blackjack2564
Crazy Jim's Gone Banana's
Well last weekend was our local launch. We went armed with a drone carrying camera in hopes of locating the lost Booster from the 2-stage, last time out. Even though it had a tracker in it at apogee we lost signal. The descent was clearly visual, but we lost it after coming in behind a tree line across the street from our field.
A month had passed & we've had torrential rains , since it is the sub tropics here. No luck with the camera after an hour of fooling around.
BUT...at the launch last month we had a German flier come visit us. [Leo Nutz] He had taken a photo just as the booster crossed the tree line. After some Voo-Doo with his photo & google earth, he sent me a pic with the line of site drawn on it.
It showed probable landing cutting the diagonal across the corner of 2 streets. We had spent hours in that field previously, on the same line but over to right about 700 ft.
We could actually line up a telephone pole with a tall tree and began to walk the line. Charlie was whacking his way through the 6ft tall weeds, when he almost stepped on our fincan! The rains had grown the weeds completely over the rocket, it was under a mess of them. No way the drone/camera could see it. But thanks to Leo all ended well!
Motor case, timer, interstage, tracker...everything intact after a month of wet weather. We were very lucky......AND I solved the lost signal mystery.
After opening the case, it was clear there was a violent event. Battery was held in with 2 wraps of electrical tape, same as I've always done for years. Battery had stretched the tape on one end & was out of box/connector. Booster was flown motor eject. Chute and cord on top of motor...tracker on top of all. When ejection occurred the tracker was "pushed" into the 2lb aluminum I/S, where I believe it hit with enough force to knock battery out. New battery showed no damage to tracker, & next launch I will install altimeter into I/S so ejection charge "pulls" the tracker out.
A month had passed & we've had torrential rains , since it is the sub tropics here. No luck with the camera after an hour of fooling around.
BUT...at the launch last month we had a German flier come visit us. [Leo Nutz] He had taken a photo just as the booster crossed the tree line. After some Voo-Doo with his photo & google earth, he sent me a pic with the line of site drawn on it.
It showed probable landing cutting the diagonal across the corner of 2 streets. We had spent hours in that field previously, on the same line but over to right about 700 ft.
We could actually line up a telephone pole with a tall tree and began to walk the line. Charlie was whacking his way through the 6ft tall weeds, when he almost stepped on our fincan! The rains had grown the weeds completely over the rocket, it was under a mess of them. No way the drone/camera could see it. But thanks to Leo all ended well!
Motor case, timer, interstage, tracker...everything intact after a month of wet weather. We were very lucky......AND I solved the lost signal mystery.
After opening the case, it was clear there was a violent event. Battery was held in with 2 wraps of electrical tape, same as I've always done for years. Battery had stretched the tape on one end & was out of box/connector. Booster was flown motor eject. Chute and cord on top of motor...tracker on top of all. When ejection occurred the tracker was "pushed" into the 2lb aluminum I/S, where I believe it hit with enough force to knock battery out. New battery showed no damage to tracker, & next launch I will install altimeter into I/S so ejection charge "pulls" the tracker out.
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