Launch Report - June 22, 2008 Plano, Texas

After Saturday's launch, I was still unfulfilled - I wanted more flying!  When I checked the weather Sunday at www.noaa.gov, it showed calm winds - 0 mph - an extremely rare condition in North Texas.  All I could think was, "MUST FLY 3 STAGE ROCKET!" While I have several birds that could take advantage of the calm air, I opted for my stretched, 3-stage Midget, called the Tridget.  Its prep time wouldn't be too bad versus an hour or more for some of the other multiple motor model rockets I have.  And the motor combo I had for it wouldn't take it too high - it could be flown without needing a large field. It was assembled with an A10-0T in the first stage, a ½A3-0T in the second and a ½A3-4T in the upper stage with a crepe paper streamer for recovery. Knowing that tracking is critical to recovery, I assigned my daughter Elena and wife Paige to the second stage, Elena's friend Natalie to the first stage and took the upper stage for myself.  Furthermore, wanting to enjoy the entire flight, I opted to forego any photography of the liftoff.  It'd be a major bummer to get a great liftoff shot but lose the rocket 'cause I wasn't watching the flight, so this is the only pic of this one today. It was a great flight with both upper stages lighting on cue.  And with the calm air, everything came back close to the pad.  Awesome!

Having had my daughter Haley with me on Saturday, I invited my middle daughter Elena to fly today.  She has one rocket which I made for her, so it was a must that we fly it today.  I began preparing it only to find the shock cord was fried and needed replacing, but was able to repair it quickly.  It was then loaded with an E9-4 and a 21" parachute. Here's Elena (right) and her friend Natalie.  They're both very tall for their age (13) and hang out together constantly.  I enjoyed having them today, and they had had fun, too, so it's a win-win deal :) Since this one wasn't going to be a difficult-to-track flight, I was planning to try and get a liftoff shot, but we encountered problems which precluded that.  Seems the launch button stuck on the first flight - daughter Elena might ougtta back off on the Wheaties - so that when the key was inserted the rocket took off catching us all a little off guard.  Fortunately, our procedures had us at the proper distance from the pad when the key was inserted, and no one was exposed to any hazard. The E9-4 seemed to burn forever, and - still a little in shock - I wasn't paying real close attention at ejection to notice if it was early.  The 21" chute broke one suspension line and the rocket was coming down at a good rate.  I ran to try and catch it, but came up a couple steps short.  It hit hard enough to crack a fin.  Not sure how much the broken suspension line contributed, but both will be fixed easily enough. I'll probably try a 24" chute on the next flight, just in case. While it was a short outing, it was quite fun.  Hopefully the girls will want to tag along with me again soon. Doug  -  June 22, 2008