balloon deflation

[Dustin cantu]

How would you prefer to squeeze the air out of your hot air balloon? what would be easy? please share your opinion

[Eric Wiggins]

two things: 1. snake the envelope to the bag, don't hop the bag to the envelope. 2. Use a squeezer. They make milking an average envelope (about a 90) a two person job.

[Andrew Robertson]

get someone else to do it. There is always a lot of important "pilot stuff" to do in the basket ;)

[Mark Pluta]

Basket and/or landowner relations :>)

[Barb Smith]

Hire a monkey with very long arms ...

[Mark Pluta]

I've seen 3 different ways for squeezing air out.

1. Hug and walk, where you hug the envelope as you walk towards the other end. The advantage is if you have a lot of crew, it is probably the quickest and gets the most air out as the others hug the envelope behind you. The disadvantage is, if you don't have a lot of crew, which tends to be more the norm (outside festivals) where I am, by about halfway to the end of the balloon, your arms give out and you are gasping for air. You'd likely have to squeeze again as your arms tire, more air escapes towards where you just squeezed.

2. Crawl down appoach, where you crawl down the envelope from basket to crown. The advantage is that you aren't picking up the heavy fabric to squeeze so you don't get tired and winded so fast. You also are most likely to get the most air out on the first try doing this. The disadvantage is if you land where there are sharp objects, stones or something, that might put a hole in the envelope as you crawl down.

3. Of course is by use of the squeezer. The advantage is you have two people so the weight of the envelope is equally distributed, the squeezer is fixed (unlike arms that get tired) so there is less of a chance for air to escape back towards the end you just squeezed. You also did need a big crew to make this go smooth and quickly. Lastly, there is no risk (outside of something in someone's pocket, a risk with any of these methods) of putting a hole in the envelope with sharp objects since the squeezer slides down the balloon.
The only disadvantage I see with it is it can take a moment to get it hooked on and it the wind is picking up, can make things interesting, but I have yet to have any major issues with it in my 3 years of flying (knock on wood).

Me personally, I prefer the squeezer as like I said, hugging the air out can be a huge workout. Sometimes I will crawl down the envelope to get any residual air out as long as there isn't anything on the ground that can hurt the envelope.


As for bagging the balloon, I prefer to set the bag up near the basket and walk the top portion of the balloon in a "J" formation to the bag rather than hopping the bag from top to bottom. Less lifting, less work!

Hope that answers your question Dustin. That was a very good question you posted!
Mark

[DS]

For those who use the "J" formation, don't you find that the envelope comes out twisted next time?

We hop the envelope bag along and put the envelope in in a straight line. Once we get to the last 15-20 feet or so, we bring that part of the envelope to the bag instead.

[Marianne Jay]

When we are in a nice location, grass, etc. We like to 'snake' the balloon, or "J" fomration. If we are on asphault or taller grass or hay fields, we start at the top of the envelope and hop the bag. I feel the Snaking method is a lot easier. And no, I don't think it gets twisted, if you know what you are doing.

[Michael Toulson]

Magic! i close my eyes for 10mins and the balloon is ready to put in the trailer.

[JP Quinn]

When its really hot, I like the no work method. Close the mouth and turn on the fan, the air will be out in no time!

[Maaike Bierma]

It depends what size balloon, Dustin. On a small one, just picking it up and squeezing it out will work, but on anything larger than a 77, you'll want to make sure you don't wear out your back (or your crew's). I personally do the 'sit, gather and squeeze' (What Mark calls a 'crawl') on a larger envelope. And get as many people as you can to help gather the fabric into the middle, so the squeezer doesn't have to do the work all by themselves! Kids love helping with this, as it is something they can do safely and easily, and they love being involved.

[Mark Pluta]

Kids also love to sit on the bag once the envelope is in it. They have fun and it helps get the extra air out of the envelope, making it less bulky when packing, plus it can actually make the bag a tad lighter.

[Sky Drifters Ballooning]

Pay crew $50.00 per morning each and refer to them as "Good Monkeys" as often as possible.

1. We bring the top of the balloon to the bag.
2. We then bring the center of the balloon to the bag so that it Z's.

Then again I think that is how they do it, I am often to busy drinking champagne with the passengers to notice.