Erco's Zeppelins
erco
Posts: 20,254
And now for something completely different...
I'm in talks with a certain SoCal airship maker and scanned some old pics from my 1996 bike trip through Germany to Zeppelin for our conversations. Thought I'd share since there are a few other airship fans here (can we please start a Zeppelin page?). I was an airship nut since I saw the 1972 film "Zeppelin" in my formative years, and I was all set to move to Germany to work for Zeppelin after I heard they were back in the airship business. They were just starting construction on their first 'NT' prototype, and I got a full tour of their facility. I had a surprise for them, I had built a flying model of their new 3-fin airship, which I had been carrying it on my Bavarian bike tour for a few hundred miles and lots of cobblestone streets. I started in Munich and took the scenic route down the Romantic Road to Neuschwanstein castle and into Austria a bit. Fortunately the model survived the trip and not surprisingly, was major hit once we filled it with helium from their welding shop. Certainly one of the best days in this nerd's life and a childhood dream come true for me. There's a pic of me of me holding my model next to their much larger proof of concept model. And a pre-trip pic of the model in my kitchen next to a Hearoid robot. I was a bachelor then and since I ran the Munich Marathon on this trip, I was in heaven: running, biking, robots & zeppelins. What else is there? OK, girls & beer, which were plentiful in Germany.
Here's the funny part. They were targeting a first flight on July 2, 2000, exactly 100 years after Count von Zeppelin's first flight. As might be expected, they missed that date, but they had a celebration and press conference in the hangar at the not-quite-ready airship. I wasn't there, but they flew my model around and inside the zeppelin framework at the press conference. This nerd was gushin'.
In a related story, I live just a few miles from the Goodyear blimp (woo hoo), which will be replaced later this year by a Zeppelin NT. The mountain finally came to erco!
Sorry for the diversion, we now return to our regularly-scheduled microcontroller discussions.
(Four photos attached)
I'm in talks with a certain SoCal airship maker and scanned some old pics from my 1996 bike trip through Germany to Zeppelin for our conversations. Thought I'd share since there are a few other airship fans here (can we please start a Zeppelin page?). I was an airship nut since I saw the 1972 film "Zeppelin" in my formative years, and I was all set to move to Germany to work for Zeppelin after I heard they were back in the airship business. They were just starting construction on their first 'NT' prototype, and I got a full tour of their facility. I had a surprise for them, I had built a flying model of their new 3-fin airship, which I had been carrying it on my Bavarian bike tour for a few hundred miles and lots of cobblestone streets. I started in Munich and took the scenic route down the Romantic Road to Neuschwanstein castle and into Austria a bit. Fortunately the model survived the trip and not surprisingly, was major hit once we filled it with helium from their welding shop. Certainly one of the best days in this nerd's life and a childhood dream come true for me. There's a pic of me of me holding my model next to their much larger proof of concept model. And a pre-trip pic of the model in my kitchen next to a Hearoid robot. I was a bachelor then and since I ran the Munich Marathon on this trip, I was in heaven: running, biking, robots & zeppelins. What else is there? OK, girls & beer, which were plentiful in Germany.
Here's the funny part. They were targeting a first flight on July 2, 2000, exactly 100 years after Count von Zeppelin's first flight. As might be expected, they missed that date, but they had a celebration and press conference in the hangar at the not-quite-ready airship. I wasn't there, but they flew my model around and inside the zeppelin framework at the press conference. This nerd was gushin'.
In a related story, I live just a few miles from the Goodyear blimp (woo hoo), which will be replaced later this year by a Zeppelin NT. The mountain finally came to erco!
Sorry for the diversion, we now return to our regularly-scheduled microcontroller discussions.
(Four photos attached)
Comments
-Phil
I think you know I'm a big fan of lighter than air ships though I have yet to build one myself. I do have a couple rolls of aluminumized plastic.
As I mentioned in another thread, the domain "RedZeppelin.com" was too rich for my blood but I am the proud owner of Zeppelin.red. I figure my future airship will need to be red.
I'm hoping I can repurpose a few quadcopter motors and produce enough thrust to move a big red airship through the air.
Taking a class from PhiPi the great, natch!
Thanks for posting. Love to hear some of these stories.
We don't live too far from the Air Dock in Akron (home of the Spirit of Akron). So we see the blimp every so often. We used to see it more from our previous house - we were on the flight path between the Air Dock and downtown Cleveland and it would fly over our house when it was covering Indians or Browns (they are supposed to be a professional football team, I hear) games. Our dog used to bark at it all the time trying to keep it out of her airspace.
Wingfoot Two now flies out of Akron. It's not really a blimp anymore but when you see it overhead, you still think "Goodyear blimp".
Prior to a blimp returning to Akron (1989, I believe), I used to often work at Goodyear Air Wheel & Brake which is on the same property as the Air Dock. On several occasions we were able to go into the dock and observe the weather. It in itself is an amazing building. (I'd provide links but my Google is broken!)
I think airships are a great compromise between the total leisure of a hot air balloon and the break-neck pace of a well maintained Piper Cub!!
I took a plant trip to Akron/Goodyear Wheel & Brake for an interview in '82 when I was graduating (the first time I ever flew in a jet!). It was not a real sexy job, but I did get a tour of the hangar. IIRC the guy said they only open the doors once a year for the employee picnic, and it takes a few hundred dollars in electricity to move them!
Speaking of Ohio, I'm a bachelor for a week since the wife & kids are visiting family in Milford. I have a few hot jobs I'm jamming on, and that Cricket robot is a major distraction. Had to put it aside in lieu of a paying job. For now anyway.
I mostly hung out in the computer room which was also interesting because it was technically a mezzanine, being hung from the roof. One day when I was there, we had an earthquake...who knew a mezzanine could swing so much compared to the ground floor! It was an interesting sensation.
Oddly enough in a separate thread, people are constructing a thread to help the one named after a kerosene fired contraption visit the US. As it happens NASA Ames came up. That site is one dedicated to lighter then air flight, in honor of a Navy Admiral who had similar interests.
The blimp makes a perfect observation platform, but for my money, I'd rather they ignore the football games......
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Odd, no robots were involved in the writing of this message.
I can see them, but I have not been able to see Youtube postings lately. I have to go to my $60 WIN10 tablet to see them with Edge.
Edit: I can't see 'em in IE11 either. Hmmm...
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Still no robots involved here.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_airship
A while back I came across an article about lighter than air materials that sort of act like aerogel's but are strong enough for structural use... something like this: industrytap.com/new-material-lighter-air-strong-enough-build-planes-cars/21247
An article that I can't find is one that talks about trapping helium instead of air inside the materials to make them both structural and lighter than air. There is a hobby base to making the stuff... sort of complicated... high vacuum pressures mixed with heat, but some guys are doing it.
There's Flogos...
I worked, for a year or so, on the team that tested the Primary Flight Computers of the Boeing 777. Writing test scripts for the test rigs connected to PFC boxes.
We worked in an aircraft hanger on the GEC-Marconi Avionics site in Rochester in the south of England. Adapted for "office space". That hanger had been built in WWII for the manufacture of Lancaster bombers or some such. It was a protected historical building.
All the furniture in there, metal desks and all, seemed to date from WWII. No windows of course.
Some years earlier I worked at the Marconi Radar research labs in Great Baddow in Essex. The situation there was much the same. Amzing 3D phased array radar technology being developed in a museum!
On site was one of the original WWII radar towers.
http://greatbaddow.org.uk/info/great-baddow-tower
On of the lead engineers used to disappear for ages. Turned out he would climb up that tower to a shed on a platform halfway up. To get some quiet time to think.
Back in 1970 something whilst at my father home in Canterbury, England, one day I heard this amazing rumbling noise from outside. What on Earth is that? Then I decided it sounded like an airship. Not that I'd ever seen one but it had that sound you get in the movies and such. Cannot be.
Looking out the Window I found it was a Goodyear blimp flying very low and slowly directly over the house. Amazing !
A few pics at http://forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?53789-Europa-Airship
I once drove past the airship hangars at Cardington. They are huge!
It was kind of funny because one had it's doors wide open and inside, floating in the middle of the huge space, was what looked like a really tiny blimp. I think that was something by Airship Industries.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airship_Industries
I wonder how many people would look at FLOGOS and NOT smile...
It has to be some form of emotional pareidolia... you
know like seeing faces in the clouds... but on an emotional level.
Why do we like white fluffy things?
Good example of what I was talking about... just add structure integrity.
Now for a question that will be easy for you but I have thought about for a couple of years...
Why don't airships have airfoil shapes? Seems like it would be easier to land them... just get negative buoyancy and land it like an STOL plane.
Why not?
On the other hand it's also going to create a lot of drag on such a huge thing.
I've seen that news reel footage before, terrifying.
That vid is blocked here. But here we go: