redbull flugtag sf 2012

Entertaining the crowd in the "hangar" area .

This November I participated in Red Bull Flugtag with a team called the Slammin Tri Lambs. We were trying to build a plane that would fly as opposed to one for comic relief. The design was supposed to resemble a double-necked guitar with wings and picks for a tail.

Quick CAD work for the event application.

The plane was a short wing, long cord, canard aircraft designed to use ground effects to gain extra lift. For this project I did most of the initial design work, with input from the team, and all of the CAD work.

Version 1.

Version 2.

The plane was designed around easily available and cheap materials from the local hardware store. The spars and fuselage were made from a plywood and foam sandwich for strength. These were surprisingly strong and could easily hold up a person when cantilevered out. The wings on each side could be pulled off for transportation. All the complex shapes were cut with a water-jet.

Water-jetted foam pieces.

Water-jetted plywood pieces.

Nearing completion. Elevator moved to the back.

After some model testing, the team decided to move the elevator to the rear for ease of calculating the center of gravity (CG) of the plane. If we had more time, I believe we could have made the canard work. However, the plane was built in only about two weeks.

Painted and ready for some final touches.

McCovey Cove with the 30 ft launch platform.

End result.

Unfortunately, the plane did not fly. After the event, we suspected two mistakes that may have caused the plane to nosedive off the platform. First, we had the plane sitting on the cart too far forward, which nosed us down as the cart went off the platform. Ideally, we should have had the CG of the plane closer to the back of the cart, allowing the plane to separate from the cart more easily. The second mistake was using paracord for the the elevator controls. After watching video from the event, we noticed that the elevator moved about a third of what it should have been capable of, meaning that the paracord was probably stretching.

A video of the live stream can be seen here. We come on at the 1:36:00 mark.

"Z" for zoom

Original design concept.

This is a project I did for some friends who are about to have a baby. They wanted to decorate the baby's room with the alphabet, where each letter was made by a different friend. I chose the letter "Z" because I thought it was cool to choose the end of the alphabet. The letters were supposed to represent the maker, so I went with a car theme using some engineering to get the wheels to do a burnout.

Car assembly.

 The car was made from six layers of plywood. Each was laser cut and glued together.

Car Interior.

The two center layers were just in the roof area so that car would straddle over the bottom of the "Z". I put in a sub frame piece to support the body of the car.

The "Z" was made from four layers of plywood, also laser cut and marked. The bottom of the "Z" from the "OOM" was one layer thick and the slot allowed the space for the sub frame and axles to slide through. In the back, there were also cutouts to allow it to hang onto nails.

Painted and in the starting position.

 The car was painted with spray paint while the wheels were painted with Plasti-Dip to give it a rubbery feel.

ZOOM.

The axles are a 1/4" hardwood dowel riding on nylon bushings that were pressed in the car. PET spacers sit between the car and the "Z" to take up space and to allow the car to slide smoothly. When the care slides across, the axles ride against the bottom of the slot causing the wheel to spin--giving the appearance of a four wheel burnout.

Here is a quick video of it in action.

home still: complete assembly, cooler, and temperature control

I haven't posted anything about the still in a while, but the work has been steady. In fact, the construction is complete.

Completed Assembly.

With some preliminary testing with water, I realized that there was a slight flaw with the condenser design. It condenses the vapors well, but since the condensed drops just fall off the coil, the liquid is still very hot. I decided to add a cooler in order to bring the temperature down.

The cooler is the smaller tubes in the foreground.

The cooler is a simple tube and shell cooler. The cooling water is plumbed from the outlet of the condenser so that I can operate both with a single pump. With this configuration I'm able to get the condensate to almost room temperature.

Another component completed is the temperature control for the pot heater.

Temperature control unit.

The control unit is the same as some DIY Sous Vide controllers that utilize a PID heater controller and solid state relay. The control unit powers a water heater element which is connected to the pot with a sanitary fitting.

Heater element with detachable cord.

I did notice some inconsistencies in the temperature readings as compared to other thermometers, but this heater unit can hold consistent temps. I believe this may be due to a slow reaction time of the RTD probe.

Other experiments have also shown that it will be better to use the dephlegmator to control vapor temperature, so I may use the temperature controller to power the dephlegmator pump instead.

The experiments will just continue from here...

carbon stand up paddle board

Cut away view.

This is just a quick design of a stand up paddle board (SUP). It's designed to be completely made from carbon fiber.

Internal skeletal structure.

The internal skeletal structure is made from interlocked sheets cut boards.

Bottom surface added to skeletal structure.

There are two exterior surfaces that are pre-molded before assembly. Everything is glued together with structural adhesive.

Completed SUP.

The top surface is colored white to keep the board cool.

Side profile.

Bottom view.

Given the construction and materials, this should be fairly light and buoyant.

folded keychain bottle opener: packaging

Ready to be mailed.

I sold my first folded keychain bottle opener (aka business card bottle opener)! But I ran into the problem of shipping. My original plan was to put it in a regular envelope. But I felt that without some support, the opener might tear the envelope and get lost in the mail. So I devised a simple package from a piece of cardboard.

Easy to remove.

To insert or remove the bottle opener, you simply bend the cardboard on the line and slide the opener in or out. The cardboard is slightly thicker than the opener so it is pressed down where the opener slides in. This also allows the opener to sit flush with the rest of the cardboard. When the opener is in the envelope, it stays flat and locked in the center.

The first piece I sent out was cut with a razor, but future ones will use a laser-cut piece. Ideally, the packaging could also be the mailer, but this worked and was very inexpensive to ship.

home still: condenser

I finally completed the condenser portion of the still. From the last update I brazed the coil into the main tube and added the collection portion of the condenser.

Collector before brazing.

This update took a little while because I was contemplating my approach for the collection portion. I eventually decided to approach it as simply as possible with a flat plate and a short tube up the center. These pieces were brazed to the stainless sanitary fitting and the fitting was then brazed to the outer tube. The center tube could be extended in the future by slipping another tube over. I will experiment with this to see which works better.

The condenser works by having the vapor come up the center through the small tube and condensing onto the cooling coil. It then drips downward and into the collection area formed by the plate and the two tubes. The liquid drains out through a tube on the bottom of the collector.

Completed condenser.

All the copper tube sections are completed. The next things to work on before testing the parts are the heating controls for the pot, and cooling system for the condenser and dephlegmator.

home still: column, dephlegmator

Completed dephlegmator and column.

Today I completed the assembly of the column and dephlemator. The column design is very similar to the gin basket, but with the addition of a thermo port on top.

Thermo port tube.

The thermo port is just a tube with an opening cut into it. The opening allows the probe to be in the vapor stream, but prevents condensation from dripping onto it and changing the readings. A silicone plug with a thermocouple will seal the tube and measure the vapor temperature.

All the main parts were brazed together and ports for the cooling shell were added. The ports are 1/2" OD tubing and I will use push-to-connect fittings to attach them to tubes.

Hand bent cooling coil.

I also started on the condenser portion of the still. The cooling coil was bent with a 90 degree hand-held tube bender from 3/8" OD tubing. I then annealed the copper and squeezed the coils closer together by hand.

The ends of the coil use 90 degree braze on fittings and a straight tube to connect to a water supply.

The next step for the condenser will involve the collection plates and tube for the condensed liquids.

home still: dephlegmator update

Here is an update on some work I have been doing for the still. I have mainly been working on the dephelgmator section.

Internal shell parts.

The plates were all waterjet-cut with the holes slightly smaller and finished with a uni-bit drill. The diverter plates are the semi-circular plates in the picture.

Dry fitted together.

I dry fitted them first to figure out the best way to braze them together. I decided it was best to braze the center tube to the diverter plates first.

Center tube brazed to the internal diverter plates.

I used two other tubes to help align the plates. I like the colors that came out when the copper was heated. It's too bad they will be hidden.

Completed internals.

Some of the plates weren't perfectly aligned and some of the plates bent when inserting the outer tubes. I was able to make it work, but it was not visually appealing.

Major components of the dephlegmator.

I decided to bead blast the interior to remove the oxidation from the inside.

Next will be the final assembly.

the car bottle opener

Here is a new bottle opener I designed. This can be mounted on a key chain through the tail pipe.

The car bottle opener.

In use.

home still: gin basket

It has been a while since I posted anything, so here is an update on the home still. I decided to make the gin basket first because it's small and simple. I also used it to learn how to silver braze so I won't mess up on the more complicated and expensive parts.

Side view.

My brazing was rough and I overheated a section so much that the flux burnt off, but I did have some clean sections and learned some things. The first thing I learned was make sure to sand and clean very well. The second was to heat everything evenly making sure not to focus on one part too much.

Bad section.

This is actually my second attempt as the first piece was much worse, and I didn't feel it was worth saving.

Top view.

There was a lot of oxidation that occured because of all the heating. I wet-sanded it with 600 grit sandpaper to get rid of most of it.

Bottom grill.

The grill was cut from a copper sheet with a waterjet. I even included a logo in there.

The next step will be to make the column, which will be the same in construction but longer.

home still: assembly concept 1

Assembly.

Here is the assembled still, minus the pot and collection tube. I will also be working on a parrot to hold an alcometer.

Parts of the still.

The lower thermometer port on the dephlegmator now has been moved to the reflux column. The reflux column and the gin basket are the same in construction with the only difference being the length. The bottom of these two have a plate to prevent the contents of each from falling down.

Close up exploded front view.

The condenser also has a shell and tubes design--same as the dephlegmator except longer, and with one more guide plate inside.

Exploded view.

I may change the condenser to a simpler coiled tube in a shell design to save on cost. And I believe that this may be better at condensing all of the vapor. The dephlegmator is not going to follow this design since its purpose is different. Having a single tube for the vapors to pass through would be too much of a restriction.

In this current design, all stainless components are purchasable and do not require any machining. The copper tubes only require being cut to length and drilled holes if needed. The copper plates will be waterjet cut. Each module will be silver soldered together; and module to module connections will use sanitary seals and clamps.