Kathryn Allebone and I were able to prove that the Squirrel is easy enough to put together in a pub. No mess and no damage to tables because the only tools you need are scissors. Staff didn’t mind and look what nice Squirrels we came up with!
Kathryn is going to be sharing the Squirrel design with her church. I’m looking forward to pictures and flying reports from that!
Jordan Loreto of San Clemente, California used the Squirrel design for a school project. Here he is showing his class how to make a Squirrel.
“Here’s the attached video and pictures, I love this design, and because it is so quick to build, I used it in my 8th grade report on “rubber powered model aircraft” where I built one in front of the audience. Thanks for such a great design!” — Jordan Loreto
I also received these two pictures of a “Tandem Squirrel” and the above amazing video from Jordan. I must say that it has to be the coolest modification I’ve seen! Flies very well too! Very stable and slow. It’s nice to see this as a school project and also to see such constructive creativity! Great job Jordan!
For more ideas of how you can learn from the Squirrel, please see Educational Activities.
April 2005, Rolf Christophersen,Wiesbaden, Germany
Hi Darcy,
I saw your Squirrel on Bill Kuhl’s site and liked the video. I downloaded the instructions and built one with a few little mods. I used two orthodontic rubber bands to hook the wing to the stick body; as you can see, the top of the wing has a center guide. I got this idea from the Denny Dart II which I’ve built several of. I took it up the hill and tried 3/32s rubber but it was sluggish. I changed to 1/8 (it weighed 6g without rubber) and after a few trimming flights, I cranked in 700 turns and gave it a toss. It specked out after six minutes. I live in Wiesbaden, Germany, and hope someone will call me to say where it came down. Our son was visiting when I gave it a toss. He ran under it for a while but it slipped into a thermal and kept going up. The flight was so stable, a gentle left turn after the initial torque ran down; then it would seek the breeze and head-up into it until it made the next circle. This picture is of the second one. I’m going to introduce it to my Model Airplane Club next week. We are learning about model aviation Why is it so stable? Those winglets look like something from Hollywood instead of dihedral.
Rolf Christophersen
Wiesbaden, Germany
I rented McNabb Community Center a few times for testing.
I would invite people to come (without charge).
With the drop-in style activity I was able to focus more on further testing and prototyping.
I made an interesting discovery which I have not published yet. I will publish it some day.
Another workshop at Jack Purcell Community Center in Ottawa, Ontario.
