Abstract: An airborne, free floating, lift-weight, balanced balloon having a closed envelope encompassing a fixed volume of lighter-than-air gas has ballast means fixed on the bottom of the envelope to tend to balance the weight of the balloon to equal the lifting effect of the gas, and to tend to cause the balloon to float in a desired horizontal attitude. At least one ballast member or a pair of ballast members form part of the ballast means and are fixed to the bottom of the balloon in symmetrical relationship to a vertical plane passing through the central horizontal axis of the balloon, ballast member(s) being constituted as a plurality of pressure sensitive removable weight control modules also arranged symmetrically with respect to a vertical plane passing through the central horizontal axis of the balloon when the balloon is in its desired attitude. These weight control modules are removed one or two at a time in order to balance the weight of the balloon so that it will float at a desired altitude.

Abstract: An airborne, free floating, lift-weight balanced toy for manual manipulation includes a closed envelope of polyethylene terephthalate (Mylar) filled with helium. The envelope is exactly counterbalanced with one or more ballast members so that the toy will assume a position at a desired distance from the floor or ground when it is let free. Such ballast members are made up of a plurality of weight control modules spirally arranged with respect to each other and held onto the skin of the toy by double face adhesive. In one form of the invention, when such a toy is initially filled with helium and a ballast member is in place, it will have a static balance such that one portion will always come back to being the bottom portion. In a second form, two ballast members are placed so that the toy will remain oriented in space in whatever position it is manually placed, if there are no outside effects except gravity and the lifting effect of the helium working on it.