Auction Lazair

[Chappy]

Original, first year series ones (I built one) came with a bicycle Banana seat (not the sling seat) and aileron cables in the wings, not pushrods. Of course there were no rudder pedals, as the controls were mixed and only had the straight overhead mounted control stick. Peter Lawrence, also a first year builder, designed the conversion to pushrods and the rudder pedal kit, and the factory adopted it (and hired him). The spar skins were .016 inch thick, and no "nose wheel" was provided. Plastic props became available near the end of the year, as wood props were originally provided for the Pioneer Chain saw engines. The wheels were baby carriage style, with none adjustable spokes. They were very fragile and prone to failure if you didn't land straight on, or ground looped. If you didn't wear a jacket or long sleeved shirt, the tires would tear up your arms while trying to taxi. The tail was larger and triangular in shape, and was fitted with factory formed, steel skids that would snag in the grass and try to pull the whole tail off the plane if you ground looped. BTDT.

The saving grace was that the series 1 was very light and had a better sink and glide ratio than the 2 and 3 series (but at slower speeds). A .016" set of series one wings was used to build and developed the 2 place Lazair, and was flown in some horrible weather (I still have nightmares about one flight Dale suckered me into accompanying him on). It is not a "weak wing". The small lift struts are much more the weak link (in negative "G's").

Chappy

[russell]

Yeah Chappy, the series one is very light, 150 lbs., glide ratio of 13 to 1. As a matter of fact, there's a Lazair in the Smithsonian and the curator's say that it is the lightest airplane in their exhibit. Mine came with the pushrods, but the manual that came with it had instructions for both the pushrods and the cables as well as for the bicycle seat and the sling.

Dale George has a nice, flyable Lazair which has the cables.

[Chappy]

Russel,

I flew my series 1 with the original cables for the first year, then modified it to the pushrods. Flew the same. The real advantage of the pushrods is that the cables are a little difficult to connect as there is tension on them. I had devised a little tool to hold the top assembly, so it wasn't much trouble after that. I just did the conversion when I did the rudder pedal upgrade. Also, I added a front wheel "skid" as several Lazairs were reported to have been flipped over after digging their nose into the dirt.

The bicycle seat, on the other hand, was not confortable for flights over an hour. Also, the view down between your legs was a little scary for this low time pilot!

Chappy

[russell]

I can just imagine how uncomfortable that seat must have been. By the time Dale K. got to the set area, parts must have been running a little low (just kidding Dale)!