repurposing/recycling items for hobby-use

Hey Rod, can I bum one of the louvers off of you? I'll put it in my new Li'l Satan kit that's waiting to be built. I have another secret idea too.
Rusty

Canopies and engine cowls on scale models are the most vulnerable and never-to-find-again-on-ebay-or-elsewhere  parts. I often replace them with sections of various plastic bottles (soda,shampoo etc) cut to size. Just like the white engine cowl on my Cosmic Wind.





The aluminum exhaust gas deflector behind the TD049 on the pic above was cut from a beer can (I had to open and drink quite a number of cans before I found the best Czech lager beer can option, but other brews are also near as much  feasible...modeling sometimes is a real health sacrifice, I tell you... ...)

My still best tank option is made of party balloons. The pass-through tube in the stopper, connecting the fuel pick-up line and the external fuel line to the engine, is made of the filler of ballpoint pens (This latter i.e. the ballpoint pen was invented by a Hungarian, by the way ...).



The plastic stem of earbuds, melted and butted at one end,  is used as the plug in the filling line of the tank. See the one protruding from the orange filling line.

Modelers are amazing innovators. Something to be proud of. Good work, all of you, and us.
Rusty

RknRusty wrote:Modelers are amazing innovators. Something to be proud of. Good work, all of you, and us.
Rusty

Yes! I like Andras' clever use of at least three items that would otherwise have been thrown away. I'd like to see a drawing of "New222's" floss-pick horn.

Some window-blind kits come with plastic hold-down clips that could be used for control-horns. Picture a set-up that used one of these along with a plate (similar to a Dubro horn) using two nylon screws that self-tap into a pre-drilled plastic mating-plate. Cut-off the "peg".. and drill a hole there for your pushrod.



Question is.. would it be a factor; having the pushrod-hole by necessity, being rearward of the hinge-line? I don't think it would alter the 1:1 deflection-ratio. It would however lengthen the distance for the pushrod to move the surface. Maybe this would be desirable where the horn doesn't have a lot of length to it.

Rusty, I'd be more than happy to send you one of those fan-louvers to try. I just edited this paragraph.. because what I'd originally posted was stupid. The photos below show .060" CF rod taped to the L/E of a cut-down louver for a stab design that would fit totally between the booms. Not out of the question.. but not what you'd want for the Lil' Satan. The louver is easily trimmed-shorter with good sharp scissors. That's .060" dia. CF rod pictured.. and combined with the tape, would lessen the tendency to flex too. A Dubro #107 1/2A control-horn is shown.




Looking at photos of your Lil' Satan.. reminded me how its stab. is hinged.. and I'm pretty sure that's how you'd do it if you used one of my parts.. but by the looks, the Goldberg stab has a larger chord-dimension? The louver's chord is 1.0".

The next time you cut-open typical clear-plastic packaging requiring scissors (cutting around the welded-perimeter) take a look at what's there once you remove the product. Flat panels are useful for a lot of things.. and can vary greatly in thickness.. for a particular application. A legal-envelope makes handy storage for an assortment of multiple flat sheets. Smaller snap-closure "hardware" packages can be re-used for small parts.. and they can hang on your peg-board hooks for high-visibility/easy-access.

I used some thin clear-plastic sheet to make simulated gear-doors on my Bearcat.





The engine-cowling is another repurposed item.. obtained from an aerosol air-freshener refill-cartridge. (Lysol/Airwick)

As per your request roddie. I don't have anything at home with that set-up right now, so I just mocked one up for ya! I hope this does clarify. I did this mock-up in a scrap piece of foam I had laying around, but the same can be done in balsa. Sometimes I remember to give it a quick 'rough-up' with a piece of sandpaper or whatever to give the glue something to adhere to. As well, different flossers have different characteristics so they may be taller or shorter (kids and adults varieties). When done, I just clipped off the 'legs' from the bottom.

Sitting on top of the area it will be installed into. It was already cut and fitted, I just removed it for the picture for clarity. In the picture, you can see the holes for the 'legs' to go into.


Installed and would just need a hole for the control rod to go into.


This link is for the picks I had used for this. They are quite sturdy.
http://us-professional.gumbrand.com/gum-professional-clean-flossers.html

One of the síde-effects of this hobby indeed is that you start to see potential airplane parts everywhere around the house and the office

Besides the plastic bottle caps and bottoms that look just like engine cowlings, there are some pipe collars that would make great cowlings too.

For nose and wingtip weights I have used self-adhesive automotive wheel balancing weights (meant for alloy wheels). They are compact, come in different sizes and have their weight number cast on them. New ones have the sticky tape, so it is easy to use them. Used ones will need new tape of course, or they can be secured with glue or a screw.

NEW222 wrote:As per your request roddie. I did this mock-up in a scrap piece of foam I had laying around, but the same can be done in balsa. Sometimes I remember to give it a quick 'rough-up' with a piece of sandpaper or whatever to give the glue something to adhere to.

Now that's innovative! Thanks Chancey! My wife uses those floss-picks. They are very rigid.. but will "green-stick" fracture when bent to the extreme, rather than shearing under force. Pretty much "unbreakable". Probably a great choice for driving the elevator on a Micro Ringmaster!

KariFS wrote:One of the síde-effects of this hobby indeed is that you start to see potential airplane parts everywhere around the house and the office

Besides the plastic bottle caps and bottoms that look just like engine cowlings, there are some pipe collars that would make great cowlings too.

For nose and wingtip weights I have used self-adhesive automotive wheel balancing weights (meant for alloy wheels). They are compact, come in different sizes and have their weight number cast on them. New ones have the sticky tape, so it is easy to use them. Used ones will need new tape of course, or they can be secured with glue or a screw.

Indeed! It's a positive side-effect though. Just don't be like Roddie, who has a habit of collecting (or making) more of some potential item/part, than he could ever use in a lifetime of modeling.. Take the cap/cowls for example.. I have over 20 of them nested in a lg. zip-seal bag (full..) You'd think that would be more than enough.. yet I'll save more of them from going in the trash.

What type of pipe-collars? They may be different from anything we use here in this country. I'm very curious.

Roddie, I am not sure if "collar" is the correct name for it but this is what I was talking about:



It is meant to clean up a sink drain installation, this one is a part of an IKEA set, left over from my kitchen remodel. Taller ones are also available, and also versions that can be split which may also be useful in some cases.

KariFS wrote:Roddie, I am not sure if "collar" is the correct name for it but this is what I was talking about:



It is meant to clean up a sink drain installation, this one is a part of an IKEA set, left over from my kitchen remodel. Taller ones are also available, and also versions that can be split which may also be useful in some cases.

I think you could call that an escutcheon.. but it's a lot more fit for an engine-cowling than the old flat, chrome-plated split escutcheon-plates which could be installed after a drain installation. They had a single rivet to hinge the two halves.. and a clip/closure on the opposite side. I remember the old steam radiators that heated the house when I was a kid. Those split-plates were used to trim around where the pipe went down through the floor. If one was missing.. you could easily lose a marble if unlucky enough to have one roll toward the hole! Actually.. I was born a little late for when marbles were popular.. but my dad had saved a small cloth-bag full, that he'd had since he was a kid. Beautiful "agates", "cat-eyes".. and one shooter. I hope he still has a few that he's saved. I'd hate to think that he's lost all his marbles..

My Tee Dee 09 works in a hot setup (glow plug conversion head, exhaust muffler) and tends to develop varnish inside the cylinder after five or so 10 minutes flights. Devarnishers for COX engines larger than the 051 class are - as far as I know - unavailable, so I had to improvise one.

I put my 049/051 devarnisher brush into the 09 cylinder, and in order to make up for the difference in cylinder bore, pushed  the stem of an earbud in in addition, aligning it parallel with the stem of the brush.

Keeping the brush and the earbud stems fixed in parallel, I rotate the cylinder a few times, and efficiently devarnish it.



In order not to plough longitudinal scratches onto the cyclinder wall that may impair compression, I always push in the brush, loose, first and the earbud stem follows only afterwards. Remove the earbud stem first and the brush afterwards, to prevent the same when done devarnishing

Well, this improvisation will stop short of solving problems like global warming or famine in the third world, but is at least a good make-shift devarnishing technique for Tee Dee 09 powerplants.

Karifs & Roddie, Those are called "Escutcheon's" and are used in plumbing to cover the pipe where it comes out of the wall. They come in many different sizes and as an old plumber I don't know why I haven't thought of it myself!

Balogh....Try using rifle/pistol cleaning brush's, they come in many different caliber's/sizes.

RK Flyer  

I am watching just haven't had nothing to say yet i think the .09 may take a 410 or 20 gage shotgun brush , i have not done a .09 but do use gun brushes for .049/.051 Seeing some good ideas here Roddie good thread !

If I tried to do a photo essay of all the household products I re-purpose; I would probably violate my rant about photo bloated threads...grin

Does not help my Hungarian friend but HF has very cheap sets of paint gun cleaning brushes ....from exceptionally small up to fairly large

I use the nylon bristle brushes, after a night of soaking in Hopps #9 to de varnish pistons and cylinders...

For a few years I had a sister who got too deep into canning...Ball Jars... every thing from pickles to jams and relishes ...all yummy

Over the years we had many excess 4 to 12 oz jars and I found New caps at Wally world for very low $

I decanted a lot of my Gallon cans of Randolph Dope into the 4 and 8 oz wide mouth jars... wrote on top if non or tautening, Nitrate or Butyrate, with or without filler (I use Zinc Stearate)

You got a computer or three that died a while back... ???

Fun project is to break the "void warranty" seal and use all your micro torx and screwdrivers to disassemble the hard drives and recover the very very strong magnets...yes oddly shaped.... but broken into smaller pieces and epoxied to the edge of a shelf will hold a lot of tools...and BTW the individual disks are very very good mirrors

I may have posted this before but since Fred brought up dead computers, here's what you can do with the HDD's after you have salvaged the magnets:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Vzr6-Fd3lwM

They make nice grinder it seems. I have 3 old ones kicking around, 200Mb Seagate and a couple of others that I have removed from old computers before scrapping them.

Hi all,  I thought that I would list this for people (like me) that are "old school" I guess is the term used nowadays.  Many of us in the past have used the old 35mm film canisters,  balloons, and many other things as fuel tanks for our 1/2A engines.  I am kicking myself that I am just now realizing the amount of available fuel tanks in our houses!  This is a swimmers ear dropper bottle that contains alcohol(75%) I think.  The alcohol can be used to thin epoxy, cleaning engines and many other modeling uses I'm sure!  When it's used up,  it doubles as a fueler or fuel tank.  These are almost perfect in that they are lightweight(lighter than a Sullivan,  can't get Hayes tanks any more in the 1-2 oz range),  are fuelproof, and slim!  All I have done here is take the twist off cap off,  drilled a .062 hole with the Dremel,  and inserted the same size aluminum tubing with another short piece of 1/2A silicone tubing on top.  I bent my aluminum tubing just because it seems easier to use to me.  I do all my fueling one handed now that I have this! These eye/ear dropper bottles are available everywhere to everyone, I hope it will be of use to someone else also.

fredvon4 wrote:
For a few years I had a sister who got too deep into canning...Ball Jars... every thing from pickles to jams and relishes ...all yummy

Over the years we had many excess 4 to 12 oz jars and I found New caps at Wally world for very low $

I decanted a lot of my Gallon cans of Randolph Dope into the 4 and 8 oz wide mouth jars... wrote on top if non or tautening, Nitrate or Butyrate, with or without filler (I use Zinc Stearate)

I am glad you posted this. I bought a ton of leftover dope from a local airport over the summer and needed to decant the stuff from the very rusty cans it came in. Too bad I don't know a canning fanatic because I had to buy canning jars new from my local grocery store.

I was concerned the dope might react with the rubber seals and I hope that by what you have written that you have the benefit of some time with this setup, where nothing bad has happened. The dope looks fine even though the cans had been stored in a drafty barn which probably had a leaky roof, to boot. The Randolph dope was visibly more viscous than another brand that was part of the mix - interesting to see to the quality of Randolph.

As part of my haul, I got an unused 5 gallon container of Randolph thinner. I had to go to HD and buy new, empty paint cans to decant the thinner. They aren't cheap! So, spending money to store the stuff took away a little from the excellent deal I originally got, but you have to do what you have to do.

This may not be a "regular household item", but still good material for modeling.

It is not my invention either. But anyway, bicycle spokes make pretty good control rods. The end of a traditional style spoke is bent and pre-formed perfectly to go into the hole of a bellcrank:



This is handy especially if you're building the controls inside the wing or fuselage in a tight space. The spokes I got are steel, 2mm thick so they are a bit heavier than I'd like at 8 grams a piece, with the nipple included. I suppose I could take just the bent end, glue it in a carbon tube, and attach a 2-56 rod in the other end for an R/C style pushrod end.

In the other end of the spoke there is a nipple (a metal kind of one, no need to get all excited )



If you take a length of a spoke and glue it in a suitable spot, the nipple makes a pretty neat mounting screw for a cowl. This is not my idea either, it has been used in a team race model called "Weaver", see the link for further details:

http://www.outerzone.co.uk/plan_details.asp?ID=4288

So far As I can tell the decanted dope...some times mixed with thinner to 50/50 or even thinner 70/30 and even the jars pre mixed with Zinc Stearate filler all open and close just fine...

I use the 4 0z jars of pre mixed quite a lot --brushing right out of the jar...of course you get dope on the lip and other "on the jar" drips...I wipe down the lip with a Lacquer Thinner soaked rag before putting the lid back on and so far have not had the dope glue the jar shut....

A while back I posted about buying a bunch of Gallon, 1/2 Gallon and Quart metal cans so I could decant the Dope OUT of the Gallon Pail container... into something I could open and pour out of

Painting right out of a typical Gallon pail intending to use all of it works fime as we all know
BUT only intending to use a pint or quart of the Gallon is a royal pain...leaves a lot of air space and I see mostly tends to let a skin off on the top of whatever product

An yes I do know about the various cans of dry air (gas) that can be used to flood the void and displace the air in the container... never tried any of them...yet

Zephyr2272 wrote:Hi all,  I thought that I would list this for people (like me) that are "old school" I guess is the term used nowadays.  Many of us in the past have used the old 35mm film canisters,  balloons, and many other things as fuel tanks for our 1/2A engines.  I am kicking myself that I am just now realizing the amount of available fuel tanks in our houses!  This is a swimmers ear dropper bottle that contains alcohol(75%) I think.  The alcohol can be used to thin epoxy, cleaning engines and many other modeling uses I'm sure!  When it's used up,  it doubles as a fueler or fuel tank.  These are almost perfect in that they are lightweight(lighter than a Sullivan,  can't get Hayes tanks any more in the 1-2 oz range),  are fuelproof, and slim!  All I have done here is take the twist off cap off,  drilled a .062 hole with the Dremel,  and inserted the same size aluminum tubing with another short piece of 1/2A silicone tubing on top.  I bent my aluminum tubing just because it seems easier to use to me.  I do all my fueling one handed now that I have this! These eye/ear dropper bottles are available everywhere to everyone, I hope it will be of use to someone else also.

Another source for similar bottles is in water test-kits. They're about 1oz. capacity. They're usually free.. and come in a package with an envelope for mailing-off/submitting your water sample to a lab. Look for them in home-center stores.

Being for use with water.. I'm not sure how fuel-proof they are, but I made a balloon-tank capsule out of one. The cap and seal are the only parts that would get fuel exposure in my example.

Water tests and labs mentioned by Roddie above  remind me of my fuel-filler syringe of 2 oz capacity that I typically buy in veterinary/pet accessory shops...they are primarily intended for injections for mid-size pets like horses ...2 oz of fuel will keep my large-size pet COX Tee Dee09 running for nearly 10 minutes in the air..

A siphon tube from a spent household cleaner comes in handy when you want to reinforce the rudder leading edge on your Lil roughneck after tens of landings on deep grass terrain that abused the rudder.
I opened up the stiff plastic tube along its length with an exacto blade and pulled it over the lead edge to stiffen the balsa rudder that snapped and almost broke on a heavy landing. Now I have a strong rudder and spared efforts to replace it.


I love this lil roughneck that was originally designed for 020 engines but I fly it with my TeeDeeReedie and she is a bullet to fly.