I some times have a look around the net for info in an attempt to find answers to some puzzel or another that's plauging me. Mostly this raises more questions than finds answers, but it's often an interesting journey.
Here's a web page devoted to propellors and propellor design for model aircraft. Besides the very well written technical articles which are many and detailed there are some very nicely made carbon props offered for sale.
If your ever wanting for some not so light reading to test your grey matter thoroughly, then I can recomend having a detailed look at performance propellor design!!
http://www.supercoolprops.com/articles.php
... and here is something that will have you gobsmacked.
"Model Aeroplanes and their Motors", published in 1916 (yeh, not 1961, ... 1916)
A couple of scans that you might enjoy ...
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Here's the table of contents - noteworthy points are "History of Model Aviation", "Steam Power Plants" and "World's Model Flying Records" ...
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Here's the Jopson gasoline model aircraft engine. It could provide 1 h.p. (= 746 Watts) and weighed 7.5 pounds ...
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... and a real humdinger is, the ... wait for it ... "Midget" 0.5 h.p. motor. Look at the size of the Midget which could transfer only about 373 Watts!!!
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If gasoline is too over the top (... forgetting LiPo powered brushless electrics of course) then you might be interested in a steam-powered motor. JohnH thought I was pulling his leg when I was talking about these today ...
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... and finally, some "Records". Notice that if you could get a seaplane to take off and stay in the air for 43 seconds, you were a world champion. Not only that, a mechanically driven (rather than say a chucker or a rubber-powered model) that stayed aloft for 51 seconds would also make you a world-beater!
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I suppose it's easy for me to sit back and be a smug smart-arse as I mock the technology that our comrades of yesteryear had to endure, but it makes you wonder. What sorts of machines will our descendants be flying a century from now?
Very interesting last statement there SMUZZ . 100 years from NOW i wonder if flying rc will be any fun, the closest i can speculate will be sending an auto flyer to another country to find a hidden object and return while your on your lunch break , perhaps you could deliver a piece of cake you just cooked to someone in a cooking contest . or building your own model to bring some moon dust from one of saturns moons back to your place .flying FPV to mars , now theres a thought .
and someone might be posting a thought on the WWTD ( WORLD WIDE THOUGHT DATA ) about how 100 years ago if a person could fly an RC aircraft out of his own view , it was considered incredible
Very interesting !!
People used to make things from scratch back in the dim dark ages.
That engine would have been a chore to manufacture with the machine tools of the day !!