Just west of Milwaukee is the city of Waukesha, and each year there is a nice swap meet at the local Expo Center. Doors open at 9, and I was there early to see what I could find before all the "good" stuff is taken.
"Good" is a relative term, as there was a LOT of junk, but that's common at swap meets.
My goal was to find some new-in-box balsa kits or some planes that are started, but not complete. I'll usually make a full pass through the entire place and then go back for the "must-have" pieces, unless I find something I can't live without. Sticking to that plan, about half-way through the show I find a NIB Sig Seniorita for $50, which is $42 less than buying new from Sig (plus no shipping charges to deal with). I've always loved the Senior and Seniorita designs, but I still left it there while I kept looking.
Plenty of tables later I'm completing my first lap and happen to find a Sig Senior, the bigger version of the Seniorita, also NIB. Priced at $60 it's a good deal (new from Sig it's $100 plus shipping). About 12 seconds later it's mine for an even $50. The seller's wife was there so I negotiated directly with HER instead of her husband who was actually selling it!
I guarantee she wanted it gone more than he wanted more money!
Figuring the Seniorita was now gone, I started Lap #2. Nothing is really jumping out at me, although there were a lot of foamies for good prices. Surprisingly, when I got back to it, the Seniorita was still there! I also noticed a NIB Smoothie balsa kit from the same seller! I convinced the seller that he needed $80 for both a lot more than he needed to carry two old balsa kits back to his house, so I was now carrying 3 NIB balsa kits.
Here's where I screwed up... I was familiar with the Smoothie kit from Balsa USA, and in my excitement I didn't notice this was the Smoothie kit from Brodak, which is not RC, it's control line! Either way, it's a very sharp looking kit and could be converted to RC if I wanted. Info about it was posted on one of the balsa forums on Face Book, and I was contacted by a guy who thinks he has the Balsa USA Smoothie kit NIB, and if so, he's willing to trade kits. If that happens, I'm very happy. If not I'll probably just sell the Smoothie to avoid the headache of kit-bashing C/L to RC.
And at every swap meet there's "the one that got away". This time it wasn't because somebody else bought it, it was because I didn't bring enough money. Somebody was selling a NIB Mountain Models SmoothE kit, and it was a steal at $35. The seller wouldn't budge on price and I only had $25 left on me. This kit is no longer made and used a foam-core wing design. It would have been kind of funny ending up with a Smoothie and a SmoothE.
There are projects in front of it still, but I'm kicking ideas around for the Senior and Seniorita kits. I know the Senior will be done with transparent blue and the Seniorita will be done with transparent red, but past that options are plentiful. One will be gas and the other electric. Both are 3-channel (rudder, elevator, throttle), but at least one of them should be converted to include ailerons. And the list goes on and on.
Size of the Senior: 78" span, 1150 sq. in. wing, wing loading of 12 oz/sq ft, 6 pound weight.
Size of the Seniorita: 63" span, 746 sq. in. wing, wing loading of 12 oz/sq ft, 62 oz weight.
"Good" is a relative term, as there was a LOT of junk, but that's common at swap meets.
My goal was to find some new-in-box balsa kits or some planes that are started, but not complete. I'll usually make a full pass through the entire place and then go back for the "must-have" pieces, unless I find something I can't live without. Sticking to that plan, about half-way through the show I find a NIB Sig Seniorita for $50, which is $42 less than buying new from Sig (plus no shipping charges to deal with). I've always loved the Senior and Seniorita designs, but I still left it there while I kept looking.
Plenty of tables later I'm completing my first lap and happen to find a Sig Senior, the bigger version of the Seniorita, also NIB. Priced at $60 it's a good deal (new from Sig it's $100 plus shipping). About 12 seconds later it's mine for an even $50. The seller's wife was there so I negotiated directly with HER instead of her husband who was actually selling it!
I guarantee she wanted it gone more than he wanted more money!Figuring the Seniorita was now gone, I started Lap #2. Nothing is really jumping out at me, although there were a lot of foamies for good prices. Surprisingly, when I got back to it, the Seniorita was still there! I also noticed a NIB Smoothie balsa kit from the same seller! I convinced the seller that he needed $80 for both a lot more than he needed to carry two old balsa kits back to his house, so I was now carrying 3 NIB balsa kits.
Here's where I screwed up... I was familiar with the Smoothie kit from Balsa USA, and in my excitement I didn't notice this was the Smoothie kit from Brodak, which is not RC, it's control line!
Either way, it's a very sharp looking kit and could be converted to RC if I wanted. Info about it was posted on one of the balsa forums on Face Book, and I was contacted by a guy who thinks he has the Balsa USA Smoothie kit NIB, and if so, he's willing to trade kits. If that happens, I'm very happy. If not I'll probably just sell the Smoothie to avoid the headache of kit-bashing C/L to RC.And at every swap meet there's "the one that got away". This time it wasn't because somebody else bought it, it was because I didn't bring enough money. Somebody was selling a NIB Mountain Models SmoothE kit, and it was a steal at $35. The seller wouldn't budge on price and I only had $25 left on me. This kit is no longer made and used a foam-core wing design. It would have been kind of funny ending up with a Smoothie and a SmoothE.
There are projects in front of it still, but I'm kicking ideas around for the Senior and Seniorita kits. I know the Senior will be done with transparent blue and the Seniorita will be done with transparent red, but past that options are plentiful. One will be gas and the other electric. Both are 3-channel (rudder, elevator, throttle), but at least one of them should be converted to include ailerons. And the list goes on and on.
Size of the Senior: 78" span, 1150 sq. in. wing, wing loading of 12 oz/sq ft, 6 pound weight.
Size of the Seniorita: 63" span, 746 sq. in. wing, wing loading of 12 oz/sq ft, 62 oz weight.
