My traveling days are over. I depend on you, friends throughout the world, to share walkalong flight with people where you live. - Slater, aka SciencetoyMaker
Notes Before Ordering Air Surf Products
- All foam sheets and gliders are made of "regular" foam unless noted. Read all about foam used for walkalong gliders.
- Children under the age of 10 years old might not have developed the hand/eye coordination to be able to fly yet. Even young teenagers might need your guidance to get started until they can read and follow directions. Here are some thoughts about teaching groups to fly air-surf gliders. Although I can do rushed orders, I discourage that because it's better if you can fly before teaching others.
- The gliders are delicate and must be handled very carefully! Building gliders is more difficult than flying them.
- You will need dead-calm air to fly in, which usually means inside, away from air vents.
- I send ready-to-fly gliders with most products. These sample gliders have a front weight made of thin copper wire. Since different designs require different weights, we do not ship weights with sheets of foam. You can use paper or aluminum foil, as explained on this page all about front weight.
- The foam sheets are very thin--half a millimeter. If you look closely, you will see tiny pinholes in between the circles (beads). These do not affect flying. Indeed, if we switched to the kind of foam that has no holes, it would be much heavier and unsatisfactory (we've tried it).
Please feel free to contact me (Slater, AKA sciencetoymaker) with any questions or comments.
A Note About Payment:
PayPal
Embedded PayPal buttons for customer convenience and security have worked well and automatically convert currencies. When you click on a button, you go to a secure PayPal page. Even if you do not have a PayPal account, you can still just use a credit card. All proceeds go directly to the non-profit, education organization, the Physics Factory.
Checks
If you send in a check, please make it out to Physics Factory. Feel free to contact me, Slater, with any questions.
Purchase Order
We are new to taking purchase orders, still a preferred method of ordering for schools and other organizations. Regrettably, we can only take purchase orders from United States customers because of huge archaic conversion fees by banks, unless checks are made payable in U.S. dollars. However, we welcome international orders using PayPal. Also, because of all the paperwork involved with purchase orders, the minimum PO is $25. However again, on the PayPal page there is no minimum order.
Until we figure out a better way to do it, I suggest that you go to the Foam Store page (or Helicopter page),figure out what you want and the cost (including shipping); then put that information into the P.O. Below is information needed to complete your order (phone#s, addresses, W-9, etc.). We will then send your stuff and issue an invoice. Please feel free to contact me, Slater, by phone or e-mail with any questions or special orders and we'll figure it out.
We are proud to note that the Physics Factory--a non-profit education organization--is the direct recipient of all proceeds from purchase orders. Here you can learn more about the Physics Factory and the latest project, the Physics Bus.
How do I know know the products and prices to put on the purchase order?
Go to the walkalong glider store or the helicopter store. Decide what you want and figure the cost, including shipping.
W-9 Form This link is to the Physics Factory W-9 form (PDF)
Vendor Address: Checks should be made out to "Physics Factory"
Physics Factory
PO Box 651
Ithaca, NY 14851
or 1204 N Tioga St, Ithaca, NY 14850 if you cannot use a P.O. Box address.
PLEASE DO NOT PUT ON BOTH THE STREET ADDRESS AND PO BOX, AS
THE ZIP CODES ARE DIFFERENT!
Phone Number and Contact Person--all questions
1-570-506-8094, Slater Harrison. This is our Pennsylvania telephone number where we make and send out gliders and foam. I can answer all questions by phone, or by the following e- mail...
E-mail--all questions
sciencetoymaker “at” gmail.com Replace the “at” with @ , no spaces. Writing my e-mail that way on web pages is said to foil spam-bots and it really seems to work! I can answer all questions by this e-mail or the phone number, just above.
Fax Number
Faxes are so last century! We don't have one anymore. Can you attach a scan to an e-mail? Or send by snail-mail. In the later case, please be sure to contact me (Slater) by e-mail or phone so I can get the order moving as it's in the mail.
Please take note of the following:
Include contact information in case we have a question about the order.
It needs to be clear where to mail the foam and where to send the invoice.
Payment within 30 days of receipt of foam. Checks should be made out to "Physics Factory"
Questions and Answers About International Postage.
Q. How long will it take to get my package?
A. By default, we use the least expensive shipping method, and it is slow. Most international packages take 2 weeks to Europe and 3 weeks to Asia/Australia. However, a few have taken as long as long as a month. Sometimes a package is shipped to the wrong country first! The packages get to their destination eventually, but even slower than usual. These countries have arrangements with the USPS for automatic tracking. If you have an event, please place your order far ahead. Also allow for some time to learn to fly so you can better help others. While you are waiting for your order to arrive, here is a walkalong gliding method that only uses paper. Paper is much heavier than foam, harder to launch and fly, but it is good practice. When you get your foam gliders, you will learn to fly them much faster because of your experience with paper gliders. Please note that I cannot ship regular post to Egypt or India.
Q. Can I pay extra to get it here faster?
A. Yes, but it is very expensive, costing over $100 USD for guaranteed delivery date--usually much more than the cost of the contents. I try to discourage rushed orders for reasons explained here but I try to respond to individual circumstances if people contact me.
Q. Why is the cost of international shipping so high?
A. I want to see young people everywhere in the world experiment with air-surfing. I want to make the thin foam available inexpensively to teachers. Unfortunately, the cost of postage to outside the U.S. has gone up drastically, as explained in this article. And it got worse January 19, 2016. The new minimum postal cost that we pay for any package up to 8 ounces is $13.50 USD; 9 oz. to 2 lbs is $22.75; up to 3 lbs is $33.75, etc. (the cost went up since then.) Although I get frustrated with the cost increases, if I gave a box to some random person and asked them to deliver it to, say, Australia, they would charge me hundreds of dollars. So by that comparison maybe it's not so bad. Furthermore, we spend extra time filling out customs forms for all packages sent outside the U.S. We do not charge extra money for that service because we feel bad that our international friends are already paying a lot for postage. So it is a kind of worthwhile subsidy for international customers
Q. What have you done to reduce shipping cost?
A. We spend extra time to fit gliders and foam into boxes that are just the right size, so you are not paying postage for extra packaging. Sometimes when people order two different items, I am able to put them in the same box, so we save some postage cost. If so, I put in extra gliders or foam for no additional cost, or refund the extra postal cost. Shipping to Canada is $4 less expensive than other countries, so I refund the difference.
Q. What can I do to reduce shipping cost?
A. You can get together with other people and make a large order. Many of the products do not add any additional postage if you order more than one of the same item. That's what I mean by "flat rate shipping". So you could order 8 or 10 or 100 of something--the ready-to-fly gliders, for example, and pay the same shipping cost as if you had ordered just one. And very large bulk orders have a better ratio of contents cost to shipping cost.
Q. Can I make my own thin foam and not need yours?
A. It takes time and effort to set up, but yes. Understand my position. I am a retired teacher with a good pension--I don't need money. The sales from foam and gliders goes directly to the Physics Factory for science STEM education in the U.S. and throughout the world. Spreading this wonderful, almost magical kind of flying is what is important to me--in whatever way works best for you. Here is what's involved to cut your own thin foam.
Q. If your shipping address is a P.O. Box number...
A. If your address is a P.O. Box number, then the United States Postal System requires that I put a phone number on the customs form. A phone number is not required for a street address.
My traveling days are over. I depend on you, friends throughout the world, to share walkalong flight with people where you live.
If you still have questions about international shipping, please contact me, Slater.