1/5 Scale Unlimited Hydroplanes

[Tom Levescy]

Does anybody know of anyone making boats of this size?

And what kind of interest is there for these boats?

Aprox: size would be, 68"x36"

 

[Hydro Junkie]

I know several years ago, someone was making a glass hull, cowling and tail set for a late 80's Circus Circus/Miller High Life, but haven't heard anything about it in years. One thing you need to look at is that this size of boat can be a real bear to handle on the beach, so a group of R/C Unlimiteds members found years ago when building 1/6th scale boats.

 

[Andy Greene]

I know several years ago, someone was making a glass hull, cowling and tail set for a late 80's Circus Circus/Miller High Life, but haven't heard anything about it in years. One thing you need to look at is that this size of boat can be a real bear to handle on the beach, so a group of R/C Unlimiteds members found years ago when building 1/6th scale boats.

What did they use of power in the 1/6 boats ??

Tom what would power plans be for the 1/5 ??

I'd love to have one- as soon as the divorce is final,Kayti graduates college and I hit the lottery- or any 2 of the above- LOL

You guys are sick - LOL.

 

[Hydro Junkie]

I know several years ago, someone was making a glass hull, cowling and tail set for a late 80's Circus Circus/Miller High Life, but haven't heard anything about it in years. One thing you need to look at is that this size of boat can be a real bear to handle on the beach, so a group of R/C Unlimiteds members found years ago when building 1/6th scale boats.

What did they use of power in the 1/6 boats ??

Tom what would power plans be for the 1/5 ??

I'd love to have one- as soon as the divorce is final and I hit the lottery-LOL

You guys are sick - LOL.

The plan on the 1/6th scale boats was to form a club, but they turned out to be so expensive the whole thing just died. We had in the rules that the only engine was to be a Zen G230 with a B H Hanson Indy mod. Since then, I've talked to several people in the engine business and have been told to go with a full mod Zen G260 if you want any real speed. With the G230, we were getting somewhere around the mid 30s or just over

 

[Andy Greene]

How heavy were they ??

Man that sounds like a lot of work- time and money for those kinda speeds ..... But really cool looking Im sure.

Do you have any pics you can share ??

 

[PakMan]

How heavy were they ??
Man that sounds like a lot of work- time and money for those kinda speeds ..... But really cool looking Im sure.

Do you have any pics you can share ??

We ran the 1/6th scales (some 7+ years ago) in the 40 mph's for sure, My Madison, and the Towne Club were likely in the 50's. I was running an X-457/3 with a Picco .67 in the Madison, and about 16-17 pounds. The boat was 60" Long. All of ours were scratch built.

DJ

 

[Hydro Junkie]

but those boats were built for a specific event, not everyday running. BTW, was anything left of them after the shooting ended?

 

[SayMikey]

How heavy were they ??
Man that sounds like a lot of work- time and money for those kinda speeds ..... But really cool looking Im sure.

Do you have any pics you can share ??

We ran the 1/6th scales (some 7+ years ago) in the 40 mph's for sure, My Madison, and the Towne Club were likely in the 50's. I was running an X-457/3 with a Picco .67 in the Madison, and about 16-17 pounds. The boat was 60" Long. All of ours were scratch built.

DJ

Is that the one you blew up in the movie? I have some nice pics somewhere of the Madison

 

[Hydro Junkie]

How heavy were they ??
Man that sounds like a lot of work- time and money for those kinda speeds ..... But really cool looking Im sure.

Do you have any pics you can share ??

We ran the 1/6th scales (some 7+ years ago) in the 40 mph's for sure, My Madison, and the Towne Club were likely in the 50's. I was running an X-457/3 with a Picco .67 in the Madison, and about 16-17 pounds. The boat was 60" Long. All of ours were scratch built.

DJ

Is that the one you blew up in the movie? I have some nice pics somewhere of the Madison

yeah, the crash and explosion scenes. If I remember right, the Towne Club had it's bow cut off and the Madison was run over by the Towne Club before it was blown up "in Seattle"

 

[PakMan]

How heavy were they ??
Man that sounds like a lot of work- time and money for those kinda speeds ..... But really cool looking Im sure.

Do you have any pics you can share ??

We ran the 1/6th scales (some 7+ years ago) in the 40 mph's for sure, My Madison, and the Towne Club were likely in the 50's. I was running an X-457/3 with a Picco .67 in the Madison, and about 16-17 pounds. The boat was 60" Long. All of ours were scratch built.

DJ

Is that the one you blew up in the movie? I have some nice pics somewhere of the Madison

Yes, the ones we ran for the Movie stunt-sequences. I ran once in Madison to show the movie guys the potential, and then we ran a couple (at least) years later in Northern California to shoot the movie footage. All the boats are still capable of running. Don requisitioned a couple boats from local builders that were almost done due to the short time frame to "be-ready", and I built the madison from scratch in just under 3 Months, from graph paper sketch from Roger to hitting the water in Madison.

Mikey likely has some pictures from the Madison inagural, as he was our local guy with starter, fuel, and anything I needed. I will contact Harry to see if he can post some pictures. He was our archivist, picture taker, Team Manager when we went to CA. That was very fun and an "unconventional" experience. We have hundreds of pictures.

Have you ever had a guy tell you to go out as far as you can, (use that tree as a marker... the one on the beach a half a mile away) then head straight at us on the beach at full speed, and then turn as close as you can to the shore before hitting us! They wanted some head on shots. Crazy film-makers. I had been racing for more than 20 years at that point, and it took all my concentration to do that. You never run straight at the beach wide open, and then try to make the turn away (left in this case, as we were running in the "scale" direction) just before hitting the beach (and the camera-men) at about 50 mph.

One of my highlights was that, on about the 3rd pass, I burried the camera guy and his assistant with water I was so close to the shore. They then modified the request to say, try to not get so much water in our "multi-thousand" dollar camera. They were using canned air to dry the camera stuff for awhile after that one.

Hopefully Harry will be able to post some stuff. BTW, all the boats were Round-Nose. Atlas, Towne Club, Cat's Pride and the Madison.

DJ

 

[Tall Fella]

Hello Tom

Some time back I was in contact with Luigi Girotto of Eli-Ka Technologies / Mathe USA 209 S Madison Ave Suite D MONROVIA CA 91016 and he put me onto a website related to the Canterbury Club in New Zealand ? who were using 35 cc Mathe Engines in scratchbuilt 6 foot Scale Hydro's . I did have some pictures a while back , but I'm not sure where they are now . The office phone number is 626 256 3674 , and his cell phone is 626 374 2670 . Tell Luigi that you were referred by Mr Baas in Australia . He can very hard to contact by phone , but give it a go .

Regards

The Tall Fella

 

[Alexander Gnauck]

Hello,

MHZ has a roundnode, shovelnose and hydroplane in this size. Not sure if it's 1/6 or 1/5.

Most people here in Germany run them with a Twin Zenoah, Blata or Pollini. But also Twin Nitro engines.

They should be also available at MHZ-USA.

Some pics of the roundnose are here:

http://www.mhz-modellbau.de/gallery/Heilbronn/2007/2007.htm

Alex

 

[DaveyK]

Very interesting topic! While researching for my Circus Circus build I came across the website for the Canterbury Model Powerboat Club in New Zealand. These guys have quite a few of these 1/5 scale boats which they say are powered by high performance 22cc gas engines or 30cc to 36cc gas engines. Here is the link, http://www.angelfire.com/mb/powerboats/index.html

It hasn't been updated since 2005 but there is some good info here and some pictures of these great looking boats.