[balloon-makers] Load Tape Positioning

[Kelley Morgan]

My Boland planbook says to sew the vertical tapes down the  vertical seams. With no tapes in the middle of the gores. I know that Bob LeDoux in the BBJ, doesn't like them there. But they do work fine. I am working on a trigore design that Bob talks about in the BBJ. You have two verical tapes per gore, so twice as much support. Kasey if you don't have the BBJ on CD, I would suggest buying a copy from Bob. It has tons of info on building! http://www.proaxis.com/~bobledoux/     Kelley  Kasey Schwemmer <private e-mail address> wrote:      Thanks Jim,     Anyone else have an opinion here? --- private e-mail address wrote:From: private e-mail addressTo:
 private e-mail addressCC: private e-mail addressSubject: Re: [balloon-makers] Load Tape PositioningDate: Sun, 17 Sep 2006 12:18:33 EDT              Yes Kasey, It would make it easer. That was what I was describing in my last post, I just find it hard sometimes to describe something in just written text!  Let me try to explain further. If you do put the load tapes down the center, you have the benefit of all those horizontal seams to sew across. Also at the top of the balloon ( where the chute fits in ) and at the mouth, you should have the circumferential load tapes. these help disperse the loads further. Although you still have fairly large areas, where the load tape is sewn over just one layer of fabric, I think It would help if  ( again, I could be wrong here too! ) you used the smallest needles possible i.e. size 14?  
             Hopefully someone else will come along to clarify this! Because I could be completely wrong here!              Best regards                               JIM.     Get your free email at: http://www.ballooningmail.com- "Balloon-makers" is archived at http://www.hombc.org/balloon-makers/