tail section and trimmed it square. There was about a foot and a half left of rear boom, and the elevator and rudder were still attached and in good shape. The nose piece, which was plastic fitted on thin plywood and balsa, was also intact. I removed the engine and squared up wood part that was still left. There was about six (6) inches of nose cone when I finished.

Hmmm, I thought stroking my closely cropped beard. All I have to do is connect the nose to the tail and I am back in business. How hard can that be?

Often when I write there are parts that I really like in a manuscript, interspersed with parts that need some major work. Sometimes I can beef these up in the edit but often they need to be surgically removed and a new connecting structure be substituted instead. For example, some parts of the novel soar and other parts are a real drag. In novels we often see this shortcoming and sense a serious shortcoming. In a flying model this problem will bore the builder for only a short period before demonstrating its flaws and expiring in a spectacular manner. You don't need a publisher to explain why it won't fly. The writer in doing an edit needs to think about the parts that are causing the problems and take steps to correct then.

In the next series of blogs I will be talking about how to repair a flying model that has crashed and speak specifically about how one goes about fixing the same sorts of flaws in writing a novel.