To calculate the volume of helium required for neutral buoyancy based on the mass of components and blimp.

Assumptions –

  1. Temperature is constant.
  2. The gas is purely helium
  3. The density of surrounding air is constant
  4. Atmospheric pressure is constant

Derivations

Using the equation -

Buoyant Force = Densityair X Volumeair displaced X g


For the blimp to float -

Buoyant Force = Weight of Blimp


Therefore -

DensityAir X Volumeair displaced X g = (MassBlimp + VolumeBlimp X Density helium) X g

where,


MassBlimp = MassComponents + MassMylar


Since,

Volume_air displaced = VolumeBlimp


On simplification, we get -

Volume = MassBlimp / (DensityAir - DensityHelium)


where,

MassBlimp = MassComponents + MassMylar


I hope the equation can help the team members to determine the approximate dimensions of the blimp.

Air Swimmers Blimp

For the past few weeks, I have been playing around with the air swimmers blimp to gather some intuition.

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