[simpits-tech] A couple questions

[Brian Sikkema]

Finally got around to answering this one:

The reason I was thinking cardboard was, once fiberglassed, it seems to be 
pretty strong, from my experience with rockets. But at the same time, the 
cylinder is probably adding to a lot of that strength. I'll poke around for 
that plywood you mentioned, and see how much it will cost me.

I'd love to use sheet metal, and if I had time to work on this up at school 
I probably would. But alas, at home I don't have the full-up machine shop 
that we have at school. So I'd prefer to stick with things like wood, that I 
can work on easily with the tools I have. A dremel doesn't handle sheet 
metal very well! ;)

As for transparencies for the lights, the real problem is that they're, 
well, transparent. I'm looking for a materal more like what cool-whip 
container lids are made of. The thought of just cutting up cool-whip 
containers HAS crossed my mind! ;) But I figured if anyone knew of something 
like that that I could buy in sheets, that would be better.

Brian



Hi Brian,

if you are going to use fiberglass, i think it would be better to use
something stronger as a base then cardboard.
if you need to keep it thin you can use the special ply wood used in RC
planes it's very thin and very strong - though a lot more expensive then
cardboard.

as for the lights , did you try using good quality transparancies with a
laser printer ? it looks like it would could do the job and they are
designed for being back lit.
as for the boxes, you can do the thin plywood way or thin aluminum which
would be a bit harder to shape, but the boxes look simple enough.

Ido