Lift off! We have lift off!!

My 12-year old wanted to build a hovercraft for his science fair project this year. I've wanted to build one since I was a kid so I was all for it. Now, I let him do the designing, figuring, and decision making. I just coached him and handled the parts of construction that would lead to an E.R. visit.
Here's a few shots of the construction phase:
1 kid plus two leaf blowers doesn't leave a lot of room, but it'll work.

Cut the blower tube to the right length, and it's a perfect fit inside of a 3" PVC pipe

Mount the 25 cc Craftsman leaf blower with a little stand under the rear support

Use a 10 MIL heavy duty tarp for the skirt...

And use socket to mark the holes

We only for the lift going today. But yes, it DOES fly!!
Link to video

We play on using the Stihl back-pack blower for thrust but I wanted to concentrate on the lift first to make sure it can lift my son (65 lbs.) plus the two leaf blowers (what, 20 lbs between them?). Turns out it'll lift 230 lbs of DrBoost too!! So, over the next week or so we'll concentrate on thrust!

Awesome. He'll be crashing into everything in the garage in no time!

He was really enjoying that flight. You're on the right track for sure.

Needs more lift

I fully support everything about this!

awesome build

hope he wins the science fair

Step 2?

Awesome fun for the whole family!

So cool! If I ever have kids I hope they get excited about building neat stuff.

If that boy was any more excited, you would have to nail him to the floor or he would fly away on his own.

Great project!!

Best thread on this forum period.

The excitement on his face is the most contagious thing I have ever seen.

Thanks guys! Yes, he's very excited. And it's totally contagious. Except his little brother, "Jake's experement is cool. I only built a dumb volcano." I think he's over it though.

That's awesome! I need to show my son this thread.

The Only thing that could make this better is more thrust Home Made Jet Engine

Very cool project!

Also, watch the new top gear race. Clarkson drives a hovercraft (again) in Russia and ends about as well as every other time he's driven one.

In reply to KyAllroad: I can picture an out of control hovercraft spinning through some poor kid's ant farm

KyAllroad wrote: Very cool project! Also, watch the new top gear race. Clarkson drives a hovercraft (again) in Russia and ends about as well as every other time he's driven one.

We watched that segment not long after he took his first flight. I think it was the hover-van episode a season or two ago that made him want to build a hover craft in the first place.
I'm proud of him. He came up with the design on his own. I think that's why he was soo over-the-moon excited in that video.

For the next build, you need to dig out old episodes of Junkyard Wars. When they were doing a championship on the England version, one of the competitions was to make a hovercraft. The winning one was very simple- two sheets of foam, one engine- and worked really, really well. No reason why your son could not make almost the same thing.

alfadriver wrote: For the next build, you need to dig out old episodes of Junkyard Wars. When they were doing a championship on the England version, one of the competitions was to make a hovercraft. The winning one was very simple- two sheets of foam, one engine- and worked really, really well. No reason why your son could not make almost the same thing.

Man, I forgot about that show. I think I remember that episode. I'm going to look on the youtubes for that episode for sure. This one, with a little 25 cc leaf blower wouldnt allow him to hover on snow, but his lighter little brother could.

That is very cool.

DrBoost wrote:

alfadriver wrote: For the next build, you need to dig out old episodes of Junkyard Wars. When they were doing a championship on the England version, one of the competitions was to make a hovercraft. The winning one was very simple- two sheets of foam, one engine- and worked really, really well. No reason why your son could not make almost the same thing.

Man, I forgot about that show. I think I remember that episode. I'm going to look on the youtubes for that episode for sure. This one, with a little 25 cc leaf blower wouldnt allow him to hover on snow, but his lighter little brother could.

May be hard to imagine, but I bet if you made the platform larger, it would hold your son better. Same pressure + more area = more force. That, and it would be more stable- with the center of gravity being in a more stable spot.

We discussed that. I wasn't sure if the 25 cc blower had enough displacement to pressurize a larger area. All the builds that actually mentioned the displacement of the blower used were all larger than 25 cc. Then I realized, I promised myself I'd take a step back and let him make the decisions. I explained the situation the best I could and he decided he'd rather go with a smaller deck and be more sure he'd get the lift he needed. Now that it's done, I think it could be a 2-seater, as long as one of the riders isn't me haha. Since it's a bag skirt, not a wall or finger skirt, there isn't a lot of area being pressurized. I think a healthy 25 cc blower could work on a 4X8 sheet of 1/2 plywood, or maybe a 4X8 sheet of 2" foam with 1/8" ply on top of it..... The deck is about 42" across.

That's a lot of awesome

Very awesome!!!!

You're winning at fatherhood sir.