Category Archives: Experimental

Dayton

Experimental, Outreach

I met with Richard Lyle Barlow yesterday. He’s very active in the model airplane community and I had the opportunity to snag a meeting with him when he was in town.

He’s a bit of a fan of the Squirrel project and we discussed the project a bit. I also showed him the new Dayton design. He had a couple of great suggestions. one was to slant the toothpick. I think that’s a great idea. It will make it easier to assemble too. It will make it easier to install the part that goes right behind the toothpick since it’s orientation will be more clear due to the angle.

Another thing that came up was the small parts. I used some shards of balsa to widen the motorstick to accommodate the wing mounting technique I learned from Lloyd Shales. This produces 4 small shards of balsa. I will look further in to the wing mount system. I really enjoy the stability and ease of the system so I will see if I can simplify it without using too much wood and avoiding the small parts.

I was able to construct an entire Dayton during this meeting. I must admit it goes together faster than a Squirrel.

I returned to the same venue later for another meeting to help somebody with a Web site. During that meeting I flew the Dayton off the bar a couple of times. In one case it took off from the bar, circled the room and landed right back on the bar. I wish I’d taken video. 🙂

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What is the Build Time for Squirrel?

Experimental

I am adding a label onto the Squirrel instructions to help set the expectations of the user. This was on another version of Squirrel instructions that was never released publicly (it’s the one I used in my volunteer work which is different than the one I publish).

What should I put for flight distance?

What should I put for build time?

What else can be on the label?

Comments?

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New Instructions Progress after All-Nighter

Experimental

I worked about 10h starting yesterday evening on the new Squirrel instructions!

Here is the progress so far. In addition to a clear diagram of a completed Squirrel, there are some newly made assembly diagrams, a ruler for part identification and the beginning of some new text. And there will be less text!

Still more assembly diagrams to come. Also coming is new text and diagrams for flying!

I may include an aileron as standard. I think that will be fun.

This packaging will weigh 1/4 less and use less ink as well. That will save on shipping costs as it will get many of the packages under shipping cost thresholds.

Current Challenges

It is a little painful getting 2D projections off 3D projections in Sketchup (CAD) without buying some expensive software. I am able to get the projections needed but am keeping my eyes peeled for a rendering system or other mechanism.

I’m using InkScape. It doesn’t allow two pages so I have a separate document for each page. I have Corel, I suppose I could switch to that. But I’m pretty far down the road so I may just grin and bear that one. I’ll just chain two PDF files together later.

I better start the hunt for people who can test the new instructions. I need some people who know about model planes and some who know nothing. Less is more. 🙂  Let me know if interested or if you know someone!

 

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