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Mr. M. Habib-ur-Rehman

 Tell us about yourself briefly?

Mr. M. Habib-ur-Rehman: Most people don’t know that when I was born, we were twins and my twin brother died after couple of days. My education from KG to F.Sc. was in Peshawar Public School. I did my Matric in 1968. I did my graduation from Edwards College Peshawar in 1972-73. I have three children, a son and two daughters.

My son is also in this hobby; he doesn’t have interest in design and building but he loves flying and he has joined me at work and I hope to God that h
e does what I’ve been doing. I would like to acknowledge the fact that my wife has been really supportive throughout. Despite the fact that I spent most of my time in this hobby/profession; she has always been very considerate.

 When did you start Aeromodelling?

Mr. M. Habib-ur-Rehman: I started aeromodeling in Public School Peshawar in 1963 and this hobby became the foundation of my profession. There were different clubs in our school like drama, agriculture, music, aeromodeling etc. I used to watch the students of higher classes fly the free flight and control line model planes once a week.

  I got interested and got myself enrolled. Since I was accustomed to most of the tools; mechanical and electrical as my father, Mr. Mufti
Abdur-Rehman (late) used to tinker around with electrical and mechanical appliances (he was ahead of his time as he had designed and built
rain censors, light censors, temperature censors, electronic locks for cabinets, slide projectors etc) so he had a workshop at home hence, it was but natural for me to step into this hobby without any reservations. My first model was a control line model from a British company called Veron, the model was called Panther, it had a 0.40cc engine and from there I started this hobby. I’ve had the honor of flying in front of Pakistan Air force Legend M. M. Alam, who was an ace pilot of PAF in 1965 war and was invited to our school in one of the prize distribution functions. I met that gentleman and I flew one of my control line models in front of him. From the very beginning I was fascinated with aircraft and model airplanes. After spending a couple of years with the school club and flying control line model airplanes, In 1968, I became the president of the aeromodeling club. There were many good aeromodelers with me who are now in different walks of life.

In 1971, I took a break from this hobby and ventured into music. In Peshawar it was quite cumbersome to find good musical instruments because there were none available. I was interested in playing bass guitar and it wasn’t available so I made one for myself. We formed a group by the name of “Two Thousand Light Years from Home”. It was a funky band; I had long hair, typical of that era; we played Beatles, Rolling Stones, Deep Purple, Yard Birds, Led Zeplin, Simon & Garfunkel, CCR, Santana etc. We used to play their numbers and some Pushto folk tunes. We played music for 5-6years and really enjoyed

 it.

Later I got hold of a 2 channel R/C system and a Pilot kit, it was Junior 100 and that was my first attempt at an R/C model. Off course the radio didn’t have servo reversing option available so somehow I got the rudder configured in the opposite direction so the Left was Right and the Right was Left and I said to myself that I’ll remember this and that it’s not a big deal flying it. I took off and off course what was supposed to happen, happened and the aircraft crashed. I flew it again with the same setup and crashed it again and then better sense prevailed, I put the controls right and started flying. I could takeoff, land and do the loops. But then it was difficult since it was a 2 channel radio; the elevator was on the left hand and the rudder was on the right hand so I made a mechanical mixer between the two sticks so I could control it with my right hand. After that I straight away progressed to a low wing aircraft (Maltese Falcon); I found the plans in a ‘Model Airplane News magazine’ and I scratch built it for a 0.35 OS Engine; from there I went to a 0.60 engine and then I moved onto a 50cc gasser engine which was a Kawasaki and made my first quarter scale Saab Safari Supporter MFI-17 (Mashak).