Well that didn't work... Failure Gallery

mannyskid said:

I saw your post on RP about that, I was hoping to see pics and video. Too bad, you'll get 'em next time. Although, I can imagine an N5800 Cstar shred was pretty spectacular!

Manny
EDIT: Did you happen to be using a Raven or other Featherweight altimeter? If you were, could you either post or send me the file? I'm trying to put together files for the MWP 5800 drag race. Thanks.

Click to expand...

I had a Raven and an R-DAS, but the boards were destroyed in the impact. I'll give the Raven to Adrian next time I see him, but I doubt there's any recoverable data to be had.

The boost was awesome though. Here are pics:



I'll post pics of the crash site later - I haven't downloaded them to the computer yet. Given how loud and spectacular the boost was though, the drag race at MWP should really be something. I'm definitely considering heading out there just to see it, now that I've seen an N5800 in action.

That's too bad, I would have really liked to see the data. Gus's 70lb bird pulled 21 Gs with an N5800, can't imagine what that thing did! I'll have to put a word in with Tim for some fillament wound 5" nose cones.

PS: You have to change your signature to (58% O)

Manny

New Ocean said:

Phantom 4000. Loved that kit, many good flights on F101, G55, and clusters. A few 5x D12 flights, to date still my most complex clusters. This last flight was on a G55, and the nosecone was too tight. Should have continued to sand it. Ballistic from 500 feet, nosecone stuck about 2 feet down into sod. Looked like one of those cartoon cannons that got plugged and blew up in daffy duck's face.

Click to expand...

YIKES

mannyskid said:

That's too bad, I would have really liked to see the data. Gus's 70lb bird pulled 21 Gs with an N5800, can't imagine what that thing did! I'll have to put a word in with Tim for some fillament wound 5" nose cones.

PS: You have to change your signature to (58% O)

Manny

Click to expand...

True enough

(I really wish I could have seen the data. Sims said 29G liftoff, accelerating to 33G peak later in the burn, and based on how it hauled off the pad, I think it did every bit of that)

cjl said:

True enough

(I really wish I could have seen the data. Sims said 29G liftoff, accelerating to 33G peak later in the burn, and based on how it hauled off the pad, I think it did every bit of that)

Click to expand...

So is the fin can okay? I mean good enough to rebuild? If it's a little on the short side you could just get a coupler and some more tube. I can't wait for the MWP drag race, I was seriously considering it but all my money is going to Carbon Nightmare ( https://www.rocketryforum.com/showthread.php?t=21457 ) It's okay as I have 2 M's lined up for a single stage launch at MWP (if you go to MWP then you're in for a treat, I have possibly the last M2200 skidmark lined up for it). If that thing was supposed to be pulling 33Gs then Gus's goose is going to cook on one of those, it sims good for 50 Gs! I hope you rebuild and try again.

Manny

The fin can is mostly OK. The front 4 inches or so is toast, and the front railbutton is gone, but other than that, it's fine. The main problem will be getting the casing out. The front of the case mushroomed when it hit, so right now, the case is quite solidly stuck inside the fin can. I may end up having to cut off the front of the motor to get it out.

Ouch! I've had a couple mushrooms before but none as bad as that. Speaking of which, this is another I can add to this gallery. Wildman 3 Last summer with an L935, some BP fell out of the canister on the way up, there was no apogee and only a main, the nose cone poped on cue at 800 ft and ripped the cord. Here is what was left (including the badly mushroomed 6glx case) the payload section is still 4 ft down in argonia. When I found it it was buried above the fin slots. Now there's a core sample! Rockets don't like falling at terminal velocity from 16,000 ft! Some say this rocket was destined to fail as it was named "Bull's Eye Racing" after me and my dad's drag racing group. PS Glad to hear that your booster is mostly fine.

Manny

CTI K300 in a 54mm minimum diameter. Forward closure burned through and ignited the apogee charge about 4 seconds into the flight. I got the electronics back and CTI replaced the motor and case under warranty. The booster was burned to a crisp by hot gas from the forward closure, but my tip-to-tip fins stayed on!

Here's the result from that N5800 flight:

cjl said:

Here's the result from that N5800 flight:



Here's the Raven:

Click to expand...

FYI, when I try to open up your pictures, my (norton) antivirus alerts to a problem with the file.

GRIFFIN said:

FYI, when I try to open up your pictures, my (norton) antivirus alerts to a problem with the file.

Click to expand...

Bizarre.

Mine (also norton) has no problems. What version do you have, and what does the warning say? I definitely don't want anyone to have trouble with any of my pictures.

cjl said:

Here's the result from that N5800 flight:

Click to expand...

It actually doesn't look too bad, minus the Av-bay. Instead of cutting that case, I would suggest using a rubber mallet and try to hammer it out. That way you could possibly send it to CTI for them to have a look at it. They may be able to fix it for you. You probably don't even need to cut that booster at all, just some new tube and a coupler. Although, I can't see it very well. All in all, very cool flight! Can't wait to see the video!

Manny

cjl said:

Bizarre.

Mine (also norton) has no problems. What version do you have, and what does the warning say? I definitely don't want anyone to have trouble with any of my pictures.

Click to expand...

I am using the 2011 norton "internet security"

When I try to open the pictures (I tried each one) it pops up with a norton warning about the Photo bucket website being a "malitious website" and it recommended not to vivit site.
I am not sure if this is a problem or not, I just figured I would let you know.
I can see the pictures fine from the forum. It's just when I try to "enlarge them" for better view.

mannyskid said:

It actually doesn't look too bad, minus the Av-bay. Instead of cutting that case, I would suggest using a rubber mallet and try to hammer it out. That way you could possibly send it to CTI for them to have a look at it. They may be able to fix it for you. You probably don't even need to cut that booster at all, just some new tube and a coupler. Although, I can't see it very well. All in all, very cool flight! Can't wait to see the video!

Manny

Click to expand...

Well, the front of the casing is swelled, so to get it out, I either have to cut the booster section (full length), or cut off the front of the casing. I'd prefer not to destroy the booster to get the casing out.

I think of all the crashes, CATOs and other goofy things that I've seen and had happen to me over the years the last flight & crash (Flt#14) of my 3X 4-D12 Clustered Orbital transport hurt the most.

Apparently all the previous flights had finally burned a hole in the BT-60 stuffer tube venting most of the ejection gas which did not leave enough to get the cone off and laundry out. The reason it hurt so, is I can't save either the mother ship or orbiter both will have to be rebuild almost completely.

cjl said:

So apparently, a 5 inch Performance Rocketry nose cone fails at around mach 2.2...

(Pics and video to come)

Click to expand...

Ouch! Sorry to hear that, man. It looked like one hell of a boost though!

cjl said:

Here's the result from that N5800 flight:

Click to expand...

So I see the drogue, I think. Did the main rip off? What could you see from the ground?

The main ripped off, and from what I can tell the rocket from the electronics bay down (including the drogue compartment) came in ballistic. The main was seen floating towards Cheyenne. I imagine the force of the main ripping away disabled the electronics, which is what prevented the drogue charge from firing when the bottom section reached apogee.

cjl said:

So apparently, a 5 inch Performance Rocketry nose cone fails at around mach 2.2...

Click to expand...

Wow, nice looking boost, but sorry to see your loss. And just as I was starting my build for the MWP9 N5800 drag race. There are 10 of us in it, now I'm just hoping to survive. Any recommendations, i.e. beefing up the nose cone?

P.S. But the drag race will be a good chance to check out Wildman's "The Wildman Rocket Lifetime Guarantee", since the N5800 IS a commercial motor.

SMR said:

Wow, nice looking boost, but sorry to see your loss. And just as I was starting my build for the MWP9 N5800 drag race. There are 10 of us in it, now I'm just hoping to survive. Any recommendations, i.e. beefing up the nose cone?

P.S. It'll be a good chance to check out Wildman's "The Wildman Rocket Lifetime Guarantee", since the N5800 IS a commercial motor.

Click to expand...

Yes, but that wasn't a Wildman rocket. It was based on an Intimidator 5, but it was modified to be lighter and more aerodynamic. My bet is that a stock Ultimate Wildman would stand a good chance at surviving, if nothing else because it won't get going as fast. I might be tempted to throw a layer of T2T on the fins, and foam the nose cone just to be sure though.

(On the other hand, if you're going for something smaller than an UW, then you'll need more serious reinforcement)

Aksrockets said:

Post whatever you want about your rocket failures. These could be:
Catos
Shreds
Instability
Lawn darts
Land sharks
Core samples
Or anything that didnt work quite like you expected.

here is mine.
See the pictures and the paragraph titled "naive launch" those flights didnt work out so well because I didnt know about the CG/CP of the rocket or what that even meant.

Here is just a photo of my failureView attachment 49405

Click to expand...

I did something like this once except I used the fins and nosecone from a Mosquito and glued them onto a C6-7 was a great flight I even managed to find the spent motor case on the field later sans fins and nose cone but the lug was still on it.

Here is my Semroc Centurion after it's first flight on a D12. My shock cord attachment was less than optimal and it suffered a separation at ejection. A quick repair with a stronger glue joint and it was good to go.

FatBoy said:

Here is my Semroc Centurion after it's first flight on a D12. My shock cord attachment was less than optimal and it suffered a separation at ejection. A quick repair with a stronger glue joint and it was good to go.

Click to expand...

Nice looking fillets. I'm glad it wasn't damaged. My nephew has a Centurion, and it's a great flying rocket.

With the recent re-introduction of the Estes A10-0T I decided to build a new sustainer for my old Beta booster stage, named Gamma. First attempt on 6/12 with an A10-0T/A3-4T combo. Excellent boost phase, followed by a failure to ignite the upper. The result was a lawn dart that wreaked havoc on the BT-20 and balsa cone.

I've only gotten this combination of motors to work in 2 out of 7 attempts over the years. Must be a systemic problem.

...I could overload this forum with failure photo's, if I had any Not failures, more than plenty of them. Just no photos.

If there were I'd probably get disgusted and quit.

JoeLaunchman said:

With the recent re-introduction of the Estes A10-0T I decided to build a new sustainer for my old Beta booster stage, named Gamma. First attempt on 6/12 with an A10-0T/A3-4T combo. Excellent boost phase, followed by a failure to ignite the upper. The result was a lawn dart that wreaked havoc on the BT-20 and balsa cone.

I've only gotten this combination of motors to work in 2 out of 7 attempts over the years. Must be a systemic problem.

Click to expand...

I had the same problem with my Beta. One of the guys I was flying with mentioned that I could lessen the possibility of this happening by poking something into the sustainer engine and scratching some of the propellant away to expose the fresh propellant. It doesn't take much and I've never had it happen since that first time.

JoeLaunchman said:

With the recent re-introduction of the Estes A10-0T I decided to build a new sustainer for my old Beta booster stage, named Gamma. First attempt on 6/12 with an A10-0T/A3-4T combo. Excellent boost phase, followed by a failure to ignite the upper. The result was a lawn dart that wreaked havoc on the BT-20 and balsa cone.

I've only gotten this combination of motors to work in 2 out of 7 attempts over the years. Must be a systemic problem.

Click to expand...

I use A10-0T / 1/2A3-4T combo most of the time and have only had the sustainer fail to ignite once. I believe the nozzle of the A3-4T and the 1/2A3-4T are the same so it should be the same reliability.

I had several A10-0T's blow through and ignite the sustainer immediately just a few feet off the pad, had one stage still on the rod, and one blow through without even moving but still lit the sustainer.

I had one blow the booster of my Midget apart but, it too, lit the sustainer.

All of the "bad" ones had the same date code 6A6 and I got them all at the same time about 6 years ago so I don't know how they were stored.

So total for that combo was:

Beta - 8 flights
Midget - 6 flights
Firefly - 4 flights
Mini Omega 3 flights

And only once did the sustainer fail to ignite.

But in keeping with the spirit of this thread. Weak ejection charge which popped the nose cone but the chute never deployed.

I'm glad I never have any flights like these!

They don't call me the core sample king for nothin'!

I think it hurts more when the Mrs. Says "I know you did your best honey."

Great pictures guys.

Andrew

First attachment is what was left of my Blue Tube RDS Shooting Star after a stuck 'chute caused it to core sample. The fin can is toast, but the recovery harness, motor retainer, and payload section all have either been recycled into other rockets or are about to be recycled.

Second attachment is my "Same Old Blues", an Always Ready Roccketry 3" Basic Blues kit (and the rocket that the Shooting Star's shock cord and motor retainer were recycled into), after the ejection charge went off upon motor ignition. Completely repairable (though I might have to rename it "Same Old 'lues" after I cut off the forward part of the airframe), and will fly again later this year.