Maiden voyage at Glattpark

The real reason (or rather, the underlying motive), however, was that my lifeboat, the Paula III, was finally ready for its maiden voyage (it had already passed the test in the bathtub!) and the rescue drill. The original Paula III operates as a buoy and marker-laying vessel at sea and in coastal waters off northern Germany and is equipped with a crane for these tasks.

My Paula III by Robbe, built to a 1:25 scale and 71 cm long, also has a movable boom, but I’ve attached a servo with a wire hook to it, which I can move horizontally. Since no real emergency (by which I mean an unintended capsizing!) occurred, the test had to be conducted with the models that were still movable. My goodness, boating (especially in reverse) really takes some getting used to! On top of that, there’s the pesky business of judging distances. Well then, after several unsuccessful attempts, we finally managed to hook it up and tow it away. However, we found that the rudder pressure with the plane attached was too

is low, and the rudder needs to be enlarged, since the boat has “only” a fixed propeller. Nevertheless, this Friday afternoon was a complete success and a lot of fun. From now on, my

Paula III will be there for every water-flying session at Glattpark; after all, for larger bodies of water, the inflatable boat comes back into use!

*Text: Walti Wuhrmann,
Photos: H.-J. Baum*