Oh, you, Aurora Chitty Bang Bang...

[magnum4342]

I have two junk and one good (on the way) Chitty Bang Bang kits. Now I know this sounds like an ambitious idea, and it is! But I wonder if it would be possible, to place a clockwork motor and replace the wings with cloth. What I want is a Chitty that opens and closes it's wings, with the outer limit of course, being the rewind point? What do you guys think? I know some of you HAVE to be more clever than me.

[showrodjohn]

I have never seen the kit but I hope that you can cover the wings with cloth. Not sure about a clockwork motor that could be too strong perhaps a pulley and fishing thread.

[magnum4342]

So far, the idea is to use the main outer strut of the wing (I'll add some photos tomorrow) and hinge it to pivot. Then replace all the wings themselves with nylon over a wire armature. A thread will go though the trailing edges to keep them from binding and not fully retracting. You are right, in that I didn't consider the stress a clockwork windup would put on the plastic. Maybe a pulley system with a small electric motor? The biggest problem I foresee is getting the front and rear wings to spread properly when coming out of the hood and tail area.

[Bert]

Sounds like a chitty job!

[magnum4342]

Sept 15, 2015 12:11:05 GMT -6 Bert said:

Sounds like a chitty job!

Bert! I mean I knew it would be someone.. but YOU?! Tsk.. Tsk.. Tsk!

[magnum4342]

Okay, so here are the wings. It's center unit is designed to cross under the car and the guides are for the rocker bottoms to sit in. Obviously building one that has operable rotor blades is out of the question, that would be REALLY overreaching. So lift off mode might be possible if the wings were left static, so I just want to do forward flight mode. Replacing the wings with armatures and nylon will be the easy part, along with hinging them. I'm trying to find a way to make them open and close with mini actuators, maybe micro processors and motors. What do you guys think? Am I asking too much of the model?

[Bert]

You are not asking too much, it's your project. You decide how much work you want to do. I like the idea. If I were building it, I would consider a manual opening and closing mechanism for displaying it wings out or wings in. If you are comfortable with motors and micro processors, go for it.

[magnum4342]

Thank you for not getting Chitty about it Bert. OOHH! And the champ comes back swinging!

[fourpaws]

just a thought here.... but have you ever seen those little wood and paper umbrellas they put in drinks?
maybe a set up like that were it folds in nice and neat into itself.
like a fold up fan.
maybe some sort of fulcrum at the end of each wing ,then some how connect them all together at one point with a pull lever or maybe a motorized or turn lever?
sorry, thinking out loud here.
nice build idea going here magnum

[magnum4342]

Thank you fourpaws, and you just gave me a great idea! I need to lay hand on the Delorean Time Machine that has the wheel mechanism that puts it from drive to flight mode. I think I can modify that. I was thinking along the lines (similar) to the Corgi Buck Rogers starfighter. Right now I'm just fishing for Ideas, and when I get started I'll post it in the build section.

[mykturk]

Monogram offered an F-14 jet fighter kit that had wings that would fold in a out and moving one wing would make the other move too. It was a pretty simple set of geared sections that meshed together, folding and unfolding the wings. That be a good start at a mechanism to my the Chitty Chitty Bang Bang wings functional.

Here's a youtube video of the F-14 kit, what you want to see is at 2:30, pause it and study the picture, it shows the parts, and how they fit together on the instructions.

[magnum4342]

Thanks for posting. They seem to work just like the old Mattel Chitty, except it had an odd shaped hole in one wing and peg on the other but the principal was the same. This vid gave me some food for thought.