~Question recovery wadding protects~

Good day, What recovery wadding protects do you use??

Thank you for your time..

~Thomas~

Welcome Lud. Do a search on 'dog barf'. There have been some recent discussions...

(Google is the best way to search: site:rocketryforum.com "dog barf" )

Dog barf is cellulose insulation treated with flame retardant. It's basically fireproof recycled and shredded newspaper. It is generally available at home improvement stores at a very low price.

Worsaer said:

Welcome Lud. Do a search on 'dog barf'. There have been some recent discussions...

(Google is the best way to search: site:rocketryforum.com "dog barf" )

Click to expand...

Here is a link to one of the discussions

https://www.rocketryforum.com/showthread.php?120655-dog-barf&highlight=dog+barf

The standards are recovery wadding (like Estes or Quest), dog barf (see above), Nomex or Kevlar chute protectors, Kevlar shock cord protectors, or cooling mesh inside a baffle. Others have gotten creative and made wadding out of toilet paper and Borax, or used things like lettuce. The key points are that it must be non-flammable and biodegradable.

For most LPR and MPR models I use a combination: a single sheet of Estes or Quest FPwadding, 2 to 3 diameters of Dog Barf and a top sheet of Std PF wadding on top.

In a number of LPR and MPR models I've made and installed 30 strand Teflon Plumbers tape Pom-Pom Permanent wadding balls attached to the shock cord.

Ocasionally a nomex Shield but they are really expensive and have been known to prevent recovery deployment so they must be trimmed to fit the model.

For Micro models and some LPR models I replace the need from wadding by using FP teflon Plumbers tape or PTFE (teflon) Militrary grade Thread sealing tape as both Wadding and Streamer. Theses Wadding/streamers are also permanent generally out lasting the model in which they are installed.

Worsaer said:

Welcome Lud. Do a search on 'dog barf'. There have been some recent discussions...

(Google is the best way to search: site:rocketryforum.com "dog barf" )

Click to expand...

Oops... you just committed the cardinal sin... suggesting someone do a search... the vultures will now descend on you and burn you to a crisp with their flames until you are well done... LOL

Later! OL JR

PS. BTW to the OP, cellulose (shredded newspaper, basically) blow-in house insulation sold in 20-ish pound bales at Lowe's or other big box indoor lumberyard type stores works wonderfully for ejection protection. By law it must be treated to be flame resistant ("flameproof") like regular Estes recovery wadding.

Other alternatives include lettuce leaves or handfuls of lush green grass (too wet to support burning), Nomex protectors, crepe paper (beware of cheap Chinese dollar store stuff that isn't always treated well or completely so it often isn't as "flameproof" as required by law). Then there's reusable wadding alternatives like teflon tape pom-poms, ejection pistons, foam plugs (used extensively in contest flying-- should always be tethered to the rocket with a thread or something to the shock cord to eliminate littering issue IMHO) and of course "waddingless" methods like ejection baffles.

About the only thing you SHOULDN'T use is untreated toilet paper (not flame resistant), and non-biodegradable flameproof materials like pillow ticking or mattress stuffing, pink fiberglass house insulation, etc that will be ejected from the rocket and drift on the wind back to earth, making a permanent litter problem that can choke or kill livestock or wildlife if eaten by grazing animals, and which will persist in the environment pretty much permanently.

OL JR

luke strawwalker said:

Oops... you just committed the cardinal sin... suggesting someone do a search... the vultures will now descend on you and burn you to a crisp with their flames until you are well done... LOL

Click to expand...

Yeah, I could have posted some links, but you know the old saying, "give a man a link, he reads for a day, teach a man to use search, he has links for a lifetime..."

That didn 't make sense, did it...


Yeah, I should have posted some links...

BEST VIDEO EVAR on recovery wadding. [video=youtube;cdg8XBRX6O8]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdg8XBRX6O8[/video]

Dog barf and nomex blankets, usually.



Later!

--Coop

Worsaer said:

Yeah, I could have posted some links, but you know the old saying, "give a man a link, he reads for a day, teach a man to use search, he has links for a lifetime..."

That didn 't make sense, did it...


Yeah, I should have posted some links...

Click to expand...

LOL

Later! OL JR

Anyone ever DIYed versions of these and used them? I suspect the larger diameter body tubes would require multiple foam board thicknesses to prevent yaw in the tube.

https://rocketry.wordpress.com/2008/06/09/history-and-use-of-recovery-wadding-and-alternatives/

Plugs – the is the most common wadding replacement in FAI competition style rockets. Foam plugs are made from the pink/blue closed cell construction foam. This can be done by making a cutter from a piece of body tube of the size plug you need. Take the tube piece and CA around the circumference of one end. This will be the cutting side. Take the tube and put it on top of the foam and slowly spin the tube while applying pressure. This will cut the plug from the foam. Plugs act like many piston and effectively help “push” out the chute in competition models.

Since I have Estes model rockets, I use Estes Recovery Wadding. What kind of rockets do you have? My advice is to use their particular brand of recovery wadding.

Xan

Winston said:

Anyone ever DIYed versions of these and used them? I suspect the larger diameter body tubes would require multiple foam board thicknesses to prevent yaw in the tube.

https://rocketry.wordpress.com/2008/06/09/history-and-use-of-recovery-wadding-and-alternatives/

Plugs – the is the most common wadding replacement in FAI competition style rockets. Foam plugs are made from the pink/blue closed cell construction foam. This can be done by making a cutter from a piece of body tube of the size plug you need. Take the tube piece and CA around the circumference of one end. This will be the cutting side. Take the tube and put it on top of the foam and slowly spin the tube while applying pressure. This will cut the plug from the foam. Plugs act like many piston and effectively help “push” out the chute in competition models.

Click to expand...

If the plug ever binds on its way out you'll likely blow a hole in your Body Tube. Sounds like to doing it properly would be quite critical.

Xan2482 said:

Since I have Estes model rockets, I use Estes Recovery Wadding. What kind of rockets do you have? My advice is to use their particular brand of recovery wadding.

Xan

Click to expand...

That has nothing to do with anything...

You can use ANY type of flame-resistant biodegradable material in ANY rocket, regardless of manufacturer, or use a baffle or "reusable" wadding substitute like a nomex heat shield, etc.

Manufacturer of either the wadding or substitute or manufacturer of the rocket makes absolutely no difference whatsoever.

Later! OL JR

Winston said:

Anyone ever DIYed versions of these and used them? I suspect the larger diameter body tubes would require multiple foam board thicknesses to prevent yaw in the tube.

https://rocketry.wordpress.com/2008/06/09/history-and-use-of-recovery-wadding-and-alternatives/


Plugs – the is the most common wadding replacement in FAI competition style rockets. Foam plugs are made from the pink/blue closed cell construction foam. This can be done by making a cutter from a piece of body tube of the size plug you need. Take the tube piece and CA around the circumference of one end. This will be the cutting side. Take the tube and put it on top of the foam and slowly spin the tube while applying pressure. This will cut the plug from the foam. Plugs act like many piston and effectively help “push” out the chute in competition models.

Click to expand...

Foam plug use is somewhat common in competition rocketry due to their being the lightest weight alternative to serve the purpose in most cases.

Thing is, to be "responsible" and keep your landowner happy, the foam plug SHOULD be securely attached to the rocket with a length of thread securely tied to the shock cord, so that the plug can be recovered with the rocket. I know that this isn't frequently done, and I can imagine the litter problem of dozens of foam plugs scattered about the launch site, and the foam does not biodegrade very rapidly (eventually exposure to solar UV will cause the foam to "dry out" and crumble little by little from the surface of the foam, but that takes considerable time).

I would think that you would want the length of the foam plug to be equal to AT LEAST one tube diameter to resist "wedging" with up to two diameters probably being better. As you mentioned, with large tube sizes, this gets to be a considerable size plug pretty rapidly. Probably have to make it from multiple layers of foam to get the necessary thickness.

At some point, the other alternatives to plugs are probably a lot easier...

Later! OL JR

The plugs are not actually that hard to deal with. They need to be roughly as long as the body diameter to work decently. Two calibers is overkill. They are tremendously effective, reasonably flame-resistant, and if you use pink foam they are pretty easy to find post-flight. The biggest restriction is that you generally need to use an external shock cord mount to have an unobstructed tube. Foam is readily available in thicknesses up to 2" so you will not need to laminate layers for most LPR uses.