What I've been up to tonight

[Plynkes]

Naughty, naughty...

...Maybe I should try the local hippy shop.  


It would never have occurred to me to use one so, as I am sweet and innocent. A crocodile clip yes, but not a hemostat.

[Gluteus Maximus]

Naughty, naughty...

...Maybe I should try the local hippy shop.  


It would never have occurred to me to use one so, as I am sweet and innocent. A crocodile clip yes, but not a hemostat.

And there was me wondering why you'd want to put clips on cockroaches  ::

[Trencher]

Nice rigging job, Plynkes. Keep it up!  
Maybe you get bolder and try this stunt again with a D.H.2 (which is a rigging nightmare along with the F.E.2b)?  

[Plynkes]

Well it has gone pretty well, so I think I shall repeat the experiment on future planes. Don't think I'll go back and do all my old planes, though. The DH2 is one I've already built, and I'm not sure I want to return to it.

You never know, though.

[Plynkes]

Finished this model a while ago and just got it out to have a look at it, and horror of horrors the lines have sagged noticeably.

Bugger. Don't get this. It's the kind of stuff some modellers use (I got the idea from a modelling website), and I haven't seen any warnings or anything on modelling sites saying "this stuff sags with time." Was feeling pretty dispirited about the whole thing, but saw mentioned on the web that nylon line actually tightens up when heated with a hair dryer (which seems arse-about-face to me, things usually expand when they heat up after all).

So I just had a go at it and the lines do seem to be tightening up again. Am I going to have to go through this rigmarole with a hair dryer every time I want to play with my flying toys? Sod that for a lark. It's been cold here the last few days and the model was in a room with no heating. If heat can tighten the line up could it be the cold that slackened it? Physics isn't exactly my strong point, but does anyone have any ideas how to stop this happening in future, or what might have caused it in the first place?

More pics soon, providing I can solve this problem.

[twrchtrwyth]

As far as I'm aware, cold tightens and heat slackens. Thats why they put telephone wires up in the winter with some give in them. Most perplexing. :

[Plynkes]

Well that was my take on it too. But all bets are off with man-made stuff such as plastics. They can have all kinds of crazy properties, and I think shrinking when heated is a possible one, and not entirely in the realm of magic and fantasy.

(Though no doubt an eminent scientist will now step up and tell me that it is.)

[matakishi]

Nylon is a polymer so it will shrink as it gets heated just like polythene. Heat it too much and it will snap though. Once it's been heated it won't stretch again.

[Plynkes]

Thanks, Paul. That's good to know. Now I don't need to junk this method or start looking for new materials.