[Bob Kuczewski]

I just texted a copy of the Otto video to a friend, but I had to do a bit of hunting around the site to find it. So here's another copy:



I really enjoy seeing so many friends in that video. It was a very special event.

[Bob Kuczewski]

Well, here at the recent USHawks party we see Joe and Mike in front of Dan Fitzgerald's Antares (Joe to own it minutes later as "free" from Dan; and Joe "free" to Chris Bolfing per Chris' wish (pending exchange). Forty-two years after Joe and Mike teamed on the Dial-Soap HG craft. Fun
Mike said he will be moving back to the mainland in September coming up.
At the party Saturday he made from--a found cup--a bi-lobe balanced hand-tossed hang glider model and flew it in the Dockweiler slope lift; such was an echo of his flying similar cup gliders at our early Gas Company meetings in the early 1970s in downtown Los Angeles. Neil Larson has photo of such in archives. Here:

FlyingCup.jpg (68.2 KiB) Viewed 1128 times

Does anyone know if Mike's flying cups had any connection to the commercial TOOBEE toy (see toobee.com )?

TOOBEE.gif (13.61 KiB) Viewed 1128 times

2B-flying-can-425x150.jpg (67.52 KiB) Viewed 1128 times

[JoeF]

Not a clue, Bob....
But.... hang glider author Dan Poynter got in on the action by publishing a handbook:
""Dorky Toobee Player's Handbook, Like Disc Golf, Frisbee, 1981 Almost Craze Description: A cool retro kinda dorky book by Dan Poynter.""
Now, that might be a bridge for the question. Dan would be a good source for the question, but Dan passed in 2015, RIP. Obituary. See our forum, a bit on Dan Poynter

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1978 Popular Science noted Toobee by Toobee Toys, Berkeley, California. A news article has some detailsHERE. And showing a quote from that article with a mention of "three years" which might eat down: 1978-1975 ..., which is getting close to our early hang gliding meetings, but I see no bridge yet:

It was designed by two former General Electric engineers, Dale Klahn and Gary Upham, who spent three years experimenting with used cans, cutting them at different angles and testing each version to find the best gliders, before discovering the Toobee formula.

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One wiki quoting from today:

A flying gyroscope (also known as a flying cylinder or flying tube) is a cylindrical wing or annular airfoil. It is thrown like a football, and can fly very far. The William Mark Corporation invented their flying gyroscope, X-Zylo, in 1993.[1] It was invented by Mark Forti, a Baylor University student, and refined within the aerospace industry. In 1994, X-Zylo unofficially broke the existing world flying disc distance record when it was thrown 655 feet (200 m).[2]

"Toobee, The Amazing Flying Can" is a flying gyroscope developed in 1978.[3] It resembles the top third of an aluminum soda can.

A simple flying gyroscope can be folded from a sheet of paper.

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http://www.toobee.com
The handbook (not read) has some history notes: http://www.toobee.com/popup_handbook.html