101–110 of 190 posts
I had one of these as a kid! I could never get the "glow plug" engine to actually fire up, though, so I was never able to fly it. Sounds like I missed out on a spectacular crash.
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Is it legal to fly them out of LOS?
It depends on where you are and what license you have, but generally LOS is different from VLOS (one means there are no obstacles between you, the other means you can't see it). Generally, there are limits to how far you can go, but you can get a license and file flight plans.
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Take a look at Cobi toys for the less garish models, although they aren't going to be like Technic sets. I still have my old erector set for my kids, as well as several boxes of knex. When I was young, I eventually lost all interest in legos once I had an erector set and a large enough knex supply. Those erector set electric motors were downright scary and I have many memories of bruised and cut fingers from making a…
> bruised and cut fingers Is that really a bad thing? Minor things like that teach the kids how to handle tools and machinery, so they can operate safely the dangerous tools adults use. Like most boys, I had to learn the hard way to not put my finger in a light socket, and how to not stab myself when the screwdriver slips.
The 70s really were another country - see also: chemistry sets. These are pale and anodyne things now with a mere handful of bland household-level chemicals - assuming you can even find one in a toy shop at all. But as a lad these were both readily available and full of dozens of intriguing substances that would send a modern health and safety wonk into apoplexy. Who among us did not incinerate all of the supplied ma…
Those sure were different times. I recall in the mid 1970s, as a kid no less, being able to go into a pharmacy and buy sulfur or KNO3 w/o any trouble at all. However it wasn't more than a couple years later, when a request for phosphorus was met with an icy "do I need to call your mother" stare, that my budding career as a chemist came to an end. Besides, the Radio Shack across the street had this computer set up for…
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Don’t worry these days kids fuck their fingers up on quadcopters instead.
But will they know the joys of dangerous chemistry sets?
Hey, I still have my Cox 049 engine somewhere. The airplane is gone, smashed up of course. I suppose it was dangerous by modern standards, but not at the time. About the worst it would do would cut your finger if it backfired when starting. Or you could use a cheater stick, or even an electric motor to start it. I once made a car for it out of piano wire. It would take off at high speed down the road, but because I n…
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> bruised and cut fingers Is that really a bad thing? Minor things like that teach the kids how to handle tools and machinery, so they can operate safely the dangerous tools adults use. Like most boys, I had to learn the hard way to not put my finger in a light socket, and how to not stab myself when the screwdriver slips.
As my professor would say "We learn by doing!" I learned so much from my erector set: about the dangers of spinning objects, how gears mesh, and even seemingly minor things like how frustrating tiny screws and nuts are when you are still learning the required fine motor control.
(Maybe that's why people keep reinventing the screw head, so I need multiple sets of screwdrivers. arrgh)
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My biggest concern about modern toys is that we have dumbed them down to work for the lowest common denominator. That's why a 3 year old today can (with a bit of training) assemble 12+ LEGO sets. Back in the day, when I was playing with LEGO Mindstorms, I thought the fact that you compile binaries and flash them with a USB cable was a feature, because it gave you full control. There was even alternative OS choices li…
I have a bone to pick with LEGO. LEGO destroyed Erector sets. Erector sets were great because they were metal parts that you screwed together, and the machines you built look like machines. (My mom was reluctant to get me an Erector set, assuming I could not handle the tiny nuts and bolts. But I had no difficulty with them.) https://www.ebay.com/itm/133855778156 Lego machines look like cheap plastic crap with all tho…
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this was before battery powered drills were a real thing, I should mention. And this was a crew that would spend a day inventing a solution instead of spending $20 to buy one. Big concrete block, in a waist deep puddle. This block is the base of the drain pipe for a pond; the drain is opened all the way so there's a lot of water flow happening in the area, too. They're drilling an anchor hole and had a long enough dr…
I'm surprised the engine could produce enough torque. Did they just push the drill bit really gently or something? (Also, that's a really long bit!)