Website: http://www.rubber-power.com
Article by Bill Kuhl http://www.scienceguy.org
Special Thanks to Darcy Whyte for all his help!
No one that I know of in recent years has done more to promote model aviation
both in person and over the Internet than Darcy Whyte, the designer of the
“Squirrel” rubber powered free flight model airplane.
The Squirrel design is so simple yet its’ design is ingenious in that it can be built
so quickly and helps novice builders avoid many problems common to other
beginner airplanes.
I have never met Darcy in person as he lives far away in Ottawa Canada but we
converse regularly via the Internet. Darcy Whyte is a software developer
specializing in Social Media and Internet systems, his model aviation website has
been a great candidate for experimentation in honing his Internet presence. His
website URL is http://www.rubber-power.com.
Darcy has provided most of the pictures for this article and has been wonderful
about answering my questions. Please pass the link to this article on to anyone
that might be interested.
Bill Kuhl - AMA Cub/Delta Dart website and Scienceguy.org
The Ideas that Became the Squirrel
Darcy tested the winglets in a sheet balsa plane.
Darcy experimented with tip dihedral before trying the winglets.
At this point he was building by pinning to building board but later glued
balsa directly to tissue.
Prototype with Wing Spar
Build process with wing spar.
Close up picture of a winglet, winglet eliminates the need for dihedral.
Wing is flat which makes for easier building and less breakage.
A really novel feature that is used with the vertical fin and stabilizer is to use only
a leading edge of balsa and no support for the tissue on the trailing edge, this
eliminates at least two additional pieces of balsa for each surface.
Popular AMA Cub plane uses dihedral, wing halves angle upward from the center.
With dihedral joint, wings often break in the center joint.
AMA Cub stab requires three pieces of balsa with angle joints.
Squirrel Website
http://www.rubber-power.com
The website for the Squirrel is a wonderful resource for building
information, ordering Squirrel kits, and interesting information
about model aviation.
Kit components
Darcy delivers Squirrel kits by motorcycle in his local area.
Box of Squirrel kits
Novice builders often have trouble cutting and fitting angled joints but the
Squirrel has no angles in the balsa joints.
Building the Squirrel
The Squirrel is built with fast drying craft glue and glue stick which are
easy to find, dry relatively fast, and is safe to use.
Flying the Squirrel
Flying indoors
Flying outdoors
The Groups that have
Built Squirrels
The Squirrel model plane has been popular with scout groups
throughout the world.
Darcy has given speeches to professional groups such as
inventors and creative thinkers about design, manufacturing
the kits, and marketing.
Slater Harrison
http://www.sciencetoymaker.org
During the summer of 2009 Darcy visited Slater Harrison who's a
school teacher in Pennsylvania who has been building Squirrel
model airplanes as part of his science classes. They met on-line
when Slater discovered the Squirrel design and started to build
them with his students.
One of Slater’s happy classes that built Squirrels.
Darcy and Slater’s son build Squirrels
Slater and Darcy
Slater holds a “walk along glider”, glider rides on a wave of air provided
by a person walking with a piece of cardboard.
This glider was built almost entirely from paper.
Slater prepares to release the glider and begin walking.
Darcy has brought his Squirrel model airplane design before more diverse groups
than anyone I know of. He has managed to combine model airplane building,
adult beverages, and socializing to coed groups in the local pubs of Ottawa.
Darcy has been building model airplanes with a variety of groups for many
years, in the above pictures he had not yet perfected his Squirrel design at
this session for nursing home group.
Mods
Several people have sent Darcy pictures and descriptions of how they have
modified the Squirrel design including biplane versions and Squirrels that are
much larger. See website Gallery for further details.
The End
http://www.scienceguy.org
Bill Kuhl
email: scienceguy33@gmail.com