BS

That's a clip from the UK government regards the National Crime Agency's latest push toward... Border Security investment as outlined by the Prime Minister yesterday.

What we're developing is eyes to go to sea. In fact many eyes at sea: a technical hydra.

And in an effort to present as balanced a picture as possible, an extract from Russia's news agency describing further UK government funding for maritime surveillance in the Black Sea.

(It doesn't all have to go to BAE Systems, but the sun doesn't have to come up either):

It's On Tape

A not inconsiderable advantage of using air propellers instead of water is that the cat can be run along the ground for launch, or over sandbanks in operation. To facilitate I recommend a strip of adhesive steel tape be applied to the underside of the skis. They ship in 5m lengths, matching that of the skirting we've used for those skis.

When I worked in airliner simulators it was all about using 'commercial off the shelf' solutions (COTS) for building such devices, for if you didn't then you'd be leapfrogged by people like Loft Dynamics... who claim to cut the cost of training by ten or twenty:

https://www.loftdynamics.com/

Much as I love them, incidentally, by from the original suppliers to avoid B & Q's 25%.

LoL

Final round of the League of Legends world championship taking place in London, and a sponsor is Mercedes. Change creeps upon us all unnoticed, but two takeaways from this post:

(1)    Computer gaming is the world's most lucrative form of entertainment bar none.

(2)    The internal combustion engine is on it's way out.

The latter is a source of regret, and for my son vehicles with such engines are like how steam-powered traction engines were to me.

Ironic though that while auto-manufacturers are having to down-size drastically in the land of their birth, the very first in the shape of Mercedes ends up providing altogether different forms of driving seat.

Mounting Stress

In the event fitting the motors proves to be less hassle than fitting the tins, and here's the proof. I'll suspend the motors so that the props are largely protected from damage and the four of them will be pitched about the C of G, allowing the boat to be flown in free air as a quadcopter but also in ground-effect like a hovercraft. In this last case propulsion may be provided by the cruise-motors at the rear, using less energy in view of the fact that the lift-motors then need make fewer adjustments to RPM.

Am off now for a well-deserved tuna sandwich...

Motor Tuning

For our 'flying boat' mock-up, as in the past I simulate the power-units too, invariably with tins of tuna which match the look-and-feel of U7 motors.

This has two advantages in that it avoids damage to the originals, plus you can make a sandwich with them after the shoot.

N.B. If you are mocking up your own build, note that tuna comes in spring-water, brine or oil and that any of these variations will address our needs here.

Hexcel... lent

My travels take me to Hexcel's manufacturing plant near Cambridge, and my attention is caught by a poster opposite the caff. The reason I'm interested is that laminate honeycomb panels make for the ideal material for the deck and sides of the flat-cat.

The UK side stems from the efforts of a Dr Bruyne in pioneering glues for aviation in the 1930s, so that for instance De Havilland would laminate plywood and balsa core for the Mosquito. His company would be taken over by CIBA, the Swiss firm into glue, and together they would be acquired by Hexcel in California.

Two things of note here, in that Hexcel not only provided the material for the feet of the first craft to land on the moon, and also in so far as their first product was to be incorporated in snow-skis. Besides this, the 747 was the first to feature honeycomb in its cabin floor, whilst the round-the-world Voyager designed by Burt Rutan used such material extensively for its stiffness and levity.

Such things are all around us ~ and underneath us when we travel by air ~ and I am sure that there is a home for them in the flat-cat. You saw how we laminated core foam for domestic use with a hardwood ply from a company in the UK Lake District, and honeycomb might mean that sooner rather than later we may not need to.

Diff Look

Appears I'll be able to steer the craft by differential thrust more easily than I imagined and without the expense of more equipment. For it seems that modellers as ever have got there first, for three distinct reasons:

(1)    It's useful for steering seaplanes like the one here without a water-rudder

(2)    It can be used to steer model aircraft like the Avro Lancaster on the ground

(3)    It can be used to turbocharge aerobatics for twin-engined models

Interestingly I'd occasionally treat myself to wingovers in a Piper Seneca many years ago and also found that a touch of power on the outside helped it around the corner: so what went around has literally come around.

Pilots will be tut-tutting, but tut-tutting each other is what we do best. Technically the 707, Vulcan and Concorde ought never to have been barrel-rolled either...