"Dual Deploy" without electronics?

I think that dual deploy rockets have a very cool method of recovery, one that makes a model rocket look more like the rockets at NASA. So I was thinking of ways to get a 'dual deployment' effect in low power, BP rockets, just for looks.

One crazy idea I came up with is as follows.

Fly a high-drag model with a cluster of motors in it (Let's say a C6-3 and a C6-7). The motor mount tubes would extend further up into the rocket than normal, almost all the way to the nose cone, and would contain parachutes of different sizes. At apogee, the tube with the smaller parachute and the C6-3 would fire its ejection charge, and then four seconds later the larger parachute would deploy from the other tube with the C6-7 in it, slowing the rocket enough to land softly.

Do you think this method would work and/or effectively simulate a dual deployment, and has it been tried before?

I don't know that it's been tried before, but if you can vent the gasses properly there's no reason that it shouldn't work

Make sure you also check the burn times to make sure you're not ejecting your drogue while the other engines are still burning. In the example you gave you should be ok.

You could do it, but a rocket which would apogee properly on a C6-3 won't go very high, thus mitigating the benefit of dual-deploy.

For a rocket which does go high, the extra 4 seconds of delay won't bring the rocket very far.

CarVac said:

You could do it, but a rocket which would apogee properly on a C6-3 won't go very high, thus mitigating the benefit of dual-deploy.

For a rocket which does go high, the extra 4 seconds of delay won't bring the rocket very far.

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I think it's more for a proof of concept and aesthetic change than for performance.

My main concern would be chute entanglement. Unless you rig the first chute to hold the airframe at an angle where it is not pointing at the one already under canopy, you risk firing your second chute directly into it.

Might also want to consider some kind of blunt nosecone on tube 2 to prevent the laundry from coming out early by either falling or getting sucked out, as well as making sure there is enough pressurization to get the job done.:bangpan:

Love the concept though:clap::handshake:oint::handshake::clap:

Let us know if you decide to pursue this, and how it turns out.:smile: