 |
Wanting to celebrate
Independence Day with my family, I asked my wife and kids to go fly
rockets with me for a while this morning. I'm really grateful they indulged me. And we all had fun, so it was a great outing. Jordan, my oldest daughter, had her rocket - Jordo - up first. Propulsion was four A10-PT's and a B6-6 in the center. All 5 motors lit and the laundry came out right at the top. |
 |
 |
At great risk of life and limb I
attempted to catch it before it hit the ground. Upon arriving at the field, my wife had given me a stick of Beemans to make sure I was capable of handling such a daunting undertaking. Demonstrating that I could walk to the pad without being overly burdened with chewing, she declared I was "go" for catching. I did in fact fail to catch this rocket, but managed to avoid stepping on it. With the 18" chute, its descent rate wasn't great, but it hit at just the right angle to pop a fin off. It simply snapped clean at the root - essentially, the paper delaminated - so repair will be very easy. In the course of the day, I did catch two others, and narrowly missed a third, all without need for a trip to the ER. |
|
 |
My kids took many of
the day's photos. Here my son was shooting the sky after the
liftoff of the Jordo. Upon reviewing the pics, at first glance this (left) almost appeared to be the rocket, but zooming in on it (right) shows it to be unidentified. I might guess it's wadding, but the liftoff smoke (cropped from pic) was still quite thick so it was too early in the flight for wadding to be out. It's our first ever rocketry UFO :) |
 |
|
| Paige was my recovery
crew. She shagged two which had managed to get way
downrange. Here's a great pic one of the kids took. |
 |
 |
Haley is my budding junior
rocketeer. Here she mugs with her rocket, Haley's Comet. On a D12-5, this one had a perfect flight and a routine recovery on an 18" chute. |
 |
|
 |
| The third flight of
the day was this upscale Midget (1.3x) on a B6-0 / B6-6 combo.
Great liftoff and staging. If flew out of sight, but fortunately
the tracking smoke kicked in just before deployment and it was in sight
all the way down. It caught some wind and, on a 12" chute, went a couple hundred yards northeast of us. Paige had a long walk, but came back proudly proclaiming she enjoyed the walk. |
||
 |
Elena is a ham. She loves
posing for pics. Here's her rocket on an E9-4. On its last
flight, it snapped a
suspension line and then popped a fin, but today it
was perfect. The E9 - as usual - seemed to burn forever. The laundry was out at the top and the repaired 21" chute brought it back not too far from the pad. I ran after it and caught it before it hit the ground. So the repaired fin wasn't tested this time out. |
 |
| The kids are all a little
soft. It wasn't that hot out, but they were acting like it was
115°F. Actually, it's more rivalry than heat. One of them had an umbrella, so they all had to get one. Fortunately, we had a good stash of them in the car. |
 |
| This was the maiden
flight for this rocket, called the Thridget60. It's a clustered
stager based on the Estes Midget upscaled by a factor of ~1.6. All three A10-0T booster motors lit together, but were not well matched and staged in staggered fashion with the result that two of the booster sections took some fire damage from the already-burning sustainer motors before falling free. Similarly, the A3-4T sustainer motors could be heard to eject in sequence. I didn't really get a good look at the ejection to see if it was early, late, or right at the top, but it managed to shred two suspension lines on the 13.5" mylar chute. Even with that, the rocket was recovered in perfect shape. Next time, I'll try a smaller chute or maybe a streamer. Regardless of the shred, it was a great flight, and my brood managed to recover all three booster sections while I shagged the sustainer. The blistered paint on the boosters is no big deal - boosters get beat up pretty good anyway. |
 |
 |
The last flight of the day
was my son's rocket on an E18. Hard to believe he just got a
haircut, eh? As a parent, I've learned to pick my battles :) The rocket popped the Copperhead ignitor, so we put a more conventional one in its place. I'd like to give credit, but not sure who gave me the apparently homemade device. It was a hair big, but worked like a charm. The delay was long - even with 5 seconds trimmed off of it - and the rocket was over the top and heading back down at ejection. The 30" chute brought it safely back down and I was able to catch it in the air. Even with the late deployment, my shock absorbing recovery harness dampened the jerk without the slightest damage to the airframe. But the chute did take a few bits of burning ejection powder, even with extra wadding. Next time, maybe I'll use a nomex chute protector. Overall it was a great flight. My gang was taken back a bit by the launch. They aren't used to hearing APCP motors burn, so the loud crackling really impressed them. |
 |
I'm really glad we could get out today and enjoy a few of the many things we have in this great country of ours. Doug - July 4, 2008  |
||