Helicopter flying stands

[Westbury]

Looking for a simple and elegant method of having helicopters fly over the 28mm battlefield (up to 18" high) without the base taking up too much of the playing area. We've got two helicopters done for our Mexican cartel games but no means of flying them.
Looked at the CorSec Engineering site that someone posted about over a year ago which looked very nice but concerned the postage will make this unrealistic.
All ideas welcome.
Thanks.

[has.been]

Ian, try extendable indoor TV aerials from the likes of Poundland.
Glue a magnet to the top of it & one to the bottom of the chopper,
(Remember to get the polarities right, i.e. North to South).
Hot glue it to some CDs (one tends to be too flexible, so I glue several together)
Then add some weight to the base. Washers, nuts & bolts. Conceal them with
'rocks' lichen etc.

Also in Poundland look at their camera tripods.

I have seen someone (possibly on LAF) use bendable coat-hangers to make a tripod.

Failing those ideas, you could also go for knitting needles fixed to a base.

[Westbury]

Looks like a trip to Poundland then!
Cheers Pete.

[gweirda]

I have seen someone (possibly on LAF) use bendable coat-hangers to make a tripod.

That might have been me...though I just used florist wire as a quickie demonstration of the idea...


While three legs are more than one pedestal, not requiring a base means the keep-from-tipping-over footprint is smaller and -with bendable legs- allows more flexibility in placement on the table.

[grant]

Plastruct makes clear rods that would give you that floaty look.

I use GW flying ball end bases on my Micro Armour choppers and aircraft. You could replicate this option with the rods.

[Westbury]

Liking the clear rods idea. Thanks.

[grant]

Liking the clear rods idea. Thanks.

No worries. I like the way clear looks.

[Daeothar]

Even though it (sort of) increases a model's footprint (usually towards the back), I'm quite fond of using bent wire to make my models 'float'.

The way this works, is that I look at the movement of the mini, and extend a length of wire from it at a suitable point. This does not have to be the tail tip! in fact, it's better to not connect the mini to the rod at the lowest point, but rather a natural point somewhere behind and above the lowest point.

I then bend the wire so it sort of forms the mini's flightpath; the wire then usually connects to the base via a looping bend, but sometimes also a spiraling shape.

The reason is that this will look more natural than a straight rod up the belly, as I find that such smooth curves are less jarring than straight, vertical lines.

This way, the mini does not look like it is balancing on top of the rod, but more like it is in flight, especially when the rod is painted in the same colours as the base (and table) at the bottom, gradually blending in a more neutral greyish tone towards the middle, and the main colour of the mini towards the top.

I've done this just with minis on 25mm bases so far, using paperclip wire, but the principle can be applied to larger models too. In fact, I've saved a whole bicycle wheel worth of spokes for just such an occasion And with enough weight in the base, the models could actually hang beyond the edge of the base too.

Regretfully, I do not have any pictures ready to show what I mean, but I could post some this evening if you'd like...