Science Olympiad Wright Stuff - The Flight of "Bob Jr."

Rubberband powered basal wood ariplane made for Science Olympiad 2005 - 2006 (middle school) competition. This particular plane was known as "Bob Jr." and in its prime got around 2:50. Not bad for a single-winged plane.

The song is by They Might Be Giants (my fav. band) and it's titled "Destination Moon."

I also just noticed that this video is featured on the official Science Olympiad Wright Stuff site. That's pretty cool!

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Science
• Olympiad
• Wright
• Stuff
• Rubber
• Band
• Basal
• Wood
• Plane
• They
• Might
• Be
• Giants
• Destination
• Moon
• John
• Henry

[ExtremePatosai]

DoctorDraco, I have two questions about your plane.

1 - How did you make the airfoil for the wing?

2 - It looks like your propeller is spinning quite fast. How thick is your rubber band

[DoctorDraco]

1 - The covering? It's just thin mylar.

2 - I do not remember, this was 4 or 5 years ago. Same goes for the length.

[ExtremePatosai]

Ah, okay, I think I have have misplaced some words. In question one, I actually meant:

For your wing, did you bend some balsa wood to create the frame for the wing (the airfoil part)? If you did, how? It's okay if you forgot, I'll just have to try some things myself.

[DoctorDraco]

No, I cut the ribs from a sheet of wood. Basal is fragile, it would be hard to bend it that much.

[Mesuni]

Lol, I have Flying Bird to do where it's just like this but they have to flap! ^.^ The big struggle for me is getting it to stay in the air longer, ecspecially because that's what you're ranked on (without penalties)! Any advice? xD *is hopeful*

[DoctorDraco]

Since I don't know much about building ornithopters, I would suggest asking around on the student forums (scioly . org), googling what others have built, etc. Basically you just need to read up!

[csdryan]

Do you remember the number of cranks you used?

[brans556]

How many times did you wind it?

[siluvoreos]

how do you do this?

[youbub33]

Model Aviation an Educational Activity

youbub33 More about Wright Stuff in that video.

[bluecobra95]

If you do want to bend the wood for the ribs, you can soak it in water overnight, then mount it on a rig; that could be a peice of hardwood cut into the correct shape or a board with nails. The only thing is that the wood will spring back a bit, so that might put extra stress on the joint, or mess up your desired airfoil. This is rather time consuming with no real advantage, so sliced ribs are mainly used for WS. Sorry if you've already figured all this out ^.^

[pmedalie09]

i wound mine about 1500 times (100 times with a 15:1 winder). i used a .093 rubber band. make sure to lubricate the rubber band beforehand with son-of-a-gun and as you wind it, walk towards the plane. im sure you already did all that so sorry if you did.

[ExtremePatosai]

Thanks!