Jump to content
Light-O-Rama Forums

How Do I Hide Airblown when deflated?


Dcroc

Recommended Posts

I was thinking about using a couple airblowns in my Halloween display.   However,  I only want to use them in a couple songs.  They will be deflated during all the other songs.  Thus,  I would like to figure out a way to have them hidden while deflated.   Being up to 8 feet tall (maybe more),  I really know of no way to control the prop as it deflates.  They have a tendency to spread out in any given direction, so even having the base behind something would require a rather large object to cover the area  where it would rest after deflating,  given that there is no real way to know which way it will fall.   Any ideas?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

honestly depends on what size the airblown is. I have done this building a False wall. Use some plywood or something to only build a wall just high enough to hide the Airblown. In my case it was about 8 nches.. Build it 3 sided and use those three sides of it for a small wall to hide them. Spray paint it black. This will hide it when not in use and in the dark they won't see the black wall very much at all. I prefer matte black when trying to hide things for the Halloween display such as fencing chords stuff like that. Gloss tends to reflect light.

Not sure if that'll help you in this case it all depends how wide the airblown is. as far as being able to control how it deflates that's a bit tricky however you can position it to lean backwards when it deflates by putting more tension on the back two stakes. Normally a 8ft tall airblown has four ground Stakes. make the back two tighter so it pulls it a little bit backwards that will help it lay backwards instead of forward when it deflates.

when my snowman kept leaning forward while deflating at night I ended up using fishing line and tying it further back so there was no option for it to go forward I just tied the fishing line around its neck but make sure you tie it properly so it doesn't slide or it will tighten up on the neck. then just mount the fishing line behind it somewhere to a tree or steak something that will put tension to pull it backwards when it's not too nflated

Edited by GriswoldStyle
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well that is a good question that I had 2 years ago. I wanted to deflate my blowups. I attached elastic string and staked it so when deflating they would pull it where I wanted it to fall. I had mine fall behind my tombstones. Also my blowups were 12 ft and unless it was a windy night they fell right every time. Hope it helps.

 

Dennis

Link to comment
Share on other sites

For me personally I don't believe that blowups have a place in a controlled lightshow. I mean they take some time to go up and forever to come back down depending on size.  I am not saying they don't have a place in a show at all just not the controllable portion. I have several that are placed in a seperate side yard but are not part of the controlled lightshow.

I have a 18' Santa and a 26' Christmas tree that are in a side yard with my "Tune To" sign and they are what greet viewers when they first come up the street to my show. It takes about 15-20 minutes for them to go up and several hours for them to come down flat on their own. Controlling them up and down several times during the show would be impossible if I wasn't out there pulling them down.

My show actually has three seperate sections to it as I live on a large corner lot. The welcoming area with blowups and "Tune To" sign, the main lightshow, and when you turn the corner a lighted Christmas Tree farm with about forty different size trees all lit up different colors seperate from the lightshow.

This is just me but I can't see blowups being controlled easy enough to be a part of the controlled show especially if you are wanting them to go up and down several times. I say find a place and leave them up, why make things more difficult.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have got to agree with Mr.P on this one.  Also CTB16PC controllers do not do well with motorized objects, and you will be controlling a fan, don't know about the newer Gen3 controllers, but the V1 and V2 boards, it could take out a triac and kill that channel in that controller until you could take it down and fix it.

Believe me, airblowns are not worth the hassle or expense they may cost you in the long run trying to run them in a controlled display.

I wouldn't attempt it and it's one reason I prefer blow molds over airblowns any time.  Airblowns are cool, don't get me wrong, but they aren't suited for controlled light show displays because of their nature and having to turn a fan motor on and off. 

And if you accidentally sequence that airblown fan as a fade up or special effect {twinkle, shimmer}, you may burn out the fan motor, or worse cause it to overheat and catch fire.  Only full on and full off for such devices if you use them, but you have to be on your toes so you don't accidentally sequence them with the wrong type setting.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I use inflatables and I use my AC controllers to inflate them for various songs and at various times. For example this is Halloween. I have 20 inflatables and they will inflate at various times to keep the kids excited.

I don't have any problems. For my big 20' Marshmallow man it takes 22 seconds to inflate. I use either a dead 22 second sequence or like last year I used the last 22 seconds of the original GB to inflate for the newer B song.

I did a Snoopy Red Baron skit with the inflatable air plane as well.

For the Snoopy skit when not in use the plane was behind my singing faces. I built a stand and screwed the motor to the top. The stand had a slight angel to it so that the plane appeared to be in a slight turn while inflated.

The stand also made it so when inflated the airplane was visible from behind the 4X4 faces.

If you would like to see it in action shoot me a pm cell # and I can send some short vids.

The kids love the inflatables and everyone has asked me to bring back GB, This is HAlloween and Snoopy this year. I also replaced my arches with circles and used my arch sections, paracord to create a machine gun fire affect for the sections of the 2 Snoopy Red Baron songs where the machine guns can be heard. The arch sections stopped about 10' from the street.

I only use this during the show. In the daytime I just plug the power cords into the AC outlets and before I start the shows just plug back into the controllers. Its not as hard as it sounds since I have everything branched to several main cords.

I have a huge yard and that is one way I fill it up.

JR 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • The topic was locked
Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...