BUILDING AN RC RIGID AIRSHIP AND THEN PULLING A HINDENBURG

We love it when engineers have a bit of fun. This is building an RC rigid airship, and then exploding it like the Hindenburg.

We do a lot of serious content at Geekerhertz, so when we saw this video, we had to share it with you. YouTuber, PeterSripol, decided to make a radio-controlled rigid airship, and then have it live out its last moments like the Hindenburg: on fire and falling from the sky.

First things first, though, he had to figure out the most efficient way to fill the craft so that it would fly. He thought through a couple of options, like helium-filled balloons, but they weren't going to fill the vessel effectively.

Eventually, he settled on a custom gasbag the same size and shape as the envelope (that's what they call the 'balloon'), which he made from plastic and a heating iron. This allowed the whole of the envelope to be filled with helium.

Then, it was time to mount propellers to the gondola, that's the portion of the airship hanging below the envelope. Again, Peter mulled over various options and tried out a couple of solutions until he found one that works.

Then, it was time to fill up the gasbag in the envelope with helium and take it for a test flight. As the structure was a little too heavy for the helium to keep it in the air, Peter then added some hydrogen. This isn't recommended because hydrogen is flammable.

Being flammable, though, inevitably leads to ideas about the Hindenburg, which was an enormous German commercial passenger-carrying airship that crashed on 6 May 1937, killing 36 people.

To check out the building process and the inevitable flaming end to Peter's creation, hit the play button below. Enjoy!