Shadow of the Future?
THIS article presents a design concept that could revolutionize the configurations used for competition in many free-flight events, both indoors and out. The basic idea behind this concept isn't new, but rather has been developed with two modifications that make it both a reliable and improved alternative to previous designs. In a category of modeling, where for too long the search has been for the perfect airfoil or the right combination of moments, this article suggests a complete change in the underlying approach used to design free-flight models for many events. Contained within this article are the concept's main points and details of its first successful application to a free-flight design for competition. It is my hope that the success of the project highlighted here will prompt others to investigate the vast array of free flight duration applications of this concept. By only giving an overview of the concept and its potential benefits. I hope that more varied solutions to the individual problems will be found, thereby producing the quickest evolution of these designs.
It's About Time
A MECHANICAL DETHERMALIZER timer that weighs less than two grams and will time accurately for over 10 minutes? Not likely, you say. Well, the timer pictured in this article weighs 1.85 grams and is repeatable within four seconds at the two-minute level. At 10 minutes it is repeatable within 20 seconds. The size is a very compact 7/32 × 17/32 × 1-1/16 in. Finally, note that it can be constructed in less than an hour from a toy that costs less than $2. In fact, we recently built four in less than two hours.
