Lightweight rafts - Kon Tiki Chairman's Challenge 2011

 

The annual Kon Tiki Chairman's Challenge was held all across Gauteng province recently. The top ten teams from Kon Tiki in March were challenged to participate. Rather than the normal race down the Vaal river, the challenge this year consisted of building a raft and completing a mobility challenge at four different lakes across the province, starting in the East at Arrowe Park, then on to the old quarry at Eastleigh Sea Scouts, then Emmarentia Dam and ending at in the West at Gilwell in Florida.

The rafts were all lightweight and designed to be quick to assemble, because this would have to be done four times. Points were also given for  advertising Scouting on the vehicles used to transport the rafts between the four lakes. Two groups, 1st Kengray BK and 1st Kempton Park,  built rafts with light plumbing pipe outriggers, pictured above. Most other troops built very light 6 barrel rafts as shown above left. The competition was won by First River Trail Scouts.

More photographs are available on the Kon Tiki Facebook page.

Robin Hills Portcullis Gateway

Robin Hills Scout troop built this portcullis gateway for their campsite at Kontiki 2011. Two A-frames support a gate that slides up along the slope of the front legs. This gate is a much bigger and sturdier portcullis than the one I blogged about back in 2006. The SketchUp model is available for download here.

Here is the gate closed at left, and open on the right.

A photograph of the gateway. Robin Hills went on to win Kontiki

JOTA JOTI Towers - 2010

This weekend sees the 54th Jamboree on the Air and 15th Jamboree on the Internet (also the sixth year of Ropes and Poles). Here are some photographs of Radio masts and towers built last year by various troops. You can sign up at Jotajoti.org to post pictures and a report of your own JOTI JOTA event, and also to see other groups' pictures as they are posted. Our camp at Arrowe Park will be posting pics and updates there, as well as on Twitter as @arrowepark .I'll also be on IRC during the weekend as RopesnpolesZA.

Giant box kite

A few years ago, our group held a joint event between the Cubs and Scouts, where we flew kites. The Cubs completed the requirements for the Cub Kites interest badge, while the Scout patrols held a competition to see whose kite would fly highest.

The biggest kite on the day was this box kite built by our Group Scouter and his son. It used cane from our Scout grounds for the frame, sisal lashings for the joints, and plastic rubbish bags for the flight surfaces. Because Benoni is 1600m (7000ft) above sea level, the wind needs to be fairly strong before a kite will fly well, but this one did get into the air a few times.

Box kites were invented in the 1890s, and were an important step on the way to the invention of heavier than air aircraft. NASA has a page with a good explanation of the aerodynamics of box kites.