Traditional First Boomerang [PP2]

I made my first boomerang in early 1974 out of 8.7 mm Fir
plywood. I was an Engineering student at California State
University Sacramento taking the hard core Engineering
classes like Fluid Mechanics (airfoil design) and Dynamics
(spinning tops and gyroscopes). On the way to an Engineering
meeting off campus, I stopped at a sporting goods store to
ask directions and the clerk had the early Lorin Hawes
Wham-O (no hole) on the counter. I saw the gyroscopic motion
and the airfoil design and purchased 3 of these for further
study. I soon figured out that being left handed while
trying to throw a right handed boomerang had its
problems.

I decided to make a mirror image left handed boomerang
for my left handed throw. The Wham-O was made out of a dense
plastic and I didn’t want to try and carve that twist in the
lift arm tip using plywood, so I carved airfoils similar to
model gliders on both blades with no undercutting. I used
think (8/7 mm) Fir plywood avoiding the voids that you
usually see running though construction plywood. I took the
finished boomerang down to a field by my home and gave it a
toss. It was an incredible flyer with a low and circular
flight of about 25 metres. I was so pleased with the results
that I started to make more of these flying toys for friends
at the University.

The problem that I had was that I was left handed and my
friends were right handed, so I learned to throw right
handed boomerangs with my left hand so that I could test
throw them before passing them on to others. That is how I
developed my odd throwing style that I never changed in 50
years of throwing. I still throw right handed boomerangs
with my left hand and I won a lot of events in competition
with this throwing style.

Handedness: left handed
Span: 44
cm
Weight: 102 gm

Historical sale price: $135