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High School Student Launches a Trash Bag Aircraft
An anonymous reader writes with a great write-up of a project completed last month by Manuja Gunaratne: "A high school student at Advanced Technologies Academy in Las Vegas, Nevada managed to launch an aircraft using trash bags. The trash bag aircraft traveled for hundreds of miles and rose to thousands of feet while capturing thousands of images of the Earth. The trash bag craft consisted of household equipment and only cost $50."
well the trash bag part ... anyway this is pretty cool
Using trash bags as balloons is nothing new, or innovative. Its a bag that holds stuff.. making a balloon out of them ( or using them to restrain a bunch of smaller balloons ) is just common sense.
Using them as kites isn't even new..
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Inb4 UFO sightings flare up!
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
More helium stocks depleted!
I don't have any 55-gallon trash bags in my house, nor the helium it would take to fill even one of them.
Cool high-school project, though. Or should that be "high school-project".
Well at least we know the school doesn't teach grammar. I wonder which engineering college will take this kid and if they'll even bother reading his essay submissions with his awesome website ~_~.
Technically it is an aircraft, when you fill a bunch of trash bags with helium, but it's not an airplane.
First one of these I've seen done in a desert....someone's probably done it, but it's kind of cool to see a different landscape.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
I've seen a couple of these projects, and since this isn't a commercial vehicle, couldn't you just use cheap 'ol hydrogen, rather than comparatively rare and expensive helium?
It'd be a rather neat project to combine electricity and water to get the hydrogen for a project like this. Then, your only costs would be the bags, the cargo, strings, water and electricity.
Ryan Fenton
Nice job. FAA letter on the way and your education will now be complete. You may learn about high speed collisions and hazards to air navigation. I know it was probably day VFR, but controlled airspace is 1400 AGL (except in the mountains). Part of doing this correctly is to play by the rules and there are a lot of them.
Seems every geek modeler with enough sense to build a UAV ought to be wise enough not to endanger the flying public.
Science is cool and all, but there is no mention of this kid getting FAA clearance. (yes, light payload, not required ... except for the "no doing anything that ends badly" clause) It is a fairly good thing that this didn't park itself in LAS approach. The approach to Las Vegas is bumpy enough w/o having to dodge trash bags.
It also would have been cooler if he had done the research to figure out how coordinates and GPSR work w/o having to be shown.
Don't get me wrong --- adventurous minds are a good thing. But you would expect a bit more rigor from a high school student at Advanced Technologies Academy
This is pretty clearly a project that has been designed for the sole purpose of getting him into better schools
if the wind had carried it slightly farther west, it would have ended up over the Nellis Air Force Range which contains the Nevada Test Site, Area 51 and other fun stuff the Air Force probably probably doesn't want you taking pictures of.
I don't think anyone considering the safety of human lives (in the air) can properly be considered a wet blanket
Nice job. FAA letter on the way and your education will now be complete. You may learn about high speed collisions and hazards to air navigation. I know it was probably day VFR, but controlled airspace is 1400 AGL (except in the mountains). Part of doing this correctly is to play by the rules and there are a lot of them.
Seems every geek modeler with enough sense to build a UAV ought to be wise enough not to endanger the flying public.
As long as they weren't in a restricted zone near an airport, I don't think this balloon and it's 1.6 lb payload violated any FAA regulations:
http://ecfr.gpoaccess.gov/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=ecfr&sid=ea968eea871ed9ab2380f6d979eaa7a6&rgn=div5&view=text&node=14:2.0.1.3.15&idno=14
Except as provided for in 101.7, any unmanned free balloon that—
(i) Carries a payload package that weighs more than four pounds and has a weight/size ratio of more than three ounces per square inch on any surface of the package, determined by dividing the total weight in ounces of the payload package by the area in square inches of its smallest surface;
(ii) Carries a payload package that weighs more than six pounds;
(iii) Carries a payload, of two or more packages, that weighs more than 12 pounds; or
(iv) Uses a rope or other device for suspension of the payload that requires an impact force of more than 50 pounds to separate the suspended payload from the balloon.
(b) For the purposes of this part, a gyroglider attached to a vehicle on the surface of the earth is considered to be a kite.
Indeed, so many that if you considered them you'd never even start.
In sixth grade, my MGM class built a hot-air balloon out of trash bags. In 1980. And ours was better than this. We cut open the bags then ironed them together to make a single unit, not this hackneyed "I'll-use-trash-bags-instead-of-helium-balloons-and-recreate-UP" lazy approach.
So, in summary:
Get off my lawn;
Don't be a lazy-ass and go back and do it right.
How is this even news-worthy? If it were an elementary school student that did it on their own, I could understand. But a senior in High School attaching a GPS and camera to helium-filled trash bags? Really? It is like creating your own computer out of cheap electronics - fun to do, interesting to those involved, but far from news-worthy. Whats next? Condoms instead of trash bags?
And I suppose small children losing a bundle of balloons should also get in trouble with the FAA.
I distinctly remember a day in elementary school when all of the kids got together, wrote down their addresses with requests for correspondence on cards attached to balloons and released them. There were hundreds of them released all at once and no permission was obtained or necessary to do that.
Neunundneunzig Muellbeutel?
Even if your hot air balloon was cooler than his, it's still pretty cool, and I enjoyed the pictures.
Arizona: Two people are being detained by the Department of Homeland Security after being found with suspicious surveillance equipment that they had recovered from the Pahranagat National Wildlife Refuge. The pair were tracked to their home by DHS working in conjunction with local and state police. The FBI executed search warrants at two locations - the suspects' home and an unnamed local welding shop, where they found all the ingredients necessary for constructing Unmanned Reconnaissance Vehicles, as well as quantities of highly compressed gas - helium - which also powers thermonuclear reactions.
The pair were found in possession of approximately 2,000 surveillance photos from their last sortie. Officials refused to comment on whether the arrests have any connection with either of two nearby military installations, Area 51 or the Nellis AFB Test Site at Groom Lake.
Additional quantities of liquid dihydrogen monoxide, a clear substance that is toxic when inhaled, were also recovered. No court date has yet been set.
Advanced high school? Seriously? This is something I would've done when I was 10, (in fact I did but there was no civilian GPS in 1970's and I used a 3.5 minute super 8 movie camera) this is one of the easiest off the shelf projects there is and frankly I expect more...wonder what other nations high school students are doing.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
Slashdot posts an article on some kid flying a balloon and gps and camera for 50 dollars, he's worked out to do it with a couple of people and a bit of research. Slashdot posters moan about how crap the balloon is. You are guys are the reason the USA is screwed in the long term - loads of people moaning when a 17 year old or so kid pushes himself and gets something like this happening? A better place would have praised the kid, I think it's great teenagers are trying to come up with technological hacks that are new to them and dreaming great goals.
A better audience, had it had any reservations, would offer kind and politely worded guidance to help him keeping creating but in a better and informed way. Instead - bitchy comments from a good number of people who are too scared to use a slashdot identity.
If you're a representative sample of how Americans respond to teenagers trying to push their technical knowledge, I reckon the USA is screwed... stamping on 17 year olds trying to be innovative and push themselves is no way to encourage your future generations. So he didn't achieve a PhD level of novel research? he didn't do something worthy of a Nobel prize? Who cares?! this might be the spark that gets him to those heights ten years down the line. He pushed himself, he wrote it up nicely, he was brave enough to publish to the world and allow comments. What were you doing when you were 17? he deserves encouragement, not scorn. Shame on you.
There is an infinitely better way. Buy the thinnest clear drop cloth plastic you can find. Fold it into a pillowcase shape. With a piece of fabric to insulate the plastic, melt the edges around all four sides with a clothes iron. Just melt it enough to make a seal. You have a perfect bag that will hold air much better than this painfully ugly trash bag aircraft. When combined with a balsa-wood cross at the open bottom and birthday candles, you have infinite teenage fun.
I surmise they no longer teach grammar to the smart students.
Otherwise, very cool.
tfa provides no indication of how gps coordinates were transmitted back to the eager pupil. at the same time they suggest to download and install CardTricks.exe. trash bags are nice touch though...
Unsightly from any angle and/or elevation.
The scope of dissemination is the problem. When I was 17 model rocket payload cameras were already back-of-catalogue novelties, my $20 microscope with inline camera/projection attachment had been sitting in my closet for around ten years, my first breadboard had been consigned to the realm of forgotten toys for nearly that long... and each kid who came after could rediscover each of things on their own because I was not going around ruining the surprises for everyone by disseminating all of my experiments.
I remember thinking that my first DIY crystal radio set, received somewhere around kindergarten age, ran on magic. This despite the fact that all of my older family members had already built their own once upon a time. They left the mysteries out there for me to untangle. This is where generational affinities are developed.
I'm more worried for a future where each thing is considered done once one person has published to the Internet. It is a big reason I stopped writing creatively and playing music - I couldn't stand the thought that instead of being discovered on a dusty shelf somewhere my work would join the legion of 'Already Been There So All After Are Derivative.'
Personally, I look at declining birth rates among the highly educated as partially attributable to the shrinking belief that there is anything worth doing on one's own. Who wants to bring a child into a world where wasting time being derivative and unoriginal is synonymous with exploring the world in logically primitive steps as did our fore-bearers.
The A-Team did that years ago!
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
Worrying that anything doesn't have value because it's somehow a derivation is stupid.
What I can be proud of, is that it's a big, amazing world with lots of things to discover, and I'm doing my best to enjoy that. I'll die having only seen and learned a tiny, tiny fraction of everything there is to see and learn. I simply don't need a Nobel prize for my life to have value.
I think we all need to relax a little on the doom and gloom. Good on this kid for making something he thought was cool, and fuck anyone that has a problem with it. Comment less, do more, people.
Have you tried getting kids interested in things they have already seen done on the Net or t.v.? I have a highly motivated nephew in early elementary school that went from constantly building to only playing with his iphone because he already knows about cooler stuff now that his mom and teachers let him roam around educational sites. Two years ago you could walk into a room and find his self-made structures all over the place. Now, nothing but watching on his educational devices and tantrums when human reaction is required for too long. \ I would smash his fucking iphone, and remove all traces of Net access from his life for the next five years if I had the right. This technology is making little repeaters out of formerly promising minds. I'm with Ray Bradbury on believing the Internet is harmful at least for developing minds.
I did this 40 years ago, it works better with dry cleaning bags they weigh less.
Up.
Brilliant concept, well executed! Helium is a good choice, I initially thought that the balloon might be thermal, powered by wax or some liquid fuel. (eg kerosene). The ballon project video is good but it could be improved.
Perhaps with a 360 degree fisheye or some kind of spin correction system, I felt a bit dizzy watching it. A really stand-out high-altitude stop-motion vid' with good production like this one of mountain views of Annapurna in Nepal can be really successful and might do a lot to promote this amazing balloon project.
Waiting for the other shoe to...
Thumbs down.
Thank you, Edward Snowden.
"Arguments from authority are worthless." —Carl Sagan
You are guys are the reason the USA is screwed in the long term - loads of people moaning when a 17 year old or so kid pushes himself and gets something like this happening? A better place would have praised the kid, I think it's great teenagers are trying to come up with technological hacks that are new to them and dreaming great goals.
No, you're the reason the USA is screwed up. This kid did not push himself, he watched a youtube video or googled it. Why should we praise a 17 year old for doing what he saw in a youtube video?
This generation has been brought up to believe that every child is a winner. Awards aren't just given to the top of the class anymore, they give awards to every kid, no matter what they do or fail to do. Brookings Institution 2006 Brown Center Report on Education finds that countries in which families and schools emphasize self-esteem for students—America for example—lag behind the cultures that don’t focus on how students feel about themselves.
All this praise has resulted in overconfident college grads, who believe they should be given larger salaries than their peers without working for it.
So you should not praise a kid that did the same or worse than other kids else, praise should only be given when the child actually excels or achieves something few of their peers have achieved.
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
I believed somebody made a plastic plane by fusing trash bag the same way you can make a laptop case. Silly me! http://youtu.be/0oddEWnj7X0
How many times have you seen this story on Youtube? I'd be willing to put money on this being a submission either by the kid himself, or someone close to him. What he did was cool but not at all newsworthy.
You're pretty much the next best thing to a dumbass, aren't you?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8th2J3c88mU
http://www.hulu.com/watch/14386/the-a-team-pros-and-cons @40 min 30 sec
Interesting point though I'd not be too worried about the global dissemination: I think the important point is that teenagers are inspired to try something that pushes them, and they achieve some goals as a result. I can remember as a kid seeing science experiments on tv and trying them at home and being so proud when they worked, showing my dad. It didn't matter that this wasn't novel science, what mattered was that I'd had the drive to replicate what I'd seen and learn something on the way (not always what I'd expected either). I think this is the important goal we should try and enable children/teenagers to reach. It doesn't matter that they've been inspired by somebody doing the same on the internet, or they've found a kit advertised in a magazine and sold to millions of others, it's that they've pushed their own knowledge a little bit further. This might give them confidence to go further, insights into real innovation, or even just a lesson that things aren't always easy to do and require plain hard work.
So I am completely in agreement with you - I'd hate a future where kids don't do something because they've seen it on the internet. On the contrary, I think seeing an example will inspire them to try it themselves. I'd take a guess this kid has seen balloons for a couple of hundred dollars and his perceived innovation is that he's made it a bit cheaper by using trash bags. It doesn't matter that a thousand other folk might have done this. He's learnt how to do it. He'll carry the sense of achievement with him. He says he wants to take up aeronautical engineering, well I reckon he's showing future university professors that he's keen and he's learnt some lessons. Better than a student who has all top grades but hasn't got his hands dirty. I have to say as well he's written it up reasonably, documentation is always a killer after the event so credit to him, heck there are open source projects by adults written up more poorly than this ;-)
I think we should be optimistic while teenagers want to go out and do things, I think there will hopefully always be kids wanting to buy the 20 dollar kits and try and tweak them a bit, or at least build them themselves. As you say, your dad and granddad probably smiled benevolently when they saw you struggling over your kits, knowing they'd done something similar - but they knew that all the learning that came along with the actual building would be really good for you. Here's to DIY! :-)