It seems incredible that hot air balloons are still built by hand, but they are. It is a very common question from passengers on a balloon flight: how is a hot air balloon built?
Building a hot air balloon is a slow process that takes many hours of work, given how labour-intensive each of its components is.
Since their invention in 1783, hot air balloons have evolved in terms of the materials used, but not so much in the construction method, which is still practically artisanal. The baskets are made by hand by experts who weave wicker; the envelope is built by sewing metre after metre of fabric. The burners are built by hand, joining together the parts that make them up.
Stage one: design
Once we have decided the size of the balloon – 1, 2, 3, 4 or 24 passengers – the decision comes down to the colours and the pattern to be used for the envelope. Thanks to the fact that today manufacturers use computers in the design phase, it is very easy and quick to visualise what the balloon will look like once it is built.
At this stage the customer and the manufacturer choose the material, the colours, and the size of the basket and envelope. Once these details have been agreed, the project moves to the manufacturing phase.
Stage two: building the main components – basket, burner and envelope
The number of passengers the balloon can carry determines the size of the basket, the volume of the envelope and the number of burners. The greater the passenger capacity, the bigger the basket, the bigger the envelope and the greater the number of burners.
When explaining how a hot air balloon is built, there are 3 basic components: basket, envelope and burners.
The basket of a hot air balloon has been built for more than 200 years using a flexible material: wicker. It is an artisanal process in which workers weave thousands of metres of wicker around an aluminium structure that gives the whole assembly greater strength. The average time needed to build a 12-passenger basket is 1 month.
The envelope is built by sewing together hundreds of fabric panels. The panels are cut beforehand by industrial cutting machines that give the exact size of each panel. Balloon factories have industrial double-needle sewing machines where the panels are sewn one by one. Kilometres of thread and thousands of square metres of fabric are used in each balloon. Sewing a balloon can take up to 2 months of work.
The number of burners depends on the size of the envelope, with a minimum of 1 burner and a maximum of 4. Of the three components, the burners are the most industrialised. The different parts of each burner are joined to a metal frame that will be mounted on the balloon’s basket.
Stage three: flight tests
The balloon is ready to be assembled and flight-tested before being delivered to the customer. The factory engineers check that the balloon has been built to the agreed specifications and that all the elements work correctly.
All set to make dreams come true. The balloon is packed and shipped to the customer with all the documentation they must present to the aeronautical authorities. We hope we have given you an idea of how a hot air balloon is built.
