RC Blimps Guide: How Radio Control Airships Work
If you're looking for a completely different and relaxing way to enjoy the radio control flying hobby, RC blimps (also known as radio control airships) are a fantastic option. For not much money, helium-filled RC blimps offer low-cost, quiet, and incredibly safe flying fun right inside your home or at local indoor venues.
Perfectly suited to indoor flying, RC blimps are easy to operate and surprisingly maneuverable.
These slow-flying aircraft come in a variety of shapes and sizes, and rarely - if ever - suffer crash damage. Puncturing the envelope (the main balloon body) is about the worst that can happen, but you really need to be doing something fairly reckless to do that. Unless the family cat or dog is to blame!
The envelope, sometimes also called the hull, of a typical RC blimp is usually made of tough nylon or Mylar foil.
The hull must be filled with helium gas in order for the blimp to stay airborne. A frequent question I get is where to find helium for these models. The good news is that you don't need a specialized industrial supplier. For finding helium, you should easily be able to pick up a disposable portable helium tank online or from a local party store. Helium is a very safe, non-flammable inert gas that is much less dense than air, giving the blimp the natural buoyancy it needs to stay aloft without relying on wings for lift.
Filling the envelope is usually a very straightforward process, but the manufacturer instructions must be adhered to for complete safety and to prevent over-inflation.
The image below shows the parts of an rc blimp:
Blimplicity - RC Blimp Simplicity!
Generally speaking, radio control blimps are incredibly simple to control, making them perfect for absolute beginners or young kids. They typically have 2 or 3 micro electric motors attached to the gondola (the plastic carriage underneath the balloon), which rotate around various axes to control direction, height, and speed.
By using the transmitter to rotate the motors and change the thrust angle and direction, the aircraft can be brought to a complete standstill in mid-air, rotated 360 degrees on the spot, and even made to reverse.
Flying speeds of radio controlled blimps are typically very slow, so absolutely no damage can be done to people or property when operating one.
Above: a couple of typical rc blimps.
As previously mentioned, the great thing about rc blimps is that there's very little risk of damage. Their slow flying speeds and soft envelope mean that if unintentional contact is made with a solid surface—like a wall, ceiling, or even a person—the blimp will merely bounce straight off. This great, forgiving characteristic differentiates them from almost all other radio control aircraft which will usually suffer damage when crashed into something!
But with that said, not all rc blimp flying has to be slow and boring - this video shows some larger blimps being thrown around in a more aggressive fashion...
RC Air Swimmers
A massive hit in the novelty RC blimp world is the Air Swimmer. These large, helium-filled flying fish operate on the fascinating basis that air has fluid properties. So, instead of using traditional spinning propellers, a big floating fish can be made to "swim" through the air in a highly realistic fashion simply by moving its tail from side to side using a small servo motor!
Great fun!
A word of warning with the Air Swimmers though - if you do want to pick one up to fly around the house, be sure that you buy an original Air Swimmers product. There are a few nasty knock-offs on the market of very poor quality that tend to lose their helium quickly or have weak tail motors. The official Air Swimmer has, generally, very favourable reviews by buyers.
Where to Fly an RC Blimp
Primarily a radio control blimp should be flown indoors, since they are easily effected by the gentlest of breezes. Obviously the larger the area, the more fun you are going to have and the easier it's going to be to perform precise maneuvers.
Having said that, many smaller rc blimps can be flown around a decent sized living room without any issues. Just put away those expensive ornaments first, and watch out for ceiling fans!
Many beginners naturally wonder if they can fly their RC blimp outside. While flying an rc blimp outdoors is possible, it should only be attempted on completely wind-free, dead-calm days. Because of their massive surface area and lighter-than-air buoyancy, even the slightest of breezes will be enough to render your airship more or less uncontrollable and carry it away into the neighbor's yard.
If you do choose to fly your blimp outdoors, then it's a very good idea to tether it with a long, fine piece of fishing line or strong thread. This will limit the altitude performance, should you lose control or get caught in a sudden thermal. Any free-roaming helium filled balloon will just keep going up, up and away.
As for general maintenance, you might be curious about how long the blimp will actually stay inflated. Depending on the quality of the nylon or foil envelope, a good RC blimp will generally hold its helium for about a week or two before it starts looking slightly deflated and losing its natural lift. When that happens, you just give it a quick top-up from your portable helium tank, and you are good to fly again.
Generally speaking, rc blimps are cheap to buy and the cost of filling the body with helium is negligible. For the low cost involved, they can provide a great deal of fun around the home, especially when young kids are present!
They don't require any prior knowledge or experience of radio control flying to operate them, and won't cause any damage to people or property.
So if you like the idea of some low cost, bounce-off-the-walls fun, try a radio controlled blimp!
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