Month: August 1993

Flying Sphere

Model aviation guru, George Parks, built the Flying Sphere aircraft in collaboration with aviation artist, Dave Santos.

George selected a thick slow speed NASA airfoil for the RC prototype.

Flying Sphere by George Parks, inspired by Dave Santos.
Flying Sphere by George Parks, inspired by Dave Santos.

The overall impression of the Flying Sphere design was that it flew about as well as conventional designs. It had interesting structural and aerodynamic qualities due to its relative absence of wingtip vortices, its spread mass, and its peculiar “rolling ball” landing style.

Flying Sphere detail
At left is the wreckage from an early crash. The center photo, by Karen Pittman, shows the repaired aircraft. At right are various small prototypes by Santos. One version, a sort of “pendulum kite” on a monofilament and bamboo pole was a mind-bender at Austin raves in the late eighties.

This project was one of several designed by David Santos to demonstrate far-fetched concepts. Others were a boat that sails directly into the wind, a rain-powered vehicle, the ProtoAndroid, and the Bipedal Ornithopter, a flapping-wing flying machine that runs on legs to take off.

Intellectual property statement – Patents pending. Designs protected by copyright. Noncommercial personal and educational use encouraged.

The background material for this page is derived from an archived page on the Internet Archive Wayback Machine. Some links may have been added, removed, or updated.

The Great Wall O’ Gizmos

The Great Wall O’ Gizmos is a continually-growing exhibit of interactive junk art technology by Brooks Coleman. It made its debut at RoboFest 4 (1993).

The boxes in the wall are modular and can be stacked and connected in different ways. A multitude of clocks, sequencers, lab timers, and dishwashing machine timers turn dissected appliances and gizmos on and off like crazed monkeys.

This is another creative use of recycled material from our resident junk yard art genius.