Motor block built by a youth technical club

DIY Motor Block "Kirpi": Compact Agricultural Machinery

In gardens and vegetable plots, at dachas and school grounds — everywhere where there is a need to cultivate small areas of land, universal walk-behind tractors (UWT) are widely used. Including homemade ones, often created with maximum use of standard units and parts. One such design was developed and successfully tested by young technicians at Read more…

Funicular for a skier

Portable Ski Tow Lift: DIY Guide with Calculations

For tourists and skiers in “large” mountains with complex terrain and significant elevation differences, chairlifts are usually installed. On their traction-carrying cable, they have special suspensions with one or two chairs. The length of such lifts is limited to 1.5—2 km: experience has shown that an ascent exceeding 10—15 minutes in time can lead to Read more…

Vehicle microclimate

Oka Car Winter Preheater: DIY Coolant System, Schematic & Build

Many motorists, especially owners of domestic cars, have experienced all the “joys” of winter operation of their beloved “steeds” firsthand. A particular “pleasure” is bringing the heart—the “fiery engine”—back to life after a frosty night. I own a giant of Russian automaking—the Oka—so all my thoughts and efforts went into developing a system that would Read more…

Motorized mono-ski

DIY Motorized Monoskier: Build Plywood Hull and Steering

Last spring I built myself water skis. But I rarely got to ski on them, since the tow was provided by… a motorcycle with a sidecar. Building a dedicated boat would have meant considerable expense, powerful engines, and above all—time. So I thought: why not design one large ski, fit it with an engine and Read more…

Paper… “firewood”

DIY fuel briquettes from paper: press plan and technology

Nowadays the amount of paper waste has increased sharply, mainly due to “disposable” printed matter: besides newspapers and magazines, mailboxes are filled with countless promotional leaflets, various election campaign materials and the like—all free of charge. It would be a shame not to put such gifts to use. The “Master” club figured this out long Read more…

Detachable concrete mixer

DIY concrete mixer with reverse drive: design

The concrete mixer is designed to produce concrete mix or cement-sand mortar. Its volumetric output is 15 ten‑liter buckets of mix in the ratio: 1.5 buckets of cement + 4.5 buckets of sand + 9 buckets of crushed stone (water not included) per batch, with a cycle time of 15 minutes (5 minutes each for Read more…

With forced air

Schematic diagram of the under-hood fan power supply

With the help of articles in the magazine «Modelist-Konstruktor», I built myself a universal power tiller based on a Minsk motorcycle. It turned out to be a good, hard-working mechanical helper. Its basis, of course, is the standard motorcycle frame, shortened (as recommended by the magazine) and fitted with the power unit and a two-stage Read more…

Autogyro control

Autogyro Control System: Complete Design and Manufacturing Guide

During 1970, our magazine published a series of articles by a group of autogyro designers about the features of building these rotary-wing aircraft, about how to build autogyro models, how to fly gyrogliders towed by a boat or car. At the request of numerous readers, we tell in this issue about the autogyro control system Read more…

Vitamin jack

Homemade Fruit Juice Press with Car Jack: DIY Guide

In our middle latitudes, there are years when fruit trees stand as if in construction scaffolding: they are not visible due to a palisade of supports saving branches overloaded with fruit. Gardeners know how difficult it is to grow a good harvest, but no less a problem is to preserve it, to make maximum use Read more…