READER INPUT
Where makers tell their tales and offer praise, brickbats, and swell ideas.
It was great to see the ornithopter project in MAKE 08! For anyone who missed it, an ornithopter is a device that flies like a bird, by flapping wings. I hope MAKE readers find the same fascination and enjoyment I’ve had from designing and building my own flying bird models over the past 20 years.
Gurstelle’s build instructions were great as usual, but the intro focused on the negative. Instead of giving a sense of all the fantastic accomplishments in this field, it was the same rhetoric we’ve heard so many times before: people can’t fly by flapping wings, but you can build a small rubber-bandpowered one. The “short history” tells little about what’s actually been done. As a result, makers didn’t get to hear about all the cool stuff people around the world have been building.
Often the ornithopter concept is judged a failure or impossibility because supposedly no manned ornithopter has flown. This is flawed for two reasons.
First, why should the concept be judged at the manned scale? If we build a device the size of a bird that flies like a bird, then we succeed in imitating bird flight. MAKE readers are smart enough to see where technology is headed. In the future, there will be a lot of unmanned vehicles doing useful work. Moving people around will be far less important than it seems now.
Also, there have been some manned flights. They were dismissed in MAKE out of pure skepticism. The idea that we can’t fly is such a deeply internalized myth that people can’t accept news of a successful flight after it happens. Of course you can’t fly like Daedalus by gluing feathers on your arms, but with the right technology and a powerfulenough engine, we can fly by flapping.
Ultimately we can make anything that exists in nature. Even Leonardo understood this, 500 years ago and well before the means were in sight.
—Nathan Chronister
Bill Gurstelle replies: Mr. Chronister’s points are well taken. I, too, look forward to the eventuality of the manned ornithopter.
Thank you for publishing your magazine! Like many engineers, I got started in engineering by tinkering with ham radio (á là Dilbert), storing static electricity in styrofoam cup capacitors, blowing up power supplies — taking things apart to see how they worked. In short, I got started by engaging in the kind of play you show in each issue of MAKE.
When engineering became a job, somehow the fun got lost. I believe that too much of engineering is treated as an assembly line function — compartmentalized, categorized, commoditized. It’s as if creativity can be planned and released in exact, controlled amounts at the exact, appropriate times.
Thanks for bringing back the “messy” human part of engineering. Your magazine should be required reading in every engineering school in the country.
—Jesse Alexander
Editor’s Note: Many readers (and the entire magazine staff) were touched by Colin Berry’s memoir (MAKE, Volume 07, page 36) about his older brother’s soap box derby successes and failures in the 1970s. We also persuaded Colin to record the piece in a quite memorable audio file; you can listen to it at makezine.com/blog/archive/2006/10/the_maker_file_2.html. After listening to the piece, one reader had his own nostalgic tale to add to the soapbox saga.
Colin,
I just listened to your touching podcast story about your brother and his soap box derby experience. What a compelling story. It took me back to my innocence and youth as I raced in the 1976 soap box derby in Valparaiso, Indiana.
As I listened, I could not believe the race similarities. I too crashed at the end of the race; the brake malfunctioned (pushed too hard and lifted the weight off the wheels), threw my car left, and my rear axle hit the guardrail, and there would be no more racing for me that 4th of July as the axle was bent beyond repair.
My family was there cheering me on amongst the crowd of about 4,000 spectators, and I felt embarrassed and somewhat of a failure at the time to have my dream taken away so quickly and in such a highly public way. But the good news was that everyone remembered me and wanted to look at the damage to the car, and I got interviewed on the radio.
I remember feeling crushed as I thought of all of the hours that I lovingly labored on my passion. The dream was over in a flash, and the only celebration would be a cake at the house and a party, as I tried to forget the pain that I felt as my dream of making it to Akron was swept away.
My son and I made the workbench based on the directions I found on makezine.com. First of all, I love the bench, and we had a great time working on it. I came across a neat design enhancement (in my humble opinion) completely by accident. When I was deciding on cutting the legs, I went with 36 inches. This meant that I used an 8-foot 2×4 to make two 36-inch legs, which left a 24-inch piece. I did this twice. When I finished the assembly, I used the leftover 24-inch pieces to further strengthen the top by installing them at 32 inches and 64 inches as braces. Thought you might like that. Now there’s no waste (even though I know I could have used the pieces on something else).
Thanks for sharing the design. It made me clean up the garage after.
—Art Trombley
As a child growing up, I was obsessed with the race and clearly remember the “Magnet Scandal.” How small a world it is to think that this scandal impacted your brother and family’s life. Thanks for the great podcast, as it gave me goose bumps to listen to it, and I can’t wait to share it with my brother, nieces, nephews, and family. Thanks again.
—Rodney Rumford
I can’t believe that nobody has flagged this error in MAKE 07, DIY Circuits, “Hello, World.” On page 150, there is a phrase: “the display 3 routine shows a ‘3’ by turning on all the segments, except for the top-right and bottom-right ones.” That will result in an uppercase “E”. The phrase should read: “the display 3 routine shows a ‘3’ by turning on all the segments, except for the top-left and bottom-left ones.” Thanks!
—Bruce Cowan
Make: Marketplace
Make: Marketplace
