Featherweight Raven Main Deployment Behavior

Does a Featherweight Raven fire its main deployment charge after apogee even if it did not reach the programmed altitude? For example, Raven3 is using default settings with first deployment at apogee and main at 1000'. Rocket launches and only makes it to 950 feet as measured by the Raven3. The apogee charge should fire, but will the main?

enderw88 said:

Does a Featherweight Raven fire its main deployment charge after apogee even if it did not reach the programmed altitude? For example, Raven3 is using default settings with first deployment at apogee and main at 1000'. Rocket launches and only makes it to 950 feet as measured by the Raven3. The apogee charge should fire, but will the main?

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Logic would say that the main would not fire.
EDIT: I think CarVac below is correct after looking at it again. It does depend on the Raven's settings but in this case both the apogee and main should fire together.

enderw88 said:

Does a Featherweight Raven fire its main deployment charge after apogee even if it did not reach the programmed altitude? For example, Raven3 is using default settings with first deployment at apogee and main at 1000'. Rocket launches and only makes it to 950 feet as measured by the Raven3. The apogee charge should fire, but will the main?

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I believe the logic is "below xxx altitude, descending" so yes. It doesn't mean that it deploys at that particular altitude. You should check that in the software though.

It should fire, I recently had a Raven 3 in a rocket that did not reach the predetermined altitude and therefore the back up charge was below the 700 foot variable to selected and it still fired.

I had a Raven II fail to fire the main. I set the apogee deploy type to baro and thought I input an appropriate field elevation. Launched to 7400 feet, the
15inch drogue deployed but no main. I cycled the altimeter and it had continuity on the channel. Took it home and the unfired charge blew when I connected it up to some launch electronics. I then stuck bare ematches on both channels of the Raven II and used the computer utility and simulate a flight and both matches fired just fine (with the same fresh battery). I did a reset of the altimeter and am going to use stock settings and only input the main deployment altitude and not try to manually input a field elevation. I was told the apogee baro deployment is more accurate than the accel apogee deployment. Featherweight should have an archive of "rock steady" programming parameters for different scenarios on the webpage as a starting point for fliers. Kurt

ksaves2 said:

I set the apogee deploy type to baro and thought I input an appropriate field elevation.

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All Raven altitude values are AGL, I believe, so there should be no need to do anything with the elevation of your field.

ksaves2 said:

Featherweight should have an archive of "rock steady" programming parameters for different scenarios on the webpage as a starting point for fliers. Kurt

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Aren't there presets in the user interface for that?

CarVac said:

Aren't there presets in the user interface for that?

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Yeah, there are a few but it would be nice if there were some screen saves for different scenarios with a description of the intended behavior.
Sure a simple DD is fine but I still am a little puzzled about H1 H2 and on the Raven III H3. One of the "H's" they say is "field elevation". Well if it
doesn't need to be set, why is it there? In a stock/preset setup, the number that appears there is way lower than what the true field elevation is.
But then again, the unit seemed to behave fine.

When I used a preset, the Raven II worked fine. People rant and rave how the Ravens can do elementary staging with some degree of checking. Well, if it's so
darned good, how come there is nothing posted on that? Seems to me some files/screen saves would help rather than having someone trying to blindly go about it.

Personally, I am not interested in staging at this time but I do like clearer instructions concerning potential use.

The worst altimeter as far as complexity is the out of production "Mission Controller". 4 channels and a passel of options that required a thick manual and worksheets. Kurt

Have you read the manual? https://www.featherweightaltimeters.com/uploads/Raven_Users_Manual_2014May20.pdf

Could be clearer but there is a lot of info in there.

mikec said:

Have you read the manual? https://www.featherweightaltimeters.com/uploads/Raven_Users_Manual_2014May20.pdf

Could be clearer but there is a lot of info in there.

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I'll fire it up. Was working with an older documentation. Thanks. Kurt