Turning Vents and Diamonds

After 4 weeks of working on other peoples balloons I finally got a full day to work on my own. I cant explain how frustrating it was to see all my fabric sitting in a pile on the shelf for nearly 30 days and wanting to get at least one panel sewn together. I'm a fairly patient person, but when I start a project it is all I ever think about and all I ever want to work on. My patience was definitely tested. Although I didn't get anything done on my own balloon over the last month, I did get to make a little artwork for a customer (along with my boss Gayle Stroble and her sister Debbie). Check out this beautiful logo we made for our friends Mike and Jennifer Parks!
 

Now, back to my own balloon...
I had already cut out the diamonds from the colored fabric last month. My first goal was to get them sewn in so I would have a complete panel #3. I have completed all but three. There is a slight difference in elasticity the dark grey and the colors which made sewing the first few a little difficult. After I figured out the way each fabric reacted to stretching, they went in pretty easy. Here is a picture of my first complete diamond (which will actually be my outer turning vent).
 
I absolutely LOVE the color contrast! The green looks just as amazing.

I am still recording every working minute of my progress and will make a second sample time lapse video once the sewing is done. I took a few pictures of the shop after I was done sewing in the majority of the diamonds... I took over a few baskets and envelope bags....


 
 

I decided to make my turning vents as simple to install (and repair) as possible. Here is a diagram of what I came up with. The outer turning vent will simply overlap the inner. The entire vent will be properly reinforced with load tapes where they are needed.

That's all I have for now. Thanks to all of you who have shown your support for my project. It keeps me motivated and it is nice to know you all care!

Let there be COLOR!!!!!

The colors came in and they look GREAT. They are much more vibrant than I expected them to be. Here are a few pictures...

I decided to redesign the turning vents from my original plans so they will be much stronger and hopefully allow more airflow when activated. As soon as I can get my scanner working I will post up my sketches.

Here's the sample clip!

So I think I figured out this video editing thing...here is a sample of the footage I have so far. Ill post up videos of each major section of the build (cutting, sewing, welding etc.) when I have the footage. Enjoy!

Two colors ordered

With all the crap that is going on in the world, prices seem to be going up...ripstop nylon included. I ended up only ordering two colors instead of four. The colors are dark pink and light green. Here is the new pattern....

I like the pattern but I have to admit I am a bit frustrated at the moment. Part of me wanted to buy the four colors anyways and fork out the extra money, but the other part of me could see the hole in my wallet getting too big. I'll just try to remind myself that in the end, Ill have a great balloon that I built by myself.

Slightly different design

So after calculating yardage and prices for the colors I wanted in the original design, 16 diamonds in 8 different colors, I have decided to do 16 diamonds in 4 different colors (Pink, Yellow, Lime and Lt. Blue). This should save me about $350 because of minimum yardage cuts when ordering. So here is my new design which is very similar to the original:
  
Here is the original:



In a lot of ways I like the new pattern. It seems much more vibrant against the dark fabric. And of course Ill save some money...

More cutting, more fabric.

I finished cutting panels 1,2,4 and 5 so far. I am going cut panel 3 (minus the colored diamond) tomorrow. I am putting in another fabric order for my colored diamonds tomorrow as well. They should be here in a week. I'm going to start working on the lower end and sewing together some of the panels I have cut while I wait for my new fabric to come in.

Also, I have started editing the time lapse video. I'm going to break the recordings down into 10 minute at the different stages of the build. I figured that would be more entertaining than watching over an hour of senseless repetition and quick movements.

Here's the updated color chart of panels that are cut.

Finally made some cuts!

So amidst all the chaos and bad weather I have finally made some progress on the balloon! I worked for about 4 hours creating my pattern on butchers paper patterns (five in total) and finished cutting all of the top panels (32 panels). Since I am working with "rights and lefts", meaning identical patterns only in reverse on one side, it us much easier to fold the fabric over itself and cut two panels at a time (1 right, 1 left). If I had someone helping me cut I could easily do four layers at a time, but dealing with that many layers of fabric by yourself gets difficult. It slides on itself and can be difficult to get exact cuts. If you are building your own balloon or cutting any fabric, I suggest investing in a GOOD set of scissors. High end scissors cut smoother and usually fit better in your hand. You're going to be cutting a lot of fabric and it will make a difference.

This is the first time I have pulled fabric off a roll larger than 20 yards and I must say it is a strange feeling. For the last 10 years I have had to be aware of how much fabric was left on the roll to make sure I could cut a full panel out of what was left. When you are pulling fabric off a 200 yard roll you don't have to think, just cut. I cut 32 panels so far and I barely made a dent in my first roll! Granted, the panels were only about 11 feet long, but still...

Like I mentioned in my previous post, I purchased a webcam to document the work and create a more entertaining way for all of you to watch my progress. I have 4 hours of footage but I am having some technical difficulties making it into a time lapse video shorter than 10 minutes. Once I have it figured out I will post it. If any of you have any FREE software suggestions to make one, please let me know. Ive tried MAGIX video and Microsoft Live Video Maker with no success.

I'm going to be filling in this chart with the amount I have completed (cutting) as I go. There are 32 panels for each section.
 
I am going to cut more panels today and tomorrow as well.  My goal is to have the throat panels cut today and make a dent in the equator as well.