Underpants Elastic Bands And Other Mistakes

The Thrifty Rocketeer blog continues….

Normally, this weblog tries to offer you some helpful, positive ideas.But today, we are going to look at a few issues To not strive.

Just tonight, I used to be chatting with some rocketry associates by Zoom, and one of many extra senior guys holds up a few pieces destined for his high energy rocket. He’s asking for assist and recommendation on find out how to proceed.

He’s bought a medium sized carabiner in his proper hand, and in his left is a strip of what he is looking an elastic band. (It seems to be extra just like the headband that Spock wears in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, but regardless of.)

It’s an extended length or skein of two inch huge elastic band that looks like it would either go in a truss, a bra, or some type of again brace.

And he’s asking, “How do I attach this to that?”

The dialogue begins and guidelines out sewing (trigger the stitches won’t stretch), rivets (cause they will pop every time it stretches), grommets (for the same motive) and glue, (as it won’t “give” without cracking).

One rocketeer mentioned, “Dump it, simply get a nylon rope or related woven elastic band tube, and tie it on”, simply as you would in mountain climbing.

All of us pretty much agreed that the 2 inch width of the elastic band will not permit for a tight knot to be tied around the carabiner, so we settle on the nylon tube/rope concept.

Now this began me considering concerning the time that I considered making my very own shock cord out of elastic. I was doing a scratch build for a recycling display on how you could possibly flip unusual trash into a quite simple rocket and nosecone with plastic Wal-Mart bag parachute. For a shock cord, I had settled upon an outdated pair of males’s tighty-whitey briefs.

I satisfied my spouse to lend me her pinking sheers, and i used a seam ripper to free the elastic band from the pair of shorts. In a short time, I bored with the seam ripper, and went for a straight sharp pair of fabric sheers, and knitted elastic webbing just minimize as close to the waist band as I could.

Now that I had the loop of elastic free, I do not recall if I minimize across the appear or ripped it free, but I wound up with a single length of one inch vast elastic that still had quite a lot of stretch in it.

Deciding that the band was too huge, I took the fabric sheers and lower down the middle of the band leaving an equal width of elastic band on both side of the lower. When you have almost any questions with regards to wherever in addition to the best way to work with knitted elastic webbing (just click Forum Pptik), you can e-mail us at our internet site. What I hadn’t counted upon was the fraying, which began immediately. The two elastic strips, while about 42 inches long, curled and buckled, refusing to lay flat.

This was symptomatic of how the elastic band would behave no matter how I lower it , stretched it, or steam pressed it. I realized that you Can’t minimize an elastic band lengthwise had have it work. (Now, for the purposes of my poster board show of the elements of a rocket, it labored nicely sufficient, however for actually use in a rocket, my idea wouldn’t have labored.)

What WOULD work is the acquisition of about 3 ft of slender 1/8-1/four inch elastic from Joann Fabrics or related shop. Except for the run on this material to make masks in the course of the pandemic, this would work for smaller, low-energy rockets if you wanted to exchange a shock cord.