Derby Talk

In our space derby last night, I ended up being the "winder" because I brought a powerdrill. I noticed that that torque supplied by the rubber bands that were soaked in the glycerin/green soap solution didn't deliver nearly as much torque once they were wound. I could feel the difference as I wound them and as I held the propeller.

One gentleman brought up his kid's rocket with soaked bands and I wound it -- a very light rocket. It failed to beat a heavier rocket and never performed well at all. Then, he changed out the bands for dry bands and the torque of winding it actually bent the loop in his prop axel open. It had WAY more felt torque. We never got to see how his would fly dry versus soaked bands, so it wasn't a complete experiment.

When I wound my own son's rocket (with soaked bands) I could feel alarmingly less torque as I did when I had wound it with dry bands. So, I replaced the bands before he raced and his rocket was way faster than anyones' -- dry or soaked.

Anyway, I'm throwing it out there that soaking the rubber bands might deserve further testing.

For rubber powered free flight in the early day’s 30-60s glycerin and soap was used. These days the thing that we use on our planes is Sun of a Gun!. Just spray some in a zip lock bag then dump your rubber bands into the bag, close it then mix the bands with the lube. It allows you to add more winds to the bands and have less friction.

One thing you might be interested in is braiding rubber bands I have added a link to a page that explains how to braid. I tried this with a friend’s son rocket the rocket three times as long as the other rocket but the torque wasn’t there so the rocket didn’t move very far.


http://www.stp.com/products/appearance- ... rotectant/" target="_blank

http://www.aalmps.com/braid.htm

My pack has always soaked new rubber bands in that soap mix. We wind to 100 turns. Never tried dry.

How many wind ups are you doing?