Making a WOODEN Airplane Propeller!

last summer I flew out to Rolla Missouri to finally film a video with one of my woodworking Aviation Heroes Culver props and Elena is the third generation in her family making air-worthy wooden propellers it's always so far one of my favorite parts of this job is like I see people building stuff on the internet and then I get to see their space for real when did you take over so Grandpa died in 2016. and then my dad and my husband helped me for another two years and then they took jobs in the concrete industry and that's when it was just me granny kids I mean they were little littler back then but we made it work do they help sometimes like they'll vacuum for me or they will little glue for me things like that but as far as let me sand not really not yet they did they do sand little miniature props for their teachers so I'm surprised how many people have nothing to do with Aviation but when a propeller okay so this is all the information we got from the owner of the Peyton pool that we're gonna fly this prop on and then this is Elena's magical translation this speed chart is for pitches that are for my profile so when you see a prop and it's stamped say 72 by 4076 by something the first number is the diameter and then the second number is going to be your pitch the pitch means it's 42 let's say inches of pitch and what that's going to mean is for every single rotation that that propeller makes his airplane is going to move 42 inches forward assuming no slip um Peyton poles have a little bit of drag so we can assume that he's not going to get exactly that distance that 42 inches because there will be some drags so you will hear people talk about angles of the blade and angle of the blade is what you use to get inches of pitch but an angle of the blade and Pitch are not the same thing so what we're going to look here is we're going to look at this 25 this is what I call my speed chart the customer at 23.50 so that's going to be this line so for his max numbers he said he red lines at like 93. so we're going to be in this area too and it puts us pretty much in the same pitch area foreign start really getting into it a quick word from the sponsor of today's video as you guys already know I am always doing something all of the time from building a actual propeller and flying it to launching Rockets or just exploring the Great Outdoors on weekends with my friends so I needed a pair of shoes that could keep up with me rain or shine and that's why I'm excited to talk about today's sponsor Bessie what makes messy awesome is that their shoes are made for all-day wearing with four-way stretch material and Diamond text technology which make the shoes 100 waterproof so it doesn't matter if I'm hiking or taking my boat out or going to the beach my feet are dry and cozy where investies allows me to be my absolutely Whimsical self and I don't have to worry about what the weather is like before I step outside and enjoy nature we all need some time outside and what better way to do that than putting on your shoes and just stepping out the front door it's great because if they get money they just rinse off and I'm good to go back out now that I have Essie shoes I welcome the weather take advantage of Bessie's Memorial Day sale and save up to 30 on a variety of vessi styles by going to vesi.com xylophoxlet in case you missed the sale you can still enjoy a 15 discount by using the code xylophoxylin at checkout don't wait too long to grab your favorite vessi shoes now let's build this propeller what I'm looking for is any imperfections I'm looking for any splits any knots any cracks um any uneven things like the planer would leave so you can feel it we will plane this quickly just to clean it up and it opens the grain so all sorts of good stuff there it'll just take a minute [Music] thank you once the boards were planed I dug out the template for this style of prop and we got to tracing now the templates get nailed down to pin them in place and then those nail holes will serve as guides later for alignment dowels [Music] foreign [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] so I did the first three and now Elena's gonna truly flex and you'll see how easy she makes it look thank you [Music] and if you want to see true bandsaw Irish we give Clover props a follow on Instagram or YouTube or something because Elena is a wizard on the bandsaw with 12 foot boards like I have truly never seen before [Music] [Music] Perfection that was also so fast you did that in like two and a half minutes flat like 17 years of work you can compare this one is Elena and these ones are mine you can't see the light on hers [Music] so we're gonna use this hole to pin all of these together so that way all of our centers will be aligned and then after we have it pinned in the center we'll clamp the ends and then we'll put a down Rod through them to secure them through the end because it gets cut off to prep for gluing we gave each contact service a quick stand and then we got to mixing up the glue now this glue is a pre-catalyzed powdered urea resin so it needs to be reconstituted with water before each use but then after that it just rolls on like normal glue [Music] thank you there we are so we'll glue this side this side flip it over like a sandwich this side this side flip it over like a sandwich [Music] and thus began gluing with some of the best trained help around [Music] thank you [Music] so first thing we'll do is I'm gonna let you set your side down first so I don't smash your fingers [Music] thank you that's day one after a night in the Press it's time to pull the blank out and start making it propeller shaped [Music] okay so we need to sand this smooth um because when we lay it on the drill press we don't want any kind of Wiggle we have any kind of Wiggle here um and our drill bit doesn't go in completely perfectly straight than our bolt pattern will be wonkady as well quantity is a word this flat side is the side that goes to the engine this is the side you're going to bolt to your engine so we are going to drill it the side up and what I'm going to do is I'm going to align the very very tip of this with the holes that we drilled earlier it's now time to drill out the bolt pattern so the propeller can actually get bolted to the engine itself [Music] a little propeller Loft okay this is a woman in her natural habitat so I probably have like 300 patterns total I organize them by Hub thickness first then diameter then right or left hand rotation and then by pitch so I have a little bit of organization but I don't really have as much room as I need but anyway so for the problem we're making today I looked at it and we need a 72s and then I'm looking for the correct rotation which is right hand rotation a pitch that is close to what we're looking for and then I'm also looking for a pattern that I like one of the advantages of having a girl make your prop like I wanted to all look good together so I usually I like seeing the airplane before I make the props people is a classic design and I do like a scimitar profile for it so that made me decide that I like this one [Music] so we'll go Chuck it up in the light we will just put it all in the lathe now it's so fun to see this lathe in person I've been like ogling it for years [Music] you just have to listen to The Machine does anything sound ugly does anything sound off does anything sound like it wants to fly apart or is anything growly Abby what do you think anything sound ugly Abby approved so what I'm making sure up here is that the center of this when it rotates is in the center of the stroke here perfect [Music] that is going to clamp our Carriage to this chain that's going to pull it down as it rotates so this is going to rotate it and then this chain is going to pull it down and so essentially we're just going to Corkscrew all the material that is not a propeller off [Music] thank you [Music] and with one side shaped we left the template exactly as it is in the lathe and then flipped the propeller around guaranteeing that the two sides will be identical [Music] so James made this little stair stepper for me and like about one to two of these equals about one inch of pitch so we need to go in about four so I'm going to put it right about there okay let's see what that does [Music] [Music] so if you take a look you can see that it cleaned really well all the way across so foreign five tangent times pi times 54 which is the double of 27 which would give us 37.6 and we're looking for 38 so we are going to call that good [Music] foreign [Music] okay so basically you'll just lay this on here and like you said 36 I make a mark at 36 then I put this on here and draw the half circle [Applause] [Music] foreign foreign [Music] bolt pattern which is what our customers that he had with which is four and three eighths on the spread which is here and then we have 3 8 bolts and that's what these are I tape over the other ones otherwise I'll get distracted [Music] so the bolt pattern is lined up so that the laser runs through center of the tip Center of Bolt Center of this bolt Center of that Bolt and then the center of that tip Okay so this is a prop flange and this is your bolt pattern and these are um when you ask for your counter bores this is a diameter that I'm asking for so you have your prop bolt that goes in here but this is your counter bore your drive lugs there's lots of different names for them but basically we need to recess the prop for those to sit in there and they're just extra centering pins is all they are [Applause] foreign blade to the top and then take your pencil down there you mark your heavy side with an X Now flip it around and do your sides again [Music] love it then you sand it and then you do this again and then you cannot and then you do it again cool it until you decide I've got it and it's a miracle or I hate this thing I'm definitely gonna cut in half and put in the purpose and once the bolt pattern is done the last step is balancing the prop and this is the most important and time consuming part of prop making it determines whether or not the prop is airworthy like it has to be perfectly balanced horizontally and vertically in order to fly this Balancing Act involves sanding both the Hub and the blades so the Hub affects the vertical balance more and then the blades will affect the horizontal balance [Music] hey okay I just need to take way more off of this fish thank you all right do you think this is it I think that's it there we go [Music] this is Culver props approved approved now we made a bunch of wind and we messed it up but yeah it's legit I think my face is right in here right over here serial number and to sign it off we stamped on a serial number and the prop specs [Music] 72 by 38. [Music] [Music] and just like that it was time for me to head back to Southern California where I was going to put this prop on a friend's peat and pole and finally give it a test flight [Music] [Music] foreign are at fox Airfield in Lancaster California and we're gonna test this from [Music] all right let's do this thing [Music] First Flight March 72. Robert helped me rebuild it back in 2000. both of the daughters felt it's a younger one mostly how long did it take you with your dad to initially found it two years just a month and it's all scratch built just from plans it's a gorgeous little airplane thank you want to see this prop I made you be a surprise oh that's pretty beautiful job what kind of would you use this is maple yeah [Music] I never want to like insert myself in someone else's airplane I feel like I heard it I was really bummed because like I mine is certified so foreign [Music] yeah working on airplanes made me like hyper conscious of cross-cutting yeah [Music] so just feed it through here the side needs to come around this side yep [Music] so the basic premise of safety wire is not only to keep the bolt in but also each of these is tugging them tighter so like as things move they're not gonna back out if anything they're gonna get a little bit tighter and that's so it's kind of an art form there's not much to pre-flight on this basically check the oil and the gas [Music] [Applause] [Music] thank you [Music] thank you [Music] thank you [Music] [Music] foreign

Channel: Xyla Foxlin

Views: 197,660

Keywords: Xyla Foxlin

Id: GXLDg7P5lO8

Length: 25min 2sec (1502 seconds)

Published: Fri May 26 2023