Hovercraft Mk.3

My First Working Model

One of my first large scale personal project CAD designs, and the most durable so far, the Mk.3, was riddled with problems. Despite this, it demonstrated incredible potential. It improved upon many aspects where the previous model had failed. Due to the previous model's inability to steer, I focused intensely on durability and steering. This resulted in what is likely the most durable design I've made to date. So much so that I strongly believe this craft would probably have survived the high speed crash that partially destroyed the Mk.4 (its successor). 

The main problem with this model was the motor. Unfortunately, the craft was limited by the motors I had available, and I imagine that this one simply couldn't handle the pressure from having to lift the weight of the craft. Ultimately I was young and inexperienced with with choosing which motors were suitable for this type of application.

In the limited videos I took these years ago of this craft flying around, the lift motor can be seen cutting in and out infrequently at completly unpredictabe intervals. It was because of this that I was too afraid to fly the model over water.

Mk.3 Flight.mp4

One of the improvements I made to this model was this bag skirt attachment method which used a sort of screw clamp. I have researched quite thoroughly online for a number of years and have never seen this mechanism used on model hovercraft at all. It is quite effective too which is great.

Before I noticed the motor issues, I was planning on running some water trials for this model. Due to the weight I was unsure whether the model would be buoyant so I added some foam beneath the heaviest parts.

I was using old connectors for this project as I was extremely limited fanatically, so I was using decades old electronics left around from family. The connectors below were nearly 40 years old and ended up fusing together on multiple occasions, requiring them to be plied apart. This wasn't good and was improved dramatically with gold plated ones upon the next design.