INDEX:
Inflatable yard balloons
Sort of a blog Scroll down to find this. Feeling Bummed.
Inflatable yard balloons – a few parts + a little work = inflatable line laundry
I got an inflatable decoration at WalMart. He was the last one, so I got him as a discount floor model. Do look for the times that they are discounting things before your buy.
I located the zipper opening, and located the things I wanted to remove.
Here are the extra parts. The air blower with screws, 3 sandbags, and the sandbag sacks. This particular model did not have any internal lights. You can see the resulting hole where the air blower was.
Quite often you can do the sewing work on the inflatable through the zipper hole. On this one the hole was too small, so I amputated his feet. I used one of the sandbag sacks and sewed over the location of the holes in the back of his feet. That way the material was matching color.
You need to decide where you want the air to be let into the figure. I thought about using his mouth, but that seemed to be difficult to get to, so I used his belt instead. The center of his buckle and about equal amounts on each side has some black fiberglass window screening sewn on the inside. I then cut away the material from the outside, reverse appliqué style, to expose the screening. I used another of the sandbag sack’s material to make a valve inside. I just made an oversize piece of material and tacked it at 4 corners and the center at top and bottom. It is loose so air can get inside, but when air tries to go back out it will push the flap to cover the screening.
And here is the nearly complete line art. He still needs some bridle lines, but I find I have better luck doing this in the field, so I take needle, and bridle line and go to it.
I like my figures to have vertical orientation instead of flying like a windsock, so I will have a line on top of his hat to suspend him. Then I will have lines to his toes with a separate attachment point to the line to hold him upright. In use he will look much like he does in this photo. This also keeps them from spinning around. I will also have lines coming from the air inlet to keep it presented to the airflow. Probably he will need a line or two to his arms. Maybe his nose if his face tries to cave in. All those lines will go to the attachment point as his feet on the kite line.
So, there you go. I have about 3 hours invested into this project, so far. So with bridling I suppose there will be around 4 hours involved.
To figure out the shape of all the pieces, cut them out, and sew the complete thing would have been a LOT longer. Anybody can do it like I did, with not so much time involved, and the cost is the same or perhaps less than making it from scratch.
For future projects I have a snowman family (6ft and 2@4ft), a Penguin (4ft), a Santa bust (8ft), a ghost (8ft) and Poo Bear with his huny bucket. (6ft seated)
I have already helped modify an 8 ft Saints, 8 ft Snoopy and dog house. For my own projects I have done an 8 ft Easter Bunny, 6 ft Jack o’ lantern with a witch’s hat, and a 4 ft Scooby Doo.
Feeling Bummed
A day or so ago I was feeling a bit bummed about not doing much kite activities so far this year. Then I got to looking trough my photo collection found that I had actually done the following: I made a 1600 mile round trip to the Oregon Kitebuilders Retreat, and made the Rockaway Bikini with John Freeman. This kite is 8 ft tall. An excellent flier. This photo was taken on a cold .and overcast day.
I also made this Sentinel type kite with Brian Champie. It is 11 ft long. Very interesting and a good flier. I later got another kit from Brian to make at a later time. This flight was taken during a bit better day than the previous one.
At this same retreat I made this lightwind kite with Sonny and Deb Cooly. You can see the cross spar in FRONT of the kite. Pretty interesting. I later changed the fiberglass rod with a carbon rod.
While at that retreat I also taught a class on making the Doggy Chew Toy line laundry. I made 4 of those during January getting ready for the class, as well as cutting out and preparing kits for the class. Back home for a few days rest while I rebuilt the Rokaway Bikini, and the Sentinel. I also repaired the light weight/indoor kite. Back on the plane again I made a 2400 mile trip to Seattle where we spent a couple of weeks with relatives. While there I managed a trip to two kite stores for a line laundry and new kite, Boeing Surplus for a few goodies, and three days at Ft Worden for another Kitemakers retreat. I had a class with Gary Engvall where he taught us to make the Celtic Cellusion. Here is a photo of mine, in the proper colors, of course. This is certainly a different looking kite, and well worth the build. All the frame work is wood dowels in this kite.
The next day I attend a class with Charmayne Umbower where she showed us how to make a Stella Octohedron, or something like that. Due to a mix-up in communication I managed to make the two main parts of this line laundry so they could not be assembled. Rather than rip the entire project apart (I had cut a hunk out of one finger by then and was a bit distressed) I just wrapped things up and visited other class rooms to see what projects were under way. When I got home I made the Stella project again, and then mixed the 4 parts to make two of the line ornaments. Pretty cool. This is a light wind day, and they are not fully inflated. The Pilot kite in this picture was made the first part of January, too.
The little red mini Sentinel was made in latter part of February. I have just completed a white version of that same kite. I will be teaching a class in making that kite on April, 22nd.
Back home for a few two weeks rest while I made the two Stella laundry items. Then I prepared the kits for two classes that I was going to present at MAKR in March. Grant Lovett and I teamed up to teach the two classes. We both presented tumbling box kites. They looked very similar, but were very different. Here is a picture of his.
Mine looked almost the same, after one box kite is like most any other box kite. Mine was about ¼ the size of his, and cost only 1/13th as much. I used coffee stir straws for struts, and thin fiberglass rods for the spreaders. While at the retreat I attend a class presented by Cliff Quinn where he shared about a 1000 ideas with us on tricks, techniques, hardware, etc. for making kites. Then he got busy with members of the class and made a kite based on a photo from the internet. The skin was completed at around midnight, I think. I attended a class presented by another Cliff. Last name Pennel from Oregon. It was a class in making a 6 kite train. This is a photo of the train, but not a photo of mine. I have not had mine in the air yet. May day after tomorrow. Crummy weather in the forecast for us tomorrow.
Sorry for being so long winded. Maybe I have done more than I thought. I just had to share, and brag a bit. Thanks for hanging in here, and listening. Here are a couple of weather photos I took. I really like this one. It was taken through the windshield of the van that Rich carried me back and forth to the retreat. I call it Spring, because it looks like that is what is just around the corner!
