Next Generation Rigid Airship Design from Eric Raymond

This is a guest post by William Anderson who did the interview.

Eric Raymond is the head of Solar Flight, the world leader in manned solar powered aircraft.

Solar Flight's Sunship Project will be the first zeppelin-class rigid airship since 1939, the next chapter in his scalable approach which has been used successfully on Solar Flight's fixed-winged Sunseeker Aircraft.

In this interview, Eric reveals how the Sunship can be kept small using modern materials such as Vectran cables. Another intriguing aspect is the use of a rocket-fired land-anchor for use in emergency moorings. And finally, he advises any newcomers with convincing ideas to start work on their ideas rather than leave projects on paper, and to assemble a high-powered advice-network of doers and creators in the field in which the big idea is relevant.

This interview was recorded on October 14, 2009.



Thanks to Kenneth Deacon, Airship Heritage Trust, and Solar Flight for use of images in the film.

Thanks to George Raymond for setting up this contact.

Thanks to Airshipworld for publishing this interview.

Thanks most of all to Eric Raymond for the fascinating story and details.

Editors Remark: Thanks again to William for putting this great interview together. If you would like to contribute to Airshipworld please send your stuff to news@airshipworld.info

Interview with Robert Rist from Ohio Airships

It's been a long time since I heard any news about the Dynalifter Aircraft that is being developed by Ohio Airships. But it seems like they rebuilt their damaged prototype in a proper hangar and are trying to continue development. I am still a bit doubtful that the Dynalifter will ever fly or if it does will have that kind of impact that Ohio Airships claims it will have. Time will tell. Have a look at this video that was just posted on YouTube where Robert Rist from Ohio Airships gives an interview about the Project, you get some good views of the prototype.
Ohio Airships

Quick Update

Things have been really quiet here and I haven't been devoting much time to Airshipworld. My passion for airships has not disappeared but I had to step away from this hobby and focus on more pressing concerns. Never the less I am working on new ways to bring regular Airship news in the future, I can not keep the editorial work going at the moment so I am working on a few things to intelligently pull news from different sources and aggregate them here. Airshipworld wont go away it will just change a little.

Akron Windtunnel Experiments 1935

© NASA

I just browsed a bit through YouTube and found a very interesting video of Windtunnel Experiments done in NASA Langley Research Center 1935. Worth a look for anyone interested in aerodynamics and historic airship footage. The models they used was a 1/14 scale model of the Akron and a model of the Lakehurst Hangar of equal scale.

Links:

• Tests of the US Akron and Lakehurst Hangar

Gertler Series 58 Generator - Second Edition available

A year after the first release of the Airshipworld Gertler Series 58 Generator I am happy to now finally release the second edition of the Series 58 Generator. Head over to the Airshipworld Development Blog for the newest version.
Links:

• Series 58 Generator 2nd Edition v0.6 now available
• Direct Download Version v0.6 14.2 Kb

I'm not dead yet!

Dear Readers,
yes there haven't been any posts in over a month. And yes we claim to be a news blog, so why is it that Airshipworld seems to be on a hiatus? Well there are many things one of them is a big lack of time. I currently can't put in the time it would need to research a for an article and post it. I can't even keep up with the massive amount of emails I get for Airshipworld. So please stay subscribed I will do my best to resume regular news posts as soon as I am able to but I can not promise when that will be. One thing that I want to make clear that it is not a question of "if" but rather "when" so we wont go away don't worry.
If you can think of ways to support me to bring Airshipworld back into a regular schedule then please be so kind and share your ideas in the comments of this Blogpost.

Thank you,

Andreas
Editor of Airshipworld

Airship Type Certificate and more for Sale

© US-LTA

The US LTA Corporation Model 138S Airship is a small single engine airship that has been developed in the late 1980s. It was issued an official FAA Type certificate in 1990. The airship is a completely new design that uses a inverted Y configuration similar to that on the Zeppelin NT. It can be controlled with only a stick in contrast to the big wheels that are used on the Goodyear blimps. And the gondola can fit 6 people. It's a nice little airship and it is really sad that no 138S is flying today anymore. But you can change this. The Type Certificate with all Engineering Documents and a lot of Parts are on sale.
Here the complete list of what is offered:

INVITATION TO OFFER

US-LTA CORPORATION IS OFFERING THE MODEL 138S AIRSHIP FAA TYPE CERTIFICATE AS2NM, ALL ENGINEERING AND TECHNICAL DOCUMENTATION, SPARE PARTS AND PARTS STORES, MOLDING AND TOOLING FOR SALE TO INTERESTED OFFERERS. THE ACQUISITION OF THE TYPE CERTIFICATE COMBINED WITH ALL THE RELEVANT ENGINEERING DOCUMENTATION AND PRODUCTION DRAWINGS WILL TRANSFER ALL RIGHTS TO BUILD AND DESIGN TO THE OFFERER.

THE ITEMS FOR SALE INCLUDE:

• TYPE CERTIFICATE
• DRAWING PACKAGE - REV W
• ENGINEERING DOCUMENTATION
• ALL PARTS STORES INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO:
  
  • CONTROL CAR - 001 CONTROL CAR INCLUDING FIBERGLASS SHELL, COWLS, HYDRAULIC LINKAGES, CONSOLES, FLOOR, FUEL TANKS, ETC., 002 CONTROL CAR UNDERCARRIAGE, TEST MULE CONTROL CAR STRUCTURE
  • CONTROL SURFACES INCLUDING FINS AND RUDDERS SUITABLE FOR PRODUCTION TEMPLATE
  • NOSE ASSEMBLY, SUITABLE FOR PRODUCTION TEMPLATE (X2)
  • STICK MAST AND MAST TRAILER
  • TOOLING, PLUGS AND MOLDS FOR COWLS, VALVES, AIR DUCT, WELDMENTS, ETC.
  • LANDING GEAR (X3)
  • AIR AND HELIUM VALVES (X6)
  • PROPELLERS (X2)
  • MISC SPARE PARTS INCLUDING HYDRAULIC ACTUATORS, AUX. FANS, ETC.
• ARCHIVE OF VIDEO AND PHOTOGRAPHIC FOOTAGE

All this can be yours for less than 500,000$ (USD). This is an absolute bargain if one considers that to buy a Zeppelin NT airship you have to pay more than 20,000,000$ (USD). Of course you wont get a complete airship but the foundation to start a business. If you are interested please contact me at airshipworld at gmail dot com. I can provide you with more information if you are interested.

The technology is of course not the most up to date but the standard of the 138S is more advanced than the Lightships and Goodyear Blimps that one sees flying all over the world. The Zeppelin NT is more advanced since it was designed a built a few years later.

This below is the Type Certificate of the 138S airship, and you can also look at the Detailed Specifications here
As2nm US-LTA138S Type Certificate

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Technology Business & Law type certificate uslta

Here some videos of the Airship so that you can get an impression of it's capabilities. I personally think it's a very capable small ship.


Again if you are interested or know someone who might be interested please let me know, by sending an email to airshipworld at gmail dot com.

Disclaimer: We only report about the sale and are not giving an evaluation of the item on sale. The opinions expressed are personal and do not reflect an scientific evaluation of the item on sale.