Schools

Preparing for Hovercraft Flight

Students from Tolland, Manchester and Rockville high schools will race their handmade hovercrafts at noon at Riverside Park in Hartford.

In the 1990s James Benini was thumbing through a copy of Popular Mechanics when he came across something so challenging and exciting he had to give it a try. But the cost to build a personal hovercraft was too expensive. He let the idea go, but never forgot it.

In 2002, a friend encouraged him to give it a try. Benini found some inexpensive plans and started. But this time he had a crew: his students at Parish Hill High School in Chaplin. Over eight years Benini and his students built several crafts and even took them to the national competition in Ohio.

Today at Riverside Park in Hartford, Benini’s Tolland students and those from Manchester and Rockville high schools will take flight over land and water on their own handmade cushions of air.

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Benini brought his hovercraft expertise to Tolland High last fall and his students have spent the better part of the year building their own hovercrafts. Today at noon, after some last minute tweaking, a safety check and a few practice runs, the student pilots will climb aboard and race the crafts in a friendly, multi-heat competition.

Beth Penney, a technology education teacher at Manchester High School, said the project can be overwhelming, but there is a great deal of pride felt once it’s completed.

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After incorporating the builds into their technology education courses, Benini and Penney started the competition in the spring of 2010 with the hope that other high schools would become involved. While many have expressed an interest, few have been able to complete their crafts. This year three schools from north central Connecticut have been confirmed with two others from the Hartford possibly participating.

In the inaugural year, it was just Parish Hill and Manchester that were able to get crafts operational in time, however several other schools came out to work as pit crews and to watch the competition.

The rules are simple; the crafts are launched at the boat ramp, head out over the pond and around a series of buoys. There are five laps per heat and up to four crafts on the water a once. At the end, the judges will tally up the points and declare a winner. Schools are able to bring as many crafts as they have that are operational and safe. The crafts must be registered with the state Department of Motor Vehicles as a boat and the students who pilot them must have a certified boaters license.  

The registration and certification process are part of the overall project, which also includes safety instruction. Benini said the crafts pick up speeds quickly over the water and under ideal conditions, with a students who weighs 180 pounds or less and with a balanced craft, the machine can reach speeds of 25 miles per hour or faster.

On Wednesday, the Tolland students had their chance to fly the hovercraft around the fields behind the school. Benini said it gave the licensed students a chance to fly the craft before getting to Riverside Park, and it also gave the pilots a chance to overcome some nerves.

It wasn’t the first time that the craft was flown, though. On June 2, Benini took the craft to Long Island with THS junior Ben Simao for a test drive. It wasn’t an ordinary practice run, though. Benini had been invited by a Science Channel film crew shooting for a new series on junkyards to bring the craft down and look for necessary parts, even though the craft was full constructed and not lacking any pieces.

The deal was that at the end, they had to fly the craft to prove that it worked. It flew perfectly, Benini said. (The episode of the yet-to-be-named show will air at the end of August or beginning of September.)

It can cost up to $500 for the schools to build a hovercraft, Benini said. This year, the THS team received a $950 grant from the Tolland Education Foundation to help pay for costs associated with items other than parts and materials. Benini tries to have many of the materials, including the engine, donated.

To watch the completion and cheer on the students head to Riverside Park in Hartford today at noon. The student teams will be there prior to that to complete last minute touch-ups, for a safety check and practice run.


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