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OMSI

I'd been trying to make it to the Starlight Parade for several years. Finally in 2004 all of the planets aligned and we made the plans. Dave then pointed out that since we would be in Portland anyway we could combine this with a trip to OMSI -- Oregon Museum of Science and Industry. After a bit of negotiation with OMSI the details were set. We arrived at OMSI mid-day of June 5.

	We spent most of our time answering questions. We would have preferred to give rides, but OMSI was too afraid of lawsuits.
	Tad was there with Shimon's Boat. He didn't spend as much time answering questions because he spent most of his time continuing to work on the boat. It really wasn't ready to race yet, and there weren't many weeks left before daVinci Days.

The trip from OMSI to the Starlight Parade

When it came time to head over to the parade we were faced with a decision. How to get there?

• Pack Rex into the trailer and drive there.
  • + Straightforward.
  • - We would have to take the decorations off to put Rex into the trailer, and then put them on again at the parade. That would add 40 minutes to the trip.
• Drive Rex on the roads, including across the bridge. Follow closely in the van+trailer for safety of the pilot.
  • + Don't take off the decorations.
  • - Pilot has to drive across the bridge alone. Physically challenging.
  • - Likely to piss-off a bunch of car drivers.
  • + Lots of folks would see Rex.
• Cross the Willamette using the pontoons.
  • + Don't take off the decorations.
  • + Both of us pilot.
  • - Have to return for the trailer.
  • - Takes longer. Have to go out of our way to find a river crossing.
  • + Totally cool.
  • + Lots of folks would see Rex.

As I'm sure you could guess, we chose to cross the Willamette. I just love taking Rex out onto water. And to pass up an opportunity like this was unthinkable.

Quizzing the locals, we learned about place where we could enter the river, and another where we could exit. The entry was at a public park next to an amusement park. The exit was at (rather uncreatively named) Willamette Park. The estimated time to the crossing point was 20 minutes, unfortunately in the opposite direction from the parade. Oh well.

We quickly recruited a couple of bicycle riders to ride alongside and direct us. That was a wonderful help. We would have otherwise struggled to find the entry point.

But things quickly went bad. By chain kept falling off. I couldn't figure out what was causing the problem. Dave carryed us there. Finally as were arriving at the amusement park the reason for the problem because clear.

The main axle locks on my side were loose. The axle kept slipping sideways, misaligning the sprockets. The slippage was so bad that the spokes started grinding against the brake housing. Very bad. Clearly we couldn't leave that. We limped over to the entry point.

	Hmm. The guy who mentioned this entry didn't mention we would be going down stairs. Fortunately several folks have gathered to watch. We recruited them. But first we had to fix the floating axle.
	But this wasn't going to be straightforward. We carry tools on Rex for field repairs. But a floating axle is not your ordinary file repair, and we didn't have the right tools for the job. But if you've raced KSRs much you become adept at making repairs with the tools at hand.
	If you look closely [at this picture and the one above] you can see that I am using a cresent wrench as a hammer. I am driving a phillips screwdriver as a pin punch to set an eccentric bearing on the main shaft. When it comes to field repairs to Kinetic Sculpture Racers, purists are left at the starting gate.
Repairs complete, we are ready for launch.
	<-- Crossing the Willamette. That's our send-off crew. Thank you, guys! And that's our destination. The time spent in the water was suprisingly short. -->

The road trip from the exit point at Willamette Park to the parade assembly point turned out to be a bit longer than we expected. Part of the problem was that it was very hilly. But the other problem was that it was just a long distance. Rather than taking 20 or 30 minutes to drive there, it took several hours.

We were so late that we expected that we would not be able to parade, because they had started without us. Fortunately it wasn't that bad. As we drove up to the parade assembly point we were immediately told to move to the starting place of the parade. We had squeaked in!

Starlight Parade

When the Starlight Parade trip was planned, Bob arranged for two groups of Kinetic Sculptures. Teams that wanted to do "antics" such as donuts would be in the pre-parade. Teams that wanted to be on television would be in the main parade.

We had elected to be in the pre-parade. And much to our amazement, we were in time for that. Barely.

The following pictures are of the parade staging area before we arrived.

	Muckle Flugga Picture by Dan Redin
Time Flys Picture by Dan Redin
	Wet Paint Picture by Dan Redin

The pre-parade consisted of the Firefighters, Time Flys, and Frogasaurus Rex.

	Laura is there with her hiccup bike. Time Flys and Frogasaurus Rex are in the background.
	I managed to get the lights onto Frogasaurus Rex. This is, after all, a night-time parade. But these pictures are before the sun had set, so they don't show the lights.
	The firemen set up a ladder overhanging a jumping platform. They then jump.

Before we drove to Portland, we replaced the rear wheel with an experimental wheel. (The rear wheel is the one that is steered.) This new wheel was a bicycle wheel. It was experimental because Rex had never run on a bicycle wheel in the back before.

The experimental wheel had much less friction than the older ATV wheel. This meant that we could spin donuts much faster. But the experimental wheel wasn't nearly as strong as the ATV wheel when subjected to sideways forces.

After we had driven a couple of blocks, the wheel collapsed. I don't think the wheel is supposed to be bent like that. [Picture was not taken at the parade.]

After a quick attempt to bend the wheel back, we hauled the Frogasaurus Rex into a nearby gas station. Spencer arranged with Mandara of the Cheezy Rider team to lend to us a bike wheel. Wheel in hand, the repair went quickly.

We could no longer join the pre-parade. That was long gone. Instead we cooled our heels and waited for the main group of Kinetic Sculptures to arrive so that we could join them.

We also could not afford to do rapid donuts. Another broken wheel would be costly. But we were not allowed to do donuts in the main parade anyway, so it all worked out.

Shriners Oriental Band	Asian dancers	Imperial Storm Troopers from CloudCitySquad.com	Port Townsend Rhododendron Festival entry

While we are waiting, I let kids sit in Frogasaurus Rex.

Finally the Kinetic Sculpture collection showed up. We zipped into the parade.

But when we got to the corner where we had broken down the audience broke into a powerful cheer! They were amazed that we had done the repair and had rejoined the parade. And they were very supportive of the team that wouldn't give up!

Thus energized, we continued the parade.

Muckle-Flugga	We have a good audience.	Paul Vibrans machine.	Cheezy Rider with Wet Paint behind them.

Epilog

In thanks to Mandara for lending us that bicycle wheel in our time of need, I made a Frogasaurus Rex T-shirt for her. It includes her honorary title, "Guardian Angel".

Altho some folks may think the experiment was a failure because the wheel collapsed, I don't look at it that way. We got valuable experience with a low friction wheel. Experience that convinced me that Frogasaurus Rex really needed this.

I then embarked on a crash $$ program to create a high strength, low friction wheel specifically for Frogasaurus Rex. I got that wheel done in time for our next race, Clearlake.

$$ - Dave says this is a lousy choice of words.

Unless otherwise stated, all pictures above were taken by Allen Brown.

Copyright 2004 C. Allen Brown