I need advice on making a Space Shuttle for Christmas. My brother and I want to build it. Does anyone have a source for plans? I also need a plan for a plywood Santa cutout for the side, just to be a bit whimsical.
I ordered the rocket motors already, but its taking forever for them to come at 3mph all the way from Cape Canaveral, and now I'm afraid the lousy truck driver won't help me unload them. With what I had to pay for shipping, I'll be darned if I'll give him an extra $25! Anyway, I figured I'd use MDF for the tiles to protect from re-entry. I thought it would work based on my testing: I threw them as high as I could in the back yard, and I didn't see any signs of burning when they came back down (although, I do have a headache.) But, after cutting them to size on my new Craftsman saw (I think its made by Delta now,) there are black marks along the cut edges. I tried to return the pieces to the lumber yard, but the jerk there would only take back full sheets. Had to buy a bunch of bar clamps and the Norm Abrams Glue Applicator, and as soon as the glue dries, he's getting his full sheets back. Cost me a fortune in glue, but I have to control costs on this thing.
My new plan is to use sheetrock. Has anyone used sheetrock for a re-entry vehicle? 1/2" or 5/8"? I'd hate to have to double it up, because the stuff gets heavy and I bought the economy rocket motors, so if I need to use 5/8", just let me know. I have a call in to Bob Vila, because I think I saw him use a knife to cut sheetrock once. Or he watched someone do it. Whatever. Anyway, I figured if anyone knew about re-entry, he was the guy (the local Sears guy didn't know squat, but I did get a nice RoboGrip pliers that auto-sizes and works on pipe, nuts, and re-entry vehicles.)
For the rocket motor housing, instead of using metal cylinders, I was thinking of PVC. Heck, PVC is rated at 480 or 48 million PSI or something, so that should be OK. I think that stuff about it shattering is bunk anyway, because my neighbor knows a guy who used to be in the Navy, and he said someone said they could use PVC for submarine missle tubes, and I figure that's the same thing. Anyone make missle tubes out of this before?
I'm also looking for a router jig to cut the payload doors, but the guys at the Router Magic show could only sell me a 23" long sliding table. Idiots! Who ever heard of routing the edges of payload doors that were only 23" long? Like that's ever going to work.
And that Roy Underhill guy is a joke too. There's no way I'm wrapping
23,000 miles of leather strapping to an adze handle, tying the other end to a flexible hickory branch and spinning the shuttle into orbit. We made rocket motors for a reason.Also, I know one of you has plans for Robin's Butt. Or something. If you do, email them to me, as I need to make comfortable seats for the shuttle, and I figure I'll just triple the dimensions to make it fit my butt.
Luigi Replace "no" with "yk" for real email address