It's been almost exactly 4.5 years in progress. I was able to successfully control the hovercraft and do laps in the parking lot.
We started with another towed hover test.
We discovered that there's a bunch of dust/and dirt. And unfortunately for my helpers it flys outward quite effectively when over a puddle.
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| Muddy spray from crossing the puddles |
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| A little bit of mud on the skirt. |
For further testing we decided to stay away from the puddles if possible. And we moved onto testing with the thrust fan and trailing ropes for safety.
Following that I demonstrated being able to travel straight and turn around.
It was a little exciting as the return was downhill.
And here's the view from Adrian's camera.
I started getting pretty confident at stopping and turning around.
Here's Adrian's view.
Not all turns happened as desired...
A gentle brush with the curb.
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| Slight contact with the curb |
And here's the flight afterwards.
And Adrian's chase footage.
Here's a gallery of photos from the day.
At the beginning we ran some engine tests before departing:
And for getting the hovercraft back lined up to load into the trailer we hovered it this time.
Adrian also tried hovering
And I spun him around while he was hovering.
While he was at it Adrian tried manual propulsion too ;-)
