July 1958 Popular Electronics Table of Contents Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics. See articles from Popular Electronics, published October 1954 - April 1985. All copyrights are hereby acknowledged.

Once again, the undaunted, indefatigable husband of "friend-wife" - maybe even the alter ego of story-teller and artist Carl Kohler - embarks on another grand and glorious electromechanical project, always meeting with near - but never total - success. This time around, the subject of his passion is a giant radio-controlled model cruiser. In the 1950s and 1960s, the great size of such a boat was perfect for the great sizes of model engines and model R/C systems. Vacuum tubes and rather large, leaded resistors and capacitors comprised the electronics of both transmitters and receivers, and at least two batteries were required for power - a lower voltage type for the signals and a higher voltage for the tube plate bias. They were usually of the carbon type; i.e., large and heavy. Even the radio-controlled model airplanes of the era were large in order to have enough wing area (lifting surface) to haul the heft aloft. Our hero's disappointment this time around had nothing to do with his craftsmanship or piloting skills; alas, it came from a totally improbable nemesis. Read on, Macduff, to discover the nature of this preposterous foe.

Operation Blub

By Carl Kohler

She was slender. She was shapely. She was, beyond any doubt, a gorgeous little thing. And, best of all, she was mine. Crooning soft melodies of love, I fondly stroked her gleaming, trim form.

Suddenly, the workshop door flew open.

"My good gosh!" hissed my wife, "Are you still playing around with her?"

"Jealous, dear?" I smiled in spite of myself.

"You're darn right, I'm jealous! What hard-working, faithful, loyal wife wouldn't be jealous? You've spent every evening for the past three weeks in here with her!"

I wiped my hands on a piece of waste-cloth and put a comforting arm about the wife.

"Well, now, I'll tell you how it -" I began.

"Look at her!" stormed the wife. "Sitting there - all five feet of her a brazen hussy with no compunction about stealing other girls' husbands!"

"Yeh, she's a real -"

"Honeypot," I said quietly, "when one builds an R/C boat, one does not put it in a bottle. One puts it in the water and that's exactly where I'm going to launch 'The Mermaid.' In the water." The wife touched the brass fittings on the model cruiser with a tentative finger.

"Golly, she sure looks like the real thing! Only smaller, of course. You've sure put a lot of work and time into building her. It certainly will be a pity."

"Pity? What will be a pity ?"

"Oh, you know . . she trailed off, meaningfully.

"No," I said in a voice harder than congealed suspicion, "I do not know. You t ell me. Exactly what will be a pity ?"

"Oh - heh, heh, heh, you know what always happens!"

I drew myself up to my full height. This never proves anything or impresses her, but it some how always makes me feel a heck of a lot more authoritative and dignified.

"You are, I presume, referring to several . . . ah . . . unfortunate and certainly . . . ah . . . accidental mishaps concerning other, previous R/C projects?"

"You dig me, dad!" she giggled.

"Well, sister, dig this!" I snarled. "I distinctly remember one occasion when all the failure involved was a direct result of a certain wife with butterfingers who stupidly dropped the transmitter-unit, there - by practically insuring nothing but -"

"Oh?" her eyebrows scampered toward her hairline. "And what about those times your old radio-controlled gismos went berserk - but amok - for no other reason than pure mechanical flubbing. Certainly, you're not going to pin your inability to construct reliable controls on poor me?"

Something told me to be charitable . . . the same something which always lets me know I'm right on the verge of losing still another discussion.

"Let's not argue about past failures," I said soothingly, bending a smile of truce in her direction. "There simply is no danger of 'The Mermaid' meeting with untoward mechanical tragedy because all the components are brand-new, all guaranteed, and I made a painstakingly careful check of each part as it was installed. From the Forster .99 motor to the servo-mechanisms through the R/C-operated transmission and back again. And I've carefully checked the transmitter-unit. Only tide, storm or an act of Providence is likely to create difficulty for this craft!"

"Wanna bet?"

"Sure - but you understand this is one time when you don't get to put your grubby little digits on the transmitter-unit or the boat, don't you?"

"I'll still give you odds!"

"Go raid your mad-money, sucker!" I chortled happily. "Who am I to turn down a sure thing!"

Several afternoons later found us standing on a deserted section of waterfront near the Long Beach Marine Stadium. I'd chosen a weekday afternoon since water . . . traffic was less in evidence. Launching "The Mermaid," we sprinkled a few drops of champagne over her bow and I started her engine. She vibrated slightly in neutral, drifting gracefully upon the water.

"Let's get her under way," I said enthusiastically, and snapped on the transmitter-unit-punching the button which would send the signal responsible for activating the R/C servo system consisting of Forward, Reverse, Due Port, Due Starboard. Simultaneously, I punched the button which would feed a signal to the waiting R/C-controlled transmission comprising the three motor speeds up to a maximum of the seven knots for which the throttle had been set.

She glided off across the water smoothly, her bow cutting the surface beautifully. Like a dream she went, leaving a realistic wake behind her. We watched, entranced by the sight.

"Pay your bet, sucker!" I gloated, holding out my hand.

"The voyage isn't over yet!"

"Welcher!" I muttered.

"Well, it's not!"

For the next ten minutes I sent 'The Mermaid' through a breath-grabbing series of complicated maneuvers, and she responded to each signal immediately, flawlessly. I began to understand a little how admirals, commodores and captains felt: powerful!

"Well," sighed Friend Wife, "I guess you win." She reached for her purse.

Suddenly, the toothsome "Mermaid" - now about two hundred feet from shore and making a wide, sweeping turn - leaped erratically forward, rolled heavily to starboard and began obviously settling aft into the water.

"I told you!" shrieked Friend Wife, hastily snapping her purse shut. "Look at that!"

"It's not the control system!" I raged, punching various buttons and watching my beloved "Mermaid" sluggishly respond to each change of direction as she mushed along through the unfriendly water which was slowly, steadily claiming her trim hull. "See? See how she still responds? Maybe she struck a rock or something. I've got to get her back to shore before she sinks! I've got to!"

Without warning, the boat lurched sharply to starboard again, sinking even lower into the water. For several agonizing seconds she bravely - nay, gallantly - struggled on her course shoreward. Then . . . blub: "The Mermaid" sank in a froth of churning water and bubbles.

"I told you," said ex-friend Wife, looking as pleased as a barracuda with a deed to the Pacific Ocean. '"And after all those hours you spent fooling with her. Tsk, tsk, tsk!"

"Shut up, you psychic, unfeeling, hardhearted -"

I wheeled about and headed for the car, knowing now why sea captains insisted upon going down with their ships. I had taken about ten stumbling steps when I heard somebody shout: "Hey, Mac! Is this 'whatchamacallit' yours?"

A character, wearing a skin diver's neoprene suit and underwater breathing apparatus, waded out of the water holding "The Mermaid" in his arms. I stared, miserably, at the two steel spear-shafts that pierced her hull.

"I'm awfully sorry, Mac," he burbled, handing me a dripping, ruined "Mermaid." "I was just exploring around, looking for the leopard shark that's been reported to be bothering folks in this area, and when I spotted this baby scooting along - why I naturally -"

"Yeh, I know," I said bitterly, "you just naturally thought it looked fishy. Well, I suppose I can't really blame you for taking a shot at it."

Tenderly lugging "The Mermaid," I rushed blindly for the car . . The way I was feeling, I might break into racking sobs any moment. Ruefully, I investigated "The Mermaid's" damaged innards. She was a mess. What the spears hadn't smashed, the salt water had finished. It would require a week of Sundays just to clean the intricate components before they started rusting.

On the way home silence filled the car with a sad atmosphere until the wife, sliding a sympathetic arm around my shoulder, murmured: "You win the bet, anyway. That should offer some consolation. You can use the money to start the next project."

I nodded.

"What do you think it'll be?" she asked, more to offer solace than anything else.

"We got any bottles around the house?"

"What kind of bottles?" she inquired.

"The kind people build boat models in," I said.