Accurately knowing how hot air balloons work initially starts out by understanding the basic underlying principles behind flying hot air balloons.  First, Archimedes discovered the buoyancy principle, and this was further developed and subsequently applied on simple flying machines by the Montgolfier brothers a couple of centuries later.

The concept behind hot air balloons is that warm air naturally rises over cooler air.  This is because warm air is less dense since it is composed of less mass per volume unit compared to cooler air.  It takes 2 cubic feet of warm air to functionally lift around 14 grams of sheer mass.  Do the math, and you'll understand that you need to constantly produce and subsequently contain 130000 cubic feet of warm air just to continuously lift 10000 grams of sheer mass.
 
Propane is now used to power these hot air balloons.  Back then, manure and other materials were used to fuel the earliest prototypes of the hot air balloon.  The wind is then used to guide the travelers on the hot air balloons to their destination.  Thus, hot air balloon rides are carefully planned in order for the hot air balloons to follow its designated course.  For more information on hot air balloons, call or send us an email.  In addition, visit Balloon-Rides.Org on a regular basis since we offer updated and interestingly useful information on hot air balloons and balloon rides.