Which Body tubes do you use for NAR competition?

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Which body tubes do you use for NAR competition?

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  • Poll closed .

shockie

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Are all the white tubes from various companies formerly Tubular Tubes body tubes?

Which do you prefer to use and why?

How important are the weight, strength and stiffness of the body tubes.

This is just for 13/18/24mm tube sizes.
 
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Make my own fiberglass tubes for most 13mm and 18mm model tubes.


Are all the white tubes from various companies formerly Tubular Tubes body tubes?

Which do you prefer to use and why?

How important are the weight, strength and stiffness of the body tubes.

This is just for 13/18/24mm tubr suzes.
 
Can I assume you are either using 0.5 to 0.75 oz fiberglass ? How many wraps?

I can't speak for Jim, but I use two wraps of .5 oz. cloth for 18mm to 30mm tubes, plus an internal wrap of Japanese tissue. (I find no practical difference between .5, .6, and .75 oz. cloth.)

FYI, I'll be presenting a session at Virtual NARCON in a couple of weeks on the production of these tubes for sport, competition, or scale models.

https://www.nar.org/narcon-2022/
James
 
I can't speak for Jim, but I use two wraps of .5 oz. cloth for 18mm to 30mm tubes, plus an internal wrap of Japanese tissue. (I find no practical difference between .5, .6, and .75 oz. cloth.)

FYI, I'll be presenting a session at Virtual NARCON in a couple of weeks on the production of these tubes for sport, competition, or scale models.

https://www.nar.org/narcon-2022/
James
Hey James.
Are these fg tubes flexible like the FAI tubes are?
Tia
 
James is correct I too use 2 wraps on top of a layer of tissue for most everything.
Cool. I assume from what I have read that for the fai 30/40mm tubes a single wrap with a small seam is used. And then covered with either esaki tissue or mylar to basically seal it.

This is for weight reduction bit the resulting tubes are really squishy.
2 wraps would make then less squishy but end up weighing more, but still less than commercial tubes.
 
I get 13 and 18 mm tubes from eRockets, by the case in 34" lengths, best deal around, and they make great piston tubes.
 
I can't speak for Jim, but I use two wraps of .5 oz. cloth for 18mm to 30mm tubes, plus an internal wrap of Japanese tissue. (I find no practical difference between .5, .6, and .75 oz. cloth.)

FYI, I'll be presenting a session at Virtual NARCON in a couple of weeks on the production of these tubes for sport, competition, or scale models.

https://www.nar.org/narcon-2022/
James
Do you know why the USA Spacemodeling technical page links are down? They had some great info for making tubes and other tubes.
 
Do you know why the USA Spacemodeling technical page links are down? They had some great info for making tubes and other tubes.
Just did a random check of several of the links, and everything appears to be fine. Perhaps it was a transient problem?
 
That works! Not sure why the old site has an error but NAR is an easier spot. Dave’s write up is a great place for folks starting out in fiberglass layups.
 
I've made regular (non FAI) PD/SD 18mm tubes with a couple of wraps of 0.7oz glass and Aeropoxy laminating epoxy on home-machined mandrels. They end up under half the mass of plain old paper tubes. The weight reduction is huge for the 40mm FAI events but you need a big lathe or a friendly machine shop to make the mandrel.
 
That works! Not sure why the old site has an error but NAR is an easier spot. Dave’s write up is a great place for folks starting out in fiberglass layups.

Nobody maintains the old USA Spacemodeling site, all of the content was moved to the NAR pages on international competition and a lot more has been added at that new location. Chris Flanigan and I keep it up to date.
 
That works! Not sure why the old site has an error but NAR is an easier spot. Dave’s write up is a great place for folks starting out in fiberglass layups.

Nobody maintains the old USA Spacemodeling site, all of the content was moved to the NAR pages on international competition and a lot more has been added at that new location. Chris Flanigan and I keep it up to date.
Thanks for the clarification and keeping the info around and up-to-date.
 
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