Most nose weight ever?

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gary7

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What was the most nose weight you ever saw in a nosecone and what size nose cone was it? I need what seems will be quite a bit.
 
I recall a rocket launch where they announced the nose cone had 25 pounds of cement in the nose for stability. I believe it was a Patriot. Can't recall the diameter
 
I helped load a 10" Saturn V on the pad once and carried the capsule part out. I don't remember exactly, but I thought they said they had around 25 lbs of lead shot in the nose cone. All I know is it was very heavy lugging that thing 500 ft out to the away cell.
 
I'm trying to remember the huge rocket from Balls 23 which had some ridiculous quantity of water in the nose cone for ballast that was released at apogee.
 
In our Madcow fiberglass 4" Super DX3, we need about 1.75 pounds with a K456 motor.
 
The nosecone of the 10" Jayhawk weighs 37.5 pounds, and the total rocket weighs 160 pounds on the pad. We carried it to the away pad (flight #1 - terrible idea), pulled it on a wagon (flight #2 - better but still problematic), and drove it out with an SUV (flight #3 - much better idea).

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My dad at python rocketry is working on a nose cone that weighs probably slightly over 100lbs does that count?
 
I helped load a 10" Saturn V on the pad once and carried the capsule part out. I don't remember exactly, but I thought they said they had around 25 lbs of lead shot in the nose cone. All I know is it was very heavy lugging that thing 500 ft out to the away cell.

Thanks for helping with that! In hindsight, I should have gone with bolt on transparent fin extensions instead of doing scale fins with 20lbs of nose weight. Lesson for next time...
 
I've heard of someone putting 3 bowling balls in their nose cone on an O motor flight.
 
Put 10 bowling pins out on the range.... try and knock them over with a rocket :)
 
My 11.5" Little John has 30lb of weight in the nose. I took barbell weight plates and drilled them to slide over 4 pieces of 1/2" all thread.

Flies straight enough to tail slide at apogee.
[video=youtube;TlAVxHC6_F8]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TlAVxHC6_F8[/video]
 
What size is your rocket?

Take a look at the Loc Warlock. I am considering something very close to that with a 4 grain 75 mm L reload.

I have been looking at threads on the Gizmo XL and see margins of .6 being ok. Having trouble understanding that too hence my original question.
 
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47lbs of whatever you could find, BB's rocks, Playa dirt at Balls 2013 to stick in "Drama Queen's Conical NC" 8in..... scratch built in 3 days. I delivered to the Ozzie camp that flew a Gorrila "O" sparky.

I think Troj's group that flew the Delta [circus coming to town] had 40-50 gallons of water or more [8lbs per G...thats 300-400lbs]
 
I've heard that OROC has launched a beer keg to a serious altitude, but I don't remember exactly how high.

Rocket was called Beer Daddy if I remember correctly. [EDIT] Yup... Beer Daddy it was. [/EDIT]


Beer Daddy Prep by Steve Jurvetson, on Flickr


Beer Daddy by Steve Jurvetson, on Flickr


Beer Keg Blastoff! by Steve Jurvetson, on Flickr

Apparently that last one had 175lb's of beer, and a donut of unknown weight, on board. It reached an altitude of 6100'.

[video=youtube;jY-5RIgm4NA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jY-5RIgm4NA[/video]
 
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Take a look at the Loc Warlock. I am considering something very close to that with a 4 grain 75 mm L reload.

I have been looking at threads on the Gizmo XL and see margins of .6 being ok. Having trouble understanding that too hence my original question.

Short stubby rocket have a lot of base drag that is not normally accounted for in a sim. In many cases the manufacturer will state in the instructions where the CG should be. If your's has that instruction then that's where you should put it and the rocket will be stable.

Excessive nose weight is problematic, especially during recovery. A heavy nose need a big chute, and many times it is best to have a 2 piece recovery with a separate chute on the NC and a separate chute on the booster, both appropriately sized for a 15 fps descent rate.

Bob
 
I've heard that OROC has launched a beer keg to a serious altitude, but I don't remember exactly how high.

Rocket was called Beer Daddy if I remember correctly. [EDIT] Yup... Beer Daddy it was. [/EDIT]

Apparently that last one had 175lb's of beer, and a donut of unknown weight, on board. It reached an altitude of 6100'.

Now that's what I call alcohol abuse! :lol:
 
Now that's what I call alcohol abuse! :lol:

No beer was injured in the keg lofts. It was consumed after.
There was one that did bust the keg but we were relieved to learn the beer was drank at the Party on the Playa and keg contained water.
They are using very good beer from an Oregon microbrewery.

The other rocket with the water ballast was fairly short with a 13 M motor cluster so it need the weight.

M
 
As Bob said, rockets with a large base drag have a different CP than expected and require less nose weight than you might think. Somewhere in the Apogee Components newsletters there is an article that describes a way to more accurately compute the CP using Rocksim. I have a Minie Magg and I added 900 grams of nose weight to account for a longish 38mm motor. It flew well but was definitely too heavy. The first flight saw the nose cone attachment point ripped off. (I was new) That 1Kg nose cone came ripping down and pounded through an inch of ice. It wasn't damaged. I changed the attachment to something considerably more robust and I've flown it on a J motor since.

I too have a LOC Warlock and I intend to build it with a 98mm motor mount so I can fly it on coffee can K's. I'll have to dig up that Apogee article. The solution involves adding a conical shape to the base of the rocket pointing towards the nose. I just cannot remember how to determine the length of the sim cone.
 
Hi Len B and thanks. I am familiar with the cone transition in Rocksim for short stubby rockets. I guess where I have my problem is understanding when said rocket is or not short and stubby. I am unaware of a formula to use for determining such. Something like the Warlock (or a Door Knob) is what I have in mind and I want to fly an L2200 in it. The Warlock, without the Rocksim transition needs about 11 pounds of weight.
 
Hi Len B and thanks. I am familiar with the cone transition in Rocksim for short stubby rockets. I guess where I have my problem is understanding when said rocket is or not short and stubby. I am unaware of a formula to use for determining such. Something like the Warlock (or a Door Knob) is what I have in mind and I want to fly an L2200 in it. The Warlock, without the Rocksim transition needs about 11 pounds of weight.

Gary, the Apogee newsletter explains it well for application on Rocsim. IIRC, you add a "zero weight" cone transition onto the aft of the rocket at a length of max diameter * pi.
 
I added two pounds of nose weight to a LOC Doorknob to bring it to one caliber of stability per OpenRocket, and it flew great. I did not know about the trick described above to simulate extra base drag, though, so this was probably overkill.

My problem was that the descent speed was a bit too much with the extra weight and the "little" 5 foot parachute that came with the kit. It landed hard, at a bad angle, and cracked a fin. I've replaced the fin and put a bigger chute in it for next time.
 
I only use RockSim at the moment but I wonder if RASAero or other simulation software may give a better idea of where the CP lies on a rocket like the Warlock? The rocket itself is not particalurly complex and may only require a short learning curve with new software. RASAero and OperRocket don't have costs associated with them. It may be worth comparing the results. Somewhere, I have AeroCFD loaded on my computer but I haven't run it in years.

Anyway, I get the point that it does become difficult to know when to apply the "high base drag" solution in RockSim. I don't have an answer for that one.
 
As Bob said, rockets with a large base drag have a different CP than expected and require less nose weight than you might think. Somewhere in the Apogee Components newsletters there is an article that describes a way to more accurately compute the CP using Rocksim. I have a Minie Magg and I added 900 grams of nose weight to account for a longish 38mm motor. It flew well but was definitely too heavy. The first flight saw the nose cone attachment point ripped off. (I was new) That 1Kg nose cone came ripping down and pounded through an inch of ice. It wasn't damaged. I changed the attachment to something considerably more robust and I've flown it on a J motor since.

I too have a LOC Warlock and I intend to build it with a 98mm motor mount so I can fly it on coffee can K's. I'll have to dig up that Apogee article. The solution involves adding a conical shape to the base of the rocket pointing towards the nose. I just cannot remember how to determine the length of the sim cone.

I believe the length of the cone was 4 times the diameter.
 
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