Lil hovercraft makeover

"THINGS THAT FLOAT"

creations by David Bosworth and friends

I have no pic's yet but I installed a custom two blade prop and seem to have picked up a goodly amount of power! The reworked four blade fan performed rather well too but when it came to trying it out on the river we discovered some very large ware holes in the skirt!. Also there has been a new prop guard installed since my last update. This one is built from alum tubing, flat bar and surpluss nylon fishing net and is quite a bit lighter than the old one.

This will be an on going page about refitting the "Lil" hovercraft. In an effort to keep it brief I will change the pic's and commentary to reflect current events.

Above left: is one of the skirt corners showing the damage from the inside where the patches will be glued on. I must have removed about 4 pounds of gravel from in there. Above left: is a vent I am installing to let out some skirt pressure without cutting lift volume when crossing un even surfaces. This also should help with getting up on plane and will be used to induce a plow-in in an emergency.

Well, I should have the rest of the work done by this weekend or early next week and we'll get her back out on the river for testing! In the event I have a less than successfull outing I will have to carve a new prop for the 12hp engine I have and give that a try! The vent in the front of the craft will be a great help when the 12hp is used, that way I won't have to do any rework on the splitter area and save the changes untill we are ready to build the next one!

A semi major flooding event presented a fine hovercrafting opportunity for us! (Nov. 2003) This is the same location as the pictures above. On top left and right Dave is hovering hover the flooded access road towards the house. On the bottom right Dave is throwing her into a tight 180 to get stopped before the bank. At 3 am last night the water was up by the motor home on the hill in the background.