REWARD: Information Leading to Return of my L3

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Then what will you do if you know that person has (or intended to) steal it?
 
blackbrandt said:
I'm leaning towards posting an ad on craigslist.
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I'm not sure that's a good idea. If someone has it, they have your contact info anyway. And, if your ad encourages someone to look for it, they'll probably want more than you're offering as a reward if they find it.

Someone already mentioned that the locals know who to contact when they find a rocket, so I'd recommend having someone from the local club let people in the area know to be on the lookout for it.

That worked for me when I had a rocket drift far away under the main at apogee. My rocket was found by a local couple out hunting hogs during their honeymoon!

-- Roger
 
TRFfan said:
Then what will you do if you know that person has (or intended to) steal it?
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This is why it's beneficial to put radioactive type stickers all over your rocket. It's like writing "food experiment- do not eat" on your lunch bag in the office refrigerator. No one is willing to take the chance :)

Blackbrandt- wish I was closer by- I'd help out with the search if I could.
 
Banzai88 said:
So all this has me thinking that anything that I fly that goes out of sight (regardless of tracker) should have one of those stainless steel dog tags that you get from the machine at Wal Mart on it somewhere.
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I use a diy waterslide decal with my name, NAR number and phone number on all my recent built rockets and eventually all of them. I am also thinking of adding a QR code as well.
 
jadebox said:
I'm not sure that's a good idea. If someone has it, they have your contact info anyway. And, if your ad encourages someone to look for it, they'll probably want more than you're offering as a reward if they find it.

Someone already mentioned that the locals know who to contact when they find a rocket, so I'd recommend having someone from the local club let people in the area know to be on the lookout for it.

That worked for me when I had a rocket drift far away under the main at apogee. My rocket was found by a local couple out hunting hogs during their honeymoon!

-- Roger
Click to expand...

I sent a message to Bob Utley, who apparently is the contact for the club.

I'll wait a week or 2 before posting a "Lost" ad, in the event it turns up. :)


I'd love to say I have my name in giant font on the outside of the rocket, but unfortunately, this managed to slip my mind. My name and number is written on the tube that the tracker is in, which is attached to the shock cord.
 
blackbrandt said:
I'd love to say I have my name in giant font on the outside of the rocket, but unfortunately, this managed to slip my mind. My name and number is written on the tube that the tracker is in, which is attached to the shock cord.
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I didn't have contact info on mine. I didn't think about it. After all, I was using dual-deploy so the rocket wasn't going to drift miles away ......

My rocket was found about twice as far away from the launch site as expected. We had seen it coming down, but grossly underestimated how far away it was.

-- Roger
 
Blackbrandt

To bad it was not Whitakers NC or Bayboro NC as I would have been there to help you look for it .
I might suggest having a set of binos when looking up through the tree canopy to see the parachute.
Sometimes I found rockets by spotting the bridle of the rocket long before spotting the parachute .
You could attach a cell phone to a helium balloon and turn on the video and run the balloon / cellphone up
on a tether

Good luck and I hope you find your rocket !

Bobby aka "Birddog" Hamill
 
There's a lot of woods in the area where it was expected to have come down. Since it hasn't been found I'm guessing that it is high up in a tree somewhere in there and if so then probably no one has seen it yet.
 
djs said:
This is why it's beneficial to put radioactive type stickers all over your rocket. It's like writing "food experiment- do not eat" on your lunch bag in the office refrigerator. No one is willing to take the chance :)

Blackbrandt- wish I was closer by- I'd help out with the search if I could.
Click to expand...

Or a neon green Bio-Hazard sticker :)

https://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-4-pcs-...ng-/201219078045?_trksid=p2385738.m2548.l4275


I've thought of kite lights like this. It could be re-built for a bigger battery and better coverage with the 6 flashing LED's. If the rocket is still lost at dark then you can find the rocket....at least stand a better chance.
 
On using hazard stickers: I'd use div 1.3 explosive.

-really- don't want to explain to the CDC or NRC why my big toy scared the local sheriff, but am on much firmer ground​ w/NFPA, DOT.
 
I've had a Rocket recovered by the police before. Landed on some guys roof. The owner of the house was pissed and called the police. The police picked it up and put it in their car (that's when I lost the tracking signal) they then brought it back to the station, went to the launch site and told the president of the club that they had recovered someone's Rocket and it was at the station. The description matched mine so I headed off to the station to recover.

There were a couple officers there standing by it on the front lawn with all it's laundry out. After a short discussion about the legality of it, they admitted it was one of the coolest things they've seen.

I remember talking to you briefly at LDRS Matt, I remember the flight and remember the main coming out at apogee (just didn't know that was yours!). I sincerely hope you find it.
 
Nope. Mr Cook was actually out there searching for my rocket today. Sadly enough, he was unable to find it. :/
 
Ok, just want to make sure you were seeing the Facebook stuff. Sometimes the FB crowd doesn't always cross paths with the TRF crowd. Some people use the one and not the other.
 
DAllen said:
Ok, just want to make sure you were seeing the Facebook stuff. Sometimes the FB crowd doesn't always cross paths with the TRF crowd. Some people use the one and not the other.
Click to expand...
Not a problem! Thanks for alerting me to it. :)
 
gerbs4me said:
I hope you find your rocket
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Yeah, I think a lot of folks are rooting for Matt. Question: Were there any lakes or ponds in the area of any significant size? Reason I ask is if there is the possibility it landed in a body of deep water that could be an explanation if it's
never found. I don't wish to be a doom-sayer but you'll have to make a determination if you move on or do another build either the same or a different project. 7000' is a nice moderate altitude for an L3 certification on such a large rocket.
Considering if one is limited to a 4" diameter rocket even a baby M is going to get close to punching it up to a 5 figure altitude so tracking becomes even more important as does the venue where the attempt is taken.

If Matt's rocket isn't found in the near future by a farmer/landowner, I believe the next milestone time is the Fall season when the vegetation dies off and Winter if the rocket is up in a tree. Anyone who is out hiking or hunting might come across it and if it's up in a tree, with the leaves down, it will be more easily seen. If the rocket is on the ground, it could get covered in snow and go out of sight till Spring.

Best case is if it came down in a farm field and in that situation would be found by a farmer readying to plant the field. Would have to hope they would make an attempt to ID the rocket or turn it over to the local club as opposed to just tossing it in
a barn/shed and forgetting about it. Some landowners can get nasty about stuff found on their ground. Kurt
 
See below.

ksaves2 said:
Yeah, I think a lot of folks are rooting for Matt. Question: Were there any lakes or ponds in the area of any significant size? Reason I ask is if there is the possibility it landed in a body of deep water that could be an explanation if it's never found.
All of the streams I saw were 5 feet deep or less.

I don't wish to be a doom-sayer but you'll have to make a determination if you move on or do another build either the same or a different project. 7000' is a nice moderate altitude for an L3 certification on such a large rocket.
Considering if one is limited to a 4" diameter rocket even a baby M is going to get close to punching it up to a 5 figure altitude so tracking becomes even more important as does the venue where the attempt is taken.
Probably the same size rocket. I might move down to 6" and build it like an absolute tank to keep it low. I'm not going to do another high altitude flight until I can be super comfortable with a tracker on low flights.

If Matt's rocket isn't found in the near future by a farmer/landowner, I believe the next milestone time is the Fall season when the vegetation dies off and Winter if the rocket is up in a tree. Anyone who is out hiking or hunting might come across it and if it's up in a tree, with the leaves down, it will be more easily seen. If the rocket is on the ground, it could get covered in snow and go out of sight till Spring.
According to someone in the area, my next luck will probably be some farmer running it over with a planter.

Best case is if it came down in a farm field and in that situation would be found by a farmer readying to plant the field. Would have to hope they would make an attempt to ID the rocket or turn it over to the local club as opposed to just tossing it in
a barn/shed and forgetting about it. Some landowners can get nasty about stuff found on their ground.

Yup, and that's my nightmare. I'm really hoping this gets found. Kurt
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Thanks everyone for all the kind words and helpful thoughts. You really are awesome!
 
Get some small rockets flown with some Eggfinders and gain some experience either with "GPS Rocket Locator" or manually inputting the last known lat/long into a mapping system to know where to go. If you had done that before this attempt you
would have discovered the battery situation long beforehand.

"According to someone in the area, my next luck will probably be some farmer running it over with a planter." I respectfully beg to differ on this (in your favor mind you). In a tilled or no-till field and the fact that farmers don't want to drive
over something foreign to wreck their machinery, I think your intact rocket would be found, picked up, put outside of the field and dealt with later. If most of the landowners around there know that HPR is done in that area they might be
sympathetic to any rockets they find and have a tendency to turn them into MDRA. My only concern is a crotchety, paranoid and borderline demented old guy who doesn't give a darn about anything or anybody else.

Five foot deep body of water could hide a rocket if it hits right but good chance a fair amount of the rocket would be outside of the water on the shore especially if it's a stream.

The batteries of your rocket are likely long dead by now so it's not a risk to anyone plus all the charges might have fired and are spent. Can't hurt anyone. Kurt
 
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many red glares ago I put my wildman extreme up and had mains at apogee on a L motor there. It never came back. Hope your experience is different.
 
ksaves2 said:
Get some small rockets flown with some Eggfinders and gain some experience either with "GPS Rocket Locator" or manually inputting the last known lat/long into a mapping system to know where to go. If you had done that before this attempt you
would have discovered the battery situation long beforehand.

"According to someone in the area, my next luck will probably be some farmer running it over with a planter." I respectfully beg to differ on this (in your favor mind you). In a tilled or no-till field and the fact that farmers don't want to drive
over something foreign to wreck their machinery, I think your intact rocket would be found, picked up, put outside of the field and dealt with later. If most of the landowners around there know that HPR is done in that area they might be
sympathetic to any rockets they find and have a tendency to turn them into MDRA. My only concern is a crotchety, paranoid and borderline demented old guy who doesn't give a darn about anything or anybody else.

Five foot deep body of water could hide a rocket if it hits right but good chance a fair amount of the rocket would be outside of the water on the shore especially if it's a stream.

The batteries of your rocket are likely long dead by now so it's not a risk to anyone plus all the charges might have fired and are spent. Can't hurt anyone. Kurt
Click to expand...
I've flown multiple flights with my Eggfinder. All were successful until now. My normal setup is running an LCD screen to be portable, plus a USB dongle hooked to my laptop for the coordinate stream. For some reason, I decided to change things right before my flight. Yet another symptom of go-fever.

That is because I decided to switch batteries because I didn't have a third 2S. I didn't realize that a 2s was the smallest battery you should fly, and thought it was just a matter of mA*H size.


Do parachutes float or sink?
 
They float until they're saturated, then they sink. I learned that during my river recovery.
 
my jr spent 3 weeks in lake icky couple years back , nc stayed up , main chute if i recall correctly was slightly under water

another good reason for long shock cords , booster didn't sink the whole rig
 

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