This weeks project started as a request from Ann, one of our "faithful readers".
      It seemed like a simple request for a pattern for a flying bird, the kind with strings up from the wings and a weight below. My farther in law has one of these that he got many years ago so I figured I would just make one similar to that. I made my patterns for a Mallard duck body and wings. I drilled the holes for the strings in the wings, mounted the wings to the body and added some weight. No matter how much or how little weight I added the darn thing just wouldn't balance out. I discovered that I forgot to add the cross bar above the wings to separate the strings.
      The next part was to find the right weight. I tried a bunch of different stuff until I got it close to right. I weighed the "stuff" and it was about 1 1/2 ounces. I then found a wooden wheel that looks pretty good and weighs just right.
I hope you enjoy this project and don't get as frustrated as I did.

Material

1/4" thick wood 6" wide approximately 4' long
8 small eyebolts
Some fishing line
A fishing swivel
A lot of patience!

Print out the body pattern in two pages from runnerduck.com/images/duck_body_front.gif and
runnerduck.com/images/duck_body_back.gif Use carbon paper to transfer your pattern onto the wood.
Cut the body out using a jigsaw or band saw.
Drill two 1/16" holes for the wings and one 1/16" hole for the fishing line near the bottom.
Print out the wing pattern from www.runndeduck.con/images/duck_wing.gif
Transfer the pattern onto your wood.
Stack two pieces of wood with double back tape in-between.
Cut out the wings.
Keep the wings together and drill two 1/16" holes for the fishing line.
Cut two pieces ¾" x 4" to mount the wings to.
Center the two pieces with the holes on the body, mark and drill.
Drill two holes in the end of each wing that aligns with the holes in the body.
Align the holes of the two 4" pieces with the holes in the body and glue in place.
Screw an eyebolt into each of the four wing holes in the body.
Half way straighten out the four eyebolts for the wing so they will hook onto the body eyebolts.
Hook the wings onto the body and close up the eye bolts.
Thread the fishing line up through one hole on the wings and back down through the other hole making them about 16" long. Do the same on the other wing.
Put the fishing line over a 7" piece of dowel near each end. You can notch the dowel or glue the line in place.
Take another piece of line and go from each end of the dowel about 12" high. This is where you will hang the duck. You can tie off a fishing swivel in the middle if you like.
Tie a fishing line through the bottom hole in the body and start adding weight.

      That's it. Well, that should be it but you may find yourself fooling around with the fishing line length and weight for quite a while. Have fun and enjoy it because the results are really quite nice.

Thanks again to Ann for suggesting this project and Frank for having the old pattern to work from.