Scott
Hansen's
02-05-00 Launch Report
First off, where was everybody?! ;-) I called the "Hotline" in the morning and it sounded to me as if Dean was still planning on going despite the winds being brisk. I owed Dean a hunk of BT-80 so I figured I'd go to observe and give him his tube. I also brought along my old Estes Cobra-1500 to fly just in case, but thought better of launching it after seeing the wind conditions. I didn't want a cruise missile flight. ;-)
I got out to the site around 10:20am. The temperature was in the mid 20's with the wind blowing from the WSW at around 15-20mph. I saw only one other car out there parked on the service road on the west end of the field. There were two father and son teams there that traveled down from Madison. Bill Hiltner and his son Rhys along with Brian Ehringer and his son John. Bill told me his son was a member of the club, but I didn't catch if the Ehringer's were members or not.
They were fairly new to the hobby so I stayed to offer support and give them tips on flying in cold, windy weather. I noticed they both had their motors sitting in boxes in the snow. I told them about heat cycling and how they should keep their motors in their jacket pockets in the winter. Rhys originally had his launch rod pointed at about 20º into the wind. I told him that was unnecessary due to the weather cocking that would happen due to the wind speed, so we straightened that up. Rhys likes to make scratch builts and modify existing designs. He had a number of scratch built models with him. I noticed a copy of G. Harry's Handbook of Model Rocketry in his range box. He also designed his own capacitor discharge launch system. He designed some pretty neat stuff for his age which I'd approximate to be around 12 years old. John brought along a number of rockets including a Quest Tracer and a balsa fin Alpha. I was happy to see that both of them had models you actually had to build with balsa fins. I guess there's still hope for today's youth!
The first launch attempt of the day was Rhys's low-drag scratch built model on an A8-3 with a streamer. He was thinking ahead and had it painted fluorescent orange with an orange streamer. We tried his launch system a few times, but the 6 volt dry cell he brought appeared to either be dead or the cold got to it. It wasn't charging the capacitor. So, I pulled my car ahead on the road a bit, opened the hood and we moved the equipment up to the car. Back to the good old days of hooking up your launch system to your car battery. ;-) We tried his launch control again. The capacitor would charge now but it still would not fire the igniter. So, we got even more primitive by doing a direct connect. We gave the countdown and Bill touched the wires to the car battery at 0. Woosh! Away it went for a very nice flight. It did get plenty of altitude even considering the wind and using an A8-3. It was easily found in the snow due to it's color.
The second launch was John's Quest Tracer on a Quest A6-4 with a parachute. I never used a Quest motor before so I was anxious to see its performance. At 0 Bill touched the wires to my car battery and off it went. My first impression was these motors are louder than Estes motors for whatever reason. The tigertail igniter appeared to work very nicely as well. The rocket flew nicely but the chute did not open due to the cold. No damage done since it landed in the soft snow.
Third flight of the day was a Fat Boy that Rhys had modified. His dad called it the Tall & Fat. Rhys had added another section of BT-80 to it to use as a payload section for accelerometer experiments. This went up on a B6-2 with a 12" chute. The flight had some pretty good weather cocking. The chute did not open due to the cold. The rocket landed in the creek on the west end of the field. Luckily it was frozen so it didn't get wet nor did it suffer any fin damage.
Fourth flight was a balsa finned Alpha that John put together. He put a Quest A6-4 in it along with a 12" chute. At 0 Bill touched the wires to the battery and off it went. About 10ft in the air it had a nice CATO, the exact type I told them could/would happen when heat cycling BP motors. It blew the propellant out the top which snapped the shock cord. Both parts of the rocket came back to the ground with minimal damage to the body. The heat from the burning propellant going up through the tube bubbled the paint on the outside of the rocket and charred the inside. Pretty cool. ;-) The rocket will fly again. I showed John what to do to re-attach his shock cord for future flights. I also told him to call Quest to see if he could get a pack of replacement motors and to fill out a MESS form on the NAR website. I was impressed to hear that Rhys already knew about the importance of filling out a MESS form. Like I said, there's still hope for today's youth.
The Fifth flight was Rhys's Tall & Fat again. This time on a C6-3. It got much better altitude, but still did some pretty severe weather cocking. The chute again did not open due to the cold. No damage to the rocket though due to landing in the snow.
The sixth and last flight of the day was Rhys's balsa finned Alpha. He put an A8-3 in it with a 12" chute. We had 2 or 3 misfires before I suggested he try a different motor. This one must've had some clay covering the propellant down in the nozzle. I told him how to clean it out when he got home. He stuck another A8-3 in it and off it went. This had a very nice flight with minimal weather cocking. Again, the chute did not open but there was no damage to the rocket.
By this time everyone was pretty cold so we decided to call it a day. Bill and Brian offered to take me to lunch or for a cup of coffee but I declined. I had stuff I had to get done and they were going to hit some hobby shops while in town. It was nice to get out and burn some BP, even if it was cold and windy. We left the field at around 11:30am.