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When my parents first asked me if I thought I might like to attend high school, at the small aviation academy, it took me about 30 seconds to give them my answer. I had spent the last several years with my nose stuck in aircraft books, flying computer flight simulators and looking up at the sky, every time I heard anything that resembled an airplane engine, of course I wanted to attend the aviation academy! |
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Flabob Airport Preparatory Academy
From the www.flabob.org web site: "Flabob Airport Preparatory Academy is a tuition-free, public charter high school and middle school (grades 7-12) located on Flabob Airport and operated by River Springs Charter School. It offers a broad liberal education, emphasizing science, mathematics, engineering and technology, and using aviation as a context, example and motivator."
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Sitting on the corner of two hangar taxiways, three large “portables” (six classrooms) make up the Flabob Airport Preparatory Academy (FAPA). With roughly 100 high school students we rotate between three teachers in four classrooms. For some, going to such a small school would not be to their liking, but for me, I love it as I am literally surrounded by aviation, aviation history and friends that share the same interest. Since our school is so small and we don’t have many of the amenities of large schools, the staff and students get to be very creative in much of the class work and activities we do. An example of this is in my Earth Science class where, in a large school you might watch a movie on fault lines and plate tectonics, but instead we all loaded up into several small airplanes and spent an afternoon flying over the San Andreas fault line. |
All my teachers love new ideas and suggestions and try to let us be as independent and creative as possible. We do a lot of group and hands on projects, which really makes learning fun.
We attend “on-campus” classes Tuesday through Thursday with Mondays and Fridays being home study days. Fridays are also days that the teachers are available for independent help, if needed. On Fridays, I also take an Aviation Seminar class where we learn the fundamentals of aeronautics.
Last year, one of the teachers put together a summer field trip, for several of the students, to attend the AirFare in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. The students got to tent camp under wings of planes, right on the airfield, and take in the Oshkosh experience. The trip was a big success and this coming summer’s trip to AirFare is already in the works. I will not be able to attend this summer, but I plan on attending the following summer and all my remaining summers at FAPA.
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Aviation Seminar "Lighter Than Air" Flight Project
In my freshman Aviation Seminar class, while studying “lighter than air” flight, we had a hot air balloon pilot, as a guest instructor for a day. He taught us the history of the first hot air balloon and how hot air balloons work. To finish up our instruction on lighter than air flight, our teacher gave us an assignment to create/build our own hot air balloon. I started my project by first searching the internet for different designs and instruction. I found a tissue paper balloon project that looked like I could build at home. A quick trip to K-Mart, for some basic supplies, and I was ready to start my project.
First, I started making the tissue paper gores. This was a two day process that required a second set of hands, to help handle the large sheets of tissue paper with out damaging them.
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Next I built the alcohol engine by stacking and securing three aluminum cans together, punched air intake holes and then hanging the engine to the bottom ring opening of the balloon. But before we attached the engine to the balloon, we took it outside and lit it just to see how much heat it put out.
On the day we had to present and demonstrate our hot air balloons, to our teacher and classmates, only myself and two others actually made hot air balloons. One of my classmates made a solar powered hot air balloon using black trash bags. The black color of the trash bags would absorb heat and heat up the trapped air inside the bag (balloon) making it rise. The solar powered hot air balloon was a successful project and flew well. Another classmate made a hot air balloon out of fabric and used a gas burner to heat the air, but the conditions were not cold enough outside to get the balloon to inflate.
Then it was my turn to demonstrate my hot air balloon. Since I was using a simple alcohol engine and a tissue paper balloon my teacher made me demonstrate my balloon design outside. With two fire extinguishers close by, I filled the engine with alcohol and ignited it while one of my classmates held up the balloon, so that it did not fall on the flame. It was a warm day and the engine was not creating enough hot air to inflate the balloon.
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We tried for several minutes, as the balloon started to fill, and then a small gust of wind would push the side in and all the hot air out. Finally, a gust of wind strong enough to cave the balloon all the way in, came and the balloon caught fire. One of my friends put the fire out with a fire extinguisher and that was the end of my hot air balloon project.
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So I guess my hot air balloon was the only one that was made to look and fly like a real "lighter than air" craft but ended up like the Hindenburg.
If you want to build your own tissue paper hot air balloon, here is the web site where you can get the instructions: http://www.inventorscolony.com/balloon/
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Rocket Car Project
As part of my freshman year Earth Science class, we were required to enter a project in the Science Fair. I teamed up with a classmate and our project was to build a rocket propelled car and determine at how much rocket thrust the car becomes unstable.
We started with a remote control car chassis that my team partner had already built. The first rocket car test we conducted at school on one of the airplane taxi ways. We attached two E size Estes rocket motors to the chassis using metal hose clamps, attached to the chassis with pop rivets.
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The first test was unsuccessful, as the rocket car veered immediately to the left, into the grass and flipped over. The next day we performed a second test, this time using three E size Estes rocket motors, in hopes to gain more speed and stability. We had a malfunction in motor ignition, with only one engine igniting and the rocket car once again veered off to the left and ended up in the grass. To solve our motor ignition problem, we borrowed a friend’s car and used his battery to ignite the three new rocket motors. The ignition of all three motors was a success however, the ignition cable got caught up in one of the rocket car tires and the car spun uncontrollably, chasing us around like chickens with our head cut off. The following day we set out to perform test number four. A rear wing was installed to try and create down force and gain stability. We also added a front spoiler to give the rocket car more aerodynamics and prevent air from going under the chassis, lifting off the ground. Again we used three E size Estes rocket motors and a car battery for ignition. Upon ignition the rocket car immediately went out of control and chased one of our teachers, almost putting an end to our project. Our big problem seemed to be that we cold not keep the rocket car from turning to the left.
Seven days and sixty dollars later, we went to the indoor go-cart track to do more testing. Our thought was that our problem might be the rough surface we were testing on, at school, and so we wanted to do the next test on a smooth flat surface. The rocket car was set up the same as the previous test. This test was much more successful, with the car actually traveling forward but with a slight left turn to it, eventually sending it into a curb.
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We headed over to my partners house, where we fabricated an adjustable rudder to use to try and compensate for the rocket car wanting to turn left.
With the rudder installed, we also utilized a cinder block as a thrust deflector and again tested the rocket car using three E size Estes rocket motors. This test was straighter than the previous but still the rocket car veered off to the left, not crashing in to anything this time however. A slight adjustment to the rudder and we were ready for what would turn out to be our final test. Three more E size Estes rocket motors installed, we ignited the motors and away the rocket car went. For about two seconds all was good, the rocket car was traveling straight and true but then things went terribly bad when our rocket motor mounting system failed, remaining attached to the rocket car chassis but no longer holding the engines secure, now the rocket motors were just aimlessly flying around all over the place, taking the rocket car along for the ride. The rocket car went airborne, leaving its two rear wheels rolling down the street. The rocket motor mount then went into complete failure, sending the rocket motors in one direction and the car chassis free to fall back to earth.
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And so ended our testing of our rocket car.
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Earth Science Field Trip
In the first semester of my freshman Earth Science class, we studied plate tectonics and of course, living in California, one of the best examples of plate tectonics is our own San Andreas Fault. The San Andreas Fault is the tectonic boundary between the Pacific Plate and the North American Plate, roughly 800 miles long, extending from Northern California, south into Baja Mexico. Besides being in our back yard, what also makes the San Andreas Fault a great example to study plate tectonics is that a large portion of the fault is clearly visible.
Traditional public and even private schools learn plate tectonics, mostly using visual aids such as text book pictures and topographical maps. At Flabob Airport Preparatory Academy, we are not quite so traditional and, being an aviation based school located on an airport, we were able to organize a “Fly Over” field trip. One Saturday afternoon, in January, a dozen Earth Science students, myself included, loaded up into four small planes and away we went. Our destination was a southern segment of the San Andreas Fault, located on the Carrizo Plane, where much of the fault is plainly visible. It was a perfect day to fly and we got a great view of the San Andreas Fault.
Photos of our Fly Over of the San Andreas Fault
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An added bonus to our field trip, I was allowed to fly the return leg from Taft Airport back to Flabob.
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