Page 26 - MFW June 2025

HORNET

EVENT

Angus Macdonald Commemoration
Stan Mauger

Auckland Model Aero Club flyers were joined by the
Macdonald family late in April, in a fun indoor event to
honour Angus Macdonald. This was a ‘one model’ indoor
precision style contest for Modelair Hornets, held at the
Drury School hall which is used by the club for indoor
events. This design was chosen back in 2020 when the
first contest in this series was run. The Club could have
chosen other fondly remembered Modelair favourites,
like the Hummingbird outdoor design, but the idea of an
indoor subject like the Hornet, also much loved by Angus,
seemed like a more practical choice. Since that first
Hornet night in 2020, with the exception of Covid affected
years, there have been annual contests and each has
been a well-supported relaxed evening of indoor flying.

In this year’s event, Charles Warren quietly got on with
improving his flights to get closest to the target time of
thirty eight seconds, in the contest’s best of three flight
times. Daniel Walker and Josh Macdonald also had close
times to make second and third place respectively. In
fact, most of the qualifying scores were in the thirty
second range. Others were content to fly models for fun
or concentrate on some trimming. An award was also
given for the best decorated model. This was taken this
year by Hannah Macdonald.

Tony Woodroffe was kept busy compiling scores and Ken
Smith, the club’s recording officer ‘did the honours’,
presenting the certificates. A special thank you also, to
the Macdonald family for taking care of catering for
supper and to Brian Howell for the behind the scenes
organization to ensure that the evening was a success.

The Modelair Hornet Event
The Hornet event is run to very simple and now well-
proven AMAC rules. It has also been successfully flown
on Morrinsville indoor days for several years. The original
Modelair design goes back to Fred Macdonald’s
Propellor’s column in the February 1938 issue of the
Auckland Star. Maurice Poletti redrew the design in 1990
and this was published at a reduced size in the December
1991 AMAC Slipstream newsletter. This drawing was
later published again in the February March 2023 issue of Top to bottom:
Louise Tupou displaying her nicely decorated Hornet.
Slipstream and can be found by downloading this issue Rick Laird sorting out Hannah Macdonald's Hornet motor. Andy
from the AMAC website under Past copies of Slipstream. Macdonald giving Josh Macdonald a hand with his model.
Go to https://aucklandmodelaeroclub.wordpress.com Daniel Walker and Ken Smith seen setting up their models.
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