Project on the side

At this point i am lacking some of the key equipment required to fly this envelope of mine and its not like me to lack a plan however i am diving knee deep in this project without knowing of the bottom end ill fly in once its complete. In spite of this lack of direction i have found an inflation fan that needs a complete overhaul. 

This project is similar to the sewing machine and the balloon itself, that being purchasing something that needs a new lease on life or going to whole DIY route.

Sadly with this fan a new lease on life isn't as straight forward as the sewing machine where i kept almost everything and applied some elbow grease to get it all nifty again. The plan for the fan is to flick off the motor (once its running a lot smoother) to anybody who will give me a buck for it along with the frame/wheels.

Realistically i am only keeping the prop and cage which will be attached to a titan 6.5hp engine and a stainless frame. Obviously everything is in the planning phase and only time will tell to what degree my vision will come to life (Attached below is the design at this point in time).

The work ahead is mostly money related which at this point therefore nothing is happening at the moment besides the elbow grease jobs. Once i am on holiday from class i will proceed with straightening up the fan cage followed by looking into powder coating the cage is possible. 

The next progression is purchasing the motor which will set me back $299 NZD which is significantly cheaper than a Honda motor. The motor is a Chinese knockoff of the Honda design and is not as top quality/won't stand as much abuse as a Honda motor. 

 

Taking this into account by my calculations an inflation fan will do between 5-10 hours a year and considering these motors probably do that in a day or week i doubt it will break any time soon. Even if it does break in 5 years i will be financially in a better place to buy a Honda motor or replace it with another Titan motor if it proves to stand up to the abuse.

 

Fabric Nightmare

So since my last posts my colours have been modified slightly and i have finally raised the funds to proceed to the next step of the build which is locking in the core details of my fabric including colours, coatings, weights, cost etc. I am sure Katie slapped me in my sleep a few times because a lot of discussion happened concerning the optional coatings.

The whole discussion was sparked by my friend Mitch in Australia due to him receiving his fabric just over a month ago. He went for PU coating followed by UV which was on coated on the same side as the PU coating which doesn't help considering PU coating to my knowledge goes on the inside of the envelope.  So with this in mind i made some inquiries with our go to man for fabric Andy Wang. With much discussion and headaches in Katie's case i had finally decided on double sided PU coated 1.9oz without the UV coating (due to cost constraints).

The numbers i got from Andy:
Cost: 1.74USD/m 1.9oz Pu coated (both sides)
Weight (with extra coating): 1.92oz-2.06oz (yd2) or 65.10g - 69.85g (m2)
Total Fabric Weight: 48.119kg-52.06kg gross fabric weight
Total Weight: 75.638-79.579 kg

Envelope Weight (Projected number via dream program):

WEIGHT CALCULATIONS
Weight of fabric               : 48.119- 52.06 kg (including the overlap of the parachute)
Weight of Nomex            : 6.321 kg
Weight of tapes   (1)        : 13.200 kg
Weight of tapes   (2)        : 0.427 kg
Weight of tract. cord        : 0.374 kg
Weight of centr. cord       : 0.221 kg
Weight of command line   : 0.769 kg about without (with) a return pulley
Weight of crown line        : 0.499
Weight of cables              : 2.585 kg
Weight of crimpings         : 0.900 kg (32 crimpings)
Weight of 4 carabiners     : 1.000 kg
Weight of crown ring       : 0.500 kg
Weight of 2 pulleys          : 0.200 kg (without a return pulley, elsewhere, add a pulley)
Weight of the thread        : 0.524 kg
Total weight                    : 75.638-79.579 kg

Keep in mind these numbers are just estimates however in terms of weight its obviously heavier than Katie's 1.3oz 74,000 which is something like 65 kg's however 80 kg's doesn't seem to bad considering a 90,000 Kav is in the 110 kg range.