Ryan Sta
The Ryan ST-A — the streamlined low-wing 1930s trainer that combined art-deco elegance with serious aerobatic capability — captured as a sport-scale RC model.
About
The Ryan ST series was developed in the early 1930s by Ryan Aeronautical of San Diego, California — the same company whose earlier Ryan NYP became Charles Lindbergh's Spirit of St. Louis. The Ryan ST first flew in 1934, and the type evolved through the ST-A and ST-M military variants into one of the most distinctive sport-and-trainer aircraft of the pre-war American general-aviation scene. The all-metal construction, low cantilever wing, sliding canopy over tandem cockpits, and the unmistakable polished-aluminum finish of many factory ST-As made the type a visual icon of art-deco-era American aviation design.
The ST-A was developed as a more powerful sport variant of the original ST, with a 125 hp Menasco C-4 engine that gave the airframe genuine aerobatic capability for the era. The military Ryan PT-22 trainer (descended from the ST-M) trained tens of thousands of U.S. Army Air Corps and U.S. Navy primary cadets through the Second World War, before the type was retired in favor of more advanced trainers. Surviving Ryan STs and PT-22s remain prized in the warbird and golden-age aircraft community, where the type's clean lines and aerobatic capability continue to attract attention at fly-ins.
The unmistakable Ryan ST silhouette — long slim fuselage, low wing, polished aluminum or natural-metal finish — is one of the most recognizable golden-age sport-aircraft subjects in modern RC scale flying.
In the simulator
A satisfying golden-age scale subject. The Ryan ST-A flies the way a real ST should — clean handling, willing in aerobatic figures, and the kind of art-deco-era aesthetic that defines the sport-aviation airframes of the 1930s. Use it for golden-age sport-scale flying.
