Re: Rigging J. O'brien

Even lycra won't work well, it's too complex and you'd have to balance the elasticity across too many lines. The problem is nothing is scale weight, strength or flexibility. Now if we could train a bunch of large black ants.....

No. I have heard of it. Where do you find the stuff- sewing stores, or what? Is it available in a wide range of colors?

Since I have the model rigged now, and don't intend to start another ship for several months, I don't need it immediately.

However, it might be good to experiment with it a bit. I'll drop you a line offline.

Yeah, one of the problems is that the blocks, from the PE set, have very sharp edges that the thread passes over going through them. They cause the thread to stick rather than pull through the blocks easily. This makes it hard to tension each drop evenly when you have several drops/passes through the block.

Aeroclub sell it:

but it is also available from sewing shops as shirring elastic

It is available in many colours, although you may have to go to a specialist supplier (scroll almost to the bottom of this page)

It has been in use for rigging WW1 aircraft for some time

The stuff I have is white (well, translucent really) and about 34 gauge (by eye, comparing it to some jewellers wire I have). I have used it for aerial wires on WW2 planes and bowstrings on my son's Warhammer elf archers :-)

Another source could be tights or pop-socks. By experiment it appears that the lycra mix variety has nylon threads woven around very fine lycra threads - much finer than 34 gauge. The lycra is much more stretchy than the nylon and can be separated quite easily. I assume it comes in different colours to match the socks, although the thread is so fine it's hard to tell.

Ensure you have the owners permission first, of course!

has it, only comes in white but it can be colored with permanent markers.

That's where wire would work better.