Limited 1/2A Streamer Idea

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sgilkey
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Limited 1/2A Streamer Idea

Post by sgilkey »

When we were flying our test flights, Brian cut himself and promptly strangled the mighty Tee Dee .051 with the streamer. Considering this happens a lot in SSC with three times the displacement and probably 4 times the prop momentum, i suspect this will be a problem in 1/2A.

I tried slitting dennecrepe streamer material. It's pretty easy to do with a prerolled 30 foot piece. using one of those utility knives with the break-away tips, with the blade fully extended. smush the streamer roll a bit and then it can be slit in half pretty cleanly with the utility knife. i think this could be done at the field pretty easily.

another option would be to slit the dennecrepe on the roll. anybody tried making a streamer slitter?

I think also that instead of cotton string we should use sewing thread.

What has been the experience of guys who have flown actual combat with 1/2As? is the streamer and string strangling issue a problem? any suggested solutions other than these?
rdc767
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Post by rdc767 »

sgilkey
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Post by sgilkey »

ron, that's a great idea, why didn't i think of that???

why don't you crawl back in your hole and build some more ugly fulmars!! then let the cat eat them!!

you're just sore beacuse i cut you at Havoc (it was probably an accident!)
Lee Liddle
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Post by Lee Liddle »

Scott for the small e-warbirds that we played with last year, we were taking regular streamers (about .75" wide) and cutting them in half on the bandsaw, then taping them straight to the plane. With slimers, tape might not be as willing to stick, but leaving off the string completly would help. A good sharp bandsaw blade will cut the streamer pretty cleanly. Hold the streamer between two blocks of wood, no fingers please.

To hold a streamer to a greasy 1/2a here`s an untested idea. Take a medium to large paperclip, use one "leg" to poke into the coro fin or stab to keep the clip attached to the plane. Then the streamer could be fed into the exposed part of the clip. If it slips out too easily, tie a loose knot in the streamer to keep it from pulling through.

This would be a very simple way to attach streamers, and could be fitted to any plane using coro tail feathers. So if a "guest" shows up, you can easily help him go with the no string method.
Don Pruitt
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Post by Don Pruitt »

Scott, & Lee,
I did pretty much the same thing as Lee except that I used a scroll saw to split the regular 30' streamer to half width. We folded the end over a couple of times and tied on the streamer using light sewing thread. The down side is that when you split the streamer with a saw you leave a rough edge that may cause the streamer to hang and not deploy. We had to unrolled them all the way before launch to keep that from happening. I tried touching them up on the belt sander and that helped but it was not 100%.
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boiler
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Post by boiler »

Jay Fromm and Mark Cipilonni used regular streamers and string as I recall. You can get lighter cotton crochet thread than the #10 that we normally use.
cipoll717
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Post by cipoll717 »

Yes- we used exclusively regular sized streamers with 1/2a and regular sized string. You would get a slightly higher frequency of engine kills due to string wrpa around the prop, but it really didnt seem to be that big a problem. It seems like we, well maybe just me, would get a higher proportion of prop cuts than drape cuts, but this was not a problem. Actually, it is pretty cool, since you could really hear it, and the streamer material seems to 'blow-up'.

I like the idea of using lighter string, but feel regular sized streamers are fine.

Mark
ZenManiac
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Post by ZenManiac »

I think Brian's just too good at cutting streamers. I probably couldn't cut my own streamer if I was standing still. [:D] Wait...of course I couldn't then.
Hat Trick
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Post by Hat Trick »

If half A takes off I can check into getting streamers made in narrower widths. They usually want a high minimum order though.
Cajun
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Post by Cajun »

In our informal electric combat we use the 3/4" material cut in half and only use 15' with no string. Since we are flying close in it works great.

For Half A I suspect it would be easier to use the full 3/4", but cut the length to around 20' to cut the drag. Since Half A can be flown closer in also, this shouldn't pose a problem,,,,,even for us OGC members with failing eyeballs[:)].
Yawnego
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Post by Yawnego »

Pretty interesting stuff here. I'll have to say that I have never split streamer material in my life, But two other options jumped into my steel vault of a mind that I can't find the key for, most of the time. That old plywood blade that you have been saving. Mount it back onto the table saw or skill saw, turn it on & sharpen it with an angle grinder, thats what we use to sut rubber hose, works great. And somthing a little simpler, an electric knife. Just my 2 cents..
Cross Check

Post by Cross Check »

Hi All,
Last spring we tried light cotton croche thread on our .25WW1 combat planes.
15-20ft string and 30ft cheap crepe.(We roll then split the 2in. stuff, 4 streamers per roll, using the knife method Scott described.)
Worked great. The thread broke easily and the longer length cut down on midairs because the target was so far behind the plane.
Until...
Gathering up the intact streamers for the next round. The darn(pun intended!) thread would tangle itself up like you wouldn't beleive. I'm guessing the thread was untwisting in flight, making it want to tangle back on the ground.
We quickly got frustrated and went to regular cotton kite string, 10-15ft long.
It was #?wt. high quality cotton croche thread, 1/3-1/2 the dia. of kite string.
Regular crepe is easier to cut than Denecrepe.(It does not like damp grass though) I'm guessing a 1/2A should be able to chew through 1/2in. wide regular crepe.

To reduce midairs for WW1 we are using a 'kill tag'. It is a 6in. peice of different colured crepe taped to the string/streamer joint. You only get points for cutting the streamer after the kill tag. Seems to work pretty good so far...
(It was used in 60/70's CL combat I beleive)

This 1/2A combat looks cool to me. I've got some old Cox engines I havn't run for years. When I get the time I'll make a pair and see if I can drum up some interest here.

Take care,
Have fun,
Dave'crosscheck'Fallowfield Maac 6437
Unabashed Combat Team
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lightning
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Post by lightning »

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by sgilkey</i>
<br />ron, that's a great idea, why didn't i think of that???.............snip<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></font id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">Scott, I don't recommend dental floss - it may be thin but have you ever tried to break that stuff?? [:0][:0] <b>MUCH</b> tougher than kite string!
Lee Liddle
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Post by Lee Liddle »

Unwaxed dental floss is a great substitute for kevlar thread for spar wrapping ect. It`s tough... like Keith says.
sgilkey
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Post by sgilkey »

i think Ron was being facetious (VERY unusual for ron!) and i KNOW i was, i'd never SERIUOSLY compliment ron!
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