Hat Band

[Jmk89]

Thanks Dave

[Jmk89]

Some further developments.

While making some researchers into Hatband on the Internet, I came across a memorial website for JOD (JOD.org.uk).

This gave me an email address to John's son, Robert and I wrote to him asking if he can give me any help in relation to Hatband.

Robert responded very promptly and indicated that there were a huge number of boxes of material that now resided at his place which he had not yet been through and catalogued. There may be some material in that.

Obviously, I am not in a position to offer to help Robert with this task since he is in the UK and I'm in OZ. However, it would be a pity if this treasure trove of free flight material were to be lost. I wonder if any of our UK HPA members might feel moved to offer assistance to Robert in going through John's collection of material. There seems to be at least one whole box of plans and it would be great if those could be scanned and put up in HPA.

Meanwhile, I will continue my hunt for information.

[Jmk89]

I have continued my searches by emailing Mike Woodhouse and Martin Dilly to see if they had any clues for finding a plan/drawing/details of Hatband.

Very kindly, they both replied within a few hours.  Neither had much info to add, although Mike corrected my understanding of a "freewheel/fold" prop mechanism that JOD mentions in his 1970 Sympo article.  It isn't a Montreal stop, but is a prop with a freewheel that also has a tension stop.  The idea is to miss the few turns at the end of the motor run when the part of the prop hook that hits the stop on the back of the nose block clunks on the stop but keeps on turning, but more slowly.  That can lead to uneven folding and a bad transition.  The idea is that the freewheel will happen on the first touch and release the power - then the prop shaft engages with the stop and the prop hub stops turning and the prop blades fold cleanly and in the same place every time.  I must try this sometime, even if I don't build a Hatband.

I also asked Martin and Mike for email addresses for some other modellers to contact who might be able to help.  I will now follow up with them (except perhaps for Dave Hipperson, because he may already have been contacted by Bill Dennis already according tho Martin's response).

PS  No reply to my email from Louis Joyner yet.

[billdennis747]

Yes I contacted Dave but he couldn't help

[Jmk89]

Yes I contacted Dave but he couldn't help

That's a pity, but many thanks for trying that. I won't ask Dave then on this subject!
 I do have one other lead - Steve Philpott was mentioned in the 1980s as a friend of JOD (courtesy of being able to text search my electronic versions of AM).  So I have emailed him (Mike Woodhouse gave me his email address).

[Jmk89]

My reply in post #17 might be misleading - that is a form of freewheel/fold device, but I don't think that it is what JOD meant.  I had a niggling doubt and thought that he may have mentioned this device in his articles from 2014+ in the relaunched AeroModeller and I was right.  In his second article (in issue 923) he described it and thr is a good drawing and diagram. 

I attach a copy of the relevant page