New material that is lightweight like balsa wood, strong as plastic and is also waterproof Here is the video to help with the concept of how its made very simple. For RC ship or RC air plane building purposes I would say use Brawny paper towels much thicker and uses less sheets then the cheap walmart paper towels I used and for larger size materials needed to craft a ship structure go to a art supply store and get a large tablet of drawing paper that is at least 60/w paper for the Veneer sheet faces. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=63aZ...e=youtu.be This might sound nuts to everyone but I'm kind of a mad scientist that way. For a balsa replacement you can get some thick paper say 60 weight paper for the skins now this where it gets weird brawny paper towels or any paper towels will work the thicker the better, for the core say 4 sheets with another sheet of 60/w paper to top it off to 1/8 thickness or stack more paper towel sheets for thicker. Use a paint brush to dab the paper with fiberglass resume then the same to the paper towels and so and so on. Before you start lay some saran wrap out , don't want your stuff to stick to your counter surface, and make sure your surface you are building material is nice and flat. No need for putting weights on top of it while it hardens you can dry stack the papers before you start to get your desired thickness. This material that is lightweight like balsa wood, strong as plastic and is also a waterproof building material . I came up with. this crafting material some time ago. I was reading the forums and saw a post to ask a question fiberglass or wood? this is my answer to the question. ==================================================== W. paper %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Filler is paper towls soaked with Resum. "Note do not press down on %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Gravity will do the work, you may need to rub top sheet to remove %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% bubbles. ==================================================== W. paper
RE: new substitute for Balsa try this out Please try it out, take pictures, and post the results. Thanks for the idea!
I saw your video and the first question is why do all that instead of spending $5 on balsa to sheet the entire ship. The resin to make enough sheets would cost more than that I would think. In the video it looked very rigid.. how will it conform to the shape of the hull? The other issue is resin, which when shot would shatter and splinter, and not take good holes. I want my hull skin to be flexible and take very small holes. Have you shot it up to see how it performs? Its looks great for certain purposes but at the most basic qualification.. cost.. why would you do that when balsa is cheap and plentiful? Now.. silkspan is another story and folks are working on that so I hear. See ya
I think he means it use it for decks and stuff instead of plywood. I prefer 1/16" thick garrolite g10 for that application because it is indestructible by cannon fire. Ron Hunt
Ahhh ... When I read balsa replacement .. then he made sheets.. sheeting is what I assumed. I wouldn't have used balsa for a deck in any case. As a replacement for plywood .. I am still not sure it would hold up to cannon fire. I think it would make a cool video .. testing this new stuff with bb guns.. yee haaaaa
@ Jadfer Structure wise it is waterproof and will hold its shape. where people wear asking wood or fiberglass worried about wood rot in another topic. I would say it wouldn't splinter like wood and would venture a guess at worse the bebe will go threw and at best stop and hold the bebe if thick enough. I wouldn't know I haven't shot it with a bebe gun before. And as far as cost go down at a art supply store and pick up a spiral bound 18x 20 thick drawing paper 10 dollars so you are not limited to small pieces of this stuff as the ships are not small, brawny paper towels 2 dollars and can of resum another 10 dollars so you could make a total water proof ship structure that wont waterlog or have to worry about waterproofing later. I did not say it was cheap or cost effective I just said light weight and could hold its shape as well as balsa wood. and as far as shapes I would say glue the paper down to the ribs and lay the paper towels over and build up the thickness I haven't tried to make a curved surface before as I am new to this hobby and am in the process of designing my first ship. I was just throwing out a new idea for people that hasn't seen it before. Actually you all are the first I have ever showed it to, I came up with it last year. Necessity is the mother of all invention.
As far as curved surfaces go I am confident making a gentle curved deck with this stuff is possible as far as skinning a ship not sure but, this application I believe would work well. Here is my Liberty ship I am working on and a example of a application I think would work well. here is a pic of my ship design I am working on. take note of the top deck the gentle sloping curve from front to back. I am 100% sure a curve like this is possible, not very sure of a ship side???
Do you know that there are Liberty plans on this site. https://rcwarshipcombat.com/resources/basic-liberty-ship-plans.9/ Also, how much does a sheet of that stuff weigh? Beaver
I did not know at first when I started on my plans then just thumbing threw the tabs I had found that Liberty Ship PDF. I wanted to finish out the plan set that I had started on. As far as the weight I can't say, but small sheet I made will float not quite on top of the water as a sheet of balsa but if buoyant enough to stay near the surface. if that helps any. I know that's not the answer you are looking for but it is the best anser I can give I don't have any thing to weight it with or wife have a kitchen scale I could use.
I wonder if it would take the beating of repeated bb hits? Also, how thick is a sheet of that stuff? Beaver
Depends on how how maney paper towels you layer on. the you-tub video I used 4 fold of cheap paper walmart towels it came out to 1/8, that is why I would say yse Brawney or some other brand that is thick, fewer layers you may need 4 layers of cheap walmart brand or 2 layers of brawney.
The reason I was asking those questions is that I was wondering if it would be strong and light enough to work as a rib material for smaller boats. I guess somebody would have to try it out sometime. Beaver
