Why not hybrids?

I got the picture, I use myself also Theters, but in your recovery design there is no redundancy as such? In this case you would need 2 AARDs?

EMiR said:

Doing dual deployment from a single tube, is where you use a device like Ratt works AARD or tethers which can be bought around the place.
the process involves the nose cone and drogue chute coming out at apogee, whilst the main is held in the same tube until low Alt is reached, where at that point the tether or AARD releases what ever is holding the main chute in, allowing it to come out
usually under the pull of the drogue.

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legranddudu said:

I got the picture, I use myself also Theters, but in your recovery design there is no redundancy as such? In this case you would need 2 AARDs?

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You can shove two ematches into the ARRD.

I love flying hybrids and have a bunch of them from HyperTek and RATT works.

I originally started flying them because they are very cool and a few other people also flew them so the setup was much easier to do. I have flown all the way to the M hybrids and love the sound that the bigger ones make.

The problem that most people have is the extra equipment needed to launch them. Most of the time the person flying is the one responsible for hooking up and maintaining the equipment and a majority of flyers have no idea how they work or have seen them even fly so not a lot of ground support. Most clubs don't even have the equipment and the flyer has to bring their own stuff out to do a flight.

The other issue is the size of the hybrids. They generally take a much longer motor tube and subsequently a longer booster section. With the availability of much longer AP motors people usually build to them to fit the longer motors so having to build a "Hybrid Ready" rocket has become less of an issue.

Might actually put a few together for some upcoming launches.

Bill Beggs
TRA 5258 L3
NAR 70094 L3

Silly question, but what is a hybrid? Solid and liquid fuel? How does one obtain or create such a beast?

watermelonman said:

Silly question, but what is a hybrid? Solid and liquid fuel? How does one obtain or create such a beast?

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Solid fuel, liquid oxidizer. You buy the motor and pieces of plastic that are reloads, and you fill them on the pad with Nitrous Oxide.

wbeggs said:

I love flying hybrids and have a bunch of them from HyperTek and RATT works.

I originally started flying them because they are very cool and a few other people also flew them so the setup was much easier to do. I have flown all the way to the M hybrids and love the sound that the bigger ones make.

The problem that most people have is the extra equipment needed to launch them. Most of the time the person flying is the one responsible for hooking up and maintaining the equipment and a majority of flyers have no idea how they work or have seen them even fly so not a lot of ground support. Most clubs don't even have the equipment and the flyer has to bring their own stuff out to do a flight.

The other issue is the size of the hybrids. They generally take a much longer motor tube and subsequently a longer booster section. With the availability of much longer AP motors people usually build to them to fit the longer motors so having to build a "Hybrid Ready" rocket has become less of an issue.

Might actually put a few together for some upcoming launches.

Bill Beggs
TRA 5258 L3
NAR 70094 L3

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2009 win for AP was a death blow to hybrids... some mfg's and most clubs and fliers dumped their hybrid gear for solid gear. Even our club sold their complete hybrid gear to me, which ultimately in-turn sold to another individual. During the craze, I flew my share of HyperTEK's, RATTWORK's and SkyRipper System hybrids, with SRS being my favorite by far.

The draw backs that our club had when we supported hybrids, was the delay in fills that ultimately ended in a dump or re-cycle. When the hybrids did work, they were awesome! I'm not real active in rocketry right now, but if I were, I would get some Contrail goodies, and bring hybrids back to Alabama and Tennessee...

watermelonman said:

Silly question, but what is a hybrid? Solid and liquid fuel? How does one obtain or create such a beast?

Click to expand...

Hyrbids are simply a combination of a sold fuel with a liquid oxidizer flow, generally Nitrous oxide. Sometime these motors are remotely filled at the pad, but in the past, a couple mfg's tried their hand at pre-filled motors that were a refreshing spin on the hybrid scene. There is no provision for motor ejection, so electronics are a must... unless doing a saucer vehicle. There are only three source mfg's left, Contrail, HyperTEK and RattWorks. Starting from the ground in hybrids is not recommended... but if you stray down that path, you could be hooked.

Now just to put everyone on same track, our great hybrid vendors are really alive and kicking...

I ordered and get delivered within a week from Contrail USA! Please note I am located in Europe...All the way from Lake Havasu to Munich ...This is what I call customer care.

Now let's have a look what is a typical Contrail delivery (for me *lol*)...

First a great packaging that travels across international borders and rough manutention:



Open it and you will find all reloads very professionally packed, each in a sealed bag and adhoc labeled so you know what to do with it...



Now you need something more: fill and vent lines, presslocks for your designed injector/reload speed, ignition wires in 12 or 24V (you tell them upfront) and a set of O-Rings that fit to your selected motor diameter internals (nozzle, injector). In addition in the package a comprenhensive and well made manual "how to prep"..this will be different if you ordered a 38mm or 54mm or 75mm reloads



Now if you are crazy enough, Contrail USA will even custom build for you... Here I got a custom made Bulkhead for a 75mm motor with... a check-valve *GGGG*...you got the picture: the appropriate modification for a 2 stage full hybrid rocket with fill-thru concept...Let see how it goes early 2015 )



Conclusion: hybrid vendors are alive, they produce best of breed hardware and consumables. Soooo...as my friend Karl says..why not hybrid guys?

Nice.

I've been seriously contemplating getting into Hybrid EX myself. I've sketched out an ~88mm M that I'd like to make. It's of similar length to the long 75mm Contrail tank setup, just more volume and a lot less weight. Design is for 40 degrees F nitrous for higher density, using evaporative chilling controlled via a pressure relief valve to set the nitrous temperature and pressure so the results should show good repeatability.

I just don't have GSE so doing everything is a bit more of a task. I suspect that is the case for many who are curious about hybrids. In my experience it is usual that nobody has GSE available at a launch and very few own GSE. So essentially a person has to do the whole thing.

I've probably asked before, but what size GSE nitrous tank are you using, for filling your cluster for instance? Nice work there, by the way!

Gerald

PS - Corrected as I mis-remembered my own design! Anyway, just over 60" long, roughly 21# loaded, recovery weight perhaps 8#. 95%M990. 40 degrees F not 32 degrees F nitrous temp. It seems like forever since I've looked it over.

Gerald,

you have great plans, hope you get it soon started!
I bought myself a GSE from Doug Pratt, just from the shelf. I had some little concern with the fill-hose but frankly, everything else just works like first day.

Here we do not have much choice on the tanks: you can get it from the retailer as it is in 2 sizes: 10 or 37 kg gas content. Just to add: the big bottle weights 50kg empty + the gaz. So a nice pain in the A* on the field. Small ones are really nice and handy but... experience shows you get only real 6,5 Liters to fly in the small one.

Losses and gaz/liquid changes in the bottle during operations are a real issue. I could not get any mathematical indication (of course everyone as an opinion) so I just trust my nose now. ) Saying that, one M or L and 2 Ks and you need a new bottle... so I need one bottle a day at the moment on a launch. the cluster needs 4,5 liters, I can launch another K then change the bottle.

When you know that and presuming everything else is fine (rocket design, recovery etc) and your ignitors are reliable...there is now way you cannot get your hybrid in the air. It just works like a swiss gun..ahhh watch of course ;-) (regards to all SIG lovers)

Here our tanks are slightly different. Our readily available tanks seem to be 25, 35, and 50 pounds --- or 11Kg (probably same as your 10Kg), 16Kg, and 23Kg. Yep, I expect a 37Kg tank is a pain to move!

I'm presuming it is your 10Kg tank which you need to refill each day?

Gerald

That's right Gerald, the 10kg one, gives 6,5L of real liquid quantity you can count on.
There is nothing more awfull to abort a start/dump because..the tank do not feed liquid anymore...So I change it when I reach the 6,5L (motor tanks volume started added).
By the way I do not refill, I just replace. Tanks are rented so when it is empty it goes back to the retailor. I prefer not to "play" with filling myself at the moment... In fact the big tank was great deal just 1/5 of the price per liter...but simply a nightmare to handle in operations.

US sizes are 20#, 35# and then you can get a K cylinder from AirGas, Praxair etc. K's are not THAT bad provided of course you have a wheeled dolly or a pickup truck to haul it to the pad, no worse than a big L3 rocket. You have to make a mount so you put it upside down because there is no DIP tube. You can rent the tank by the month.

With a dip tube tank you do not get all the capacity of the tank because the tube may not get all the way to the bottom. On my Catalina 20# alumimum I can only get about 17 of the 20#. On my next fill I will ask my gas shop if he can fit a longer tube.

jderimig said:

With a dip tube tank you do not get all the capacity of the tank because the tube may not get all the way to the bottom. On my Catalina 20# alumimum I can only get about 17 of the 20#. On my next fill I will ask my gas shop if he can fit a longer tube.

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I took apart my 20 lb. tank and extended the dip tube so that it was less than half an inch off the bottom. I still can't get that last 3 lbs. out of it. I suspect that when it gets that low the gas just bubbles through the liquid.

So Contrail was mulling over the idea of making reloads for the SkyRipper line of motors... If this ever came to fuition, I would be looking for SkyRipper hardware in a heartbeat (29mm-38mm-54mm). Does Todd know how much we miss the SkyRipper product line?

"So Contrail was mulling over the idea of making reloads for the SkyRipper line of motors."... Where did you got that in the thread? *lol* ...I never heard about that....

legranddudu said:

"So Contrail was mulling over the idea of making reloads for the SkyRipper line of motors."... Where did you got that in the thread? *lol* ...I never heard about that....

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Tom hinted at doing such a thing over on the hybrid rocket motor yahoo group forum last year... he made no promices, but indicated he would inquire (w/ Todd of ShyRipper Fame). That was the last I had read.

The current Contrail fuel grains should fit the hardware and the injector/nozzle sizes are similar. Would just need to certify it and probably get an OK from Todd, which may not be easy.

jderimig said:

The current Contrail fuel grains should fit the hardware and the injector/nozzle sizes are similar. Would just need to certify it and probably get an OK from Todd, which may not be easy.

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You don't really need permission... Do you? Look at KBA animal compatible, or CTI in Aerotech hardware.

Those SRS 29mm's need some love too!

What are the benefits of each system in a given size range?

For example, RATTWorks seems to have long burn times, while Contrail has short burns. How about Sky Ripper and West Coast? What is the draw?

hi all,

Just a quick post on some of latest Test firings from our 4" Ex hybrid.

[video=youtube;rGVy8wVtC4U]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGVy8wVtC4U[/video]

[video=youtube;76iAz5zD4Go]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76iAz5zD4Go[/video]

EMiR said:

hi all,

Just a quick post on some of latest Test firings from our 4" Ex hybrid.

[video=youtube;rGVy8wVtC4U]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGVy8wVtC4U[/video]

[video=youtube;76iAz5zD4Go]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76iAz5zD4Go[/video]

Click to expand...

Now that is COOL!

EMiR said:

hi all,

Just a quick post on some of latest Test firings from our 4" Ex hybrid.

[video]Awesome Video #1[video]

[video]Awesome Video #2[/video]

Click to expand...

Very nice work, how many more test do you planned before flight?

dixontj93060 said:

Now that is COOL!

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+1

CarVac said:

What are the benefits of each system in a given size range?

For example, RATTWorks seems to have long burn times, while Contrail has short burns. How about Sky Ripper and West Coast? What is the draw?

Click to expand...

Contrail has Slow, Medium, Fast and Extra Fast burn times. One of the things that I personally like about the Contrail motors is in the hardware design. I like how they seal the nozzle to the motor case with an O ring and groove.

West Coast and Skyripper are out of production.

I do not have experience with West Coast but I like the information they have on pyroless ignition for U/C valve motors.

What I like about Skyripper is that they get more total impulse out of their motors.

I would recommend Contrail right now because they have inventory in stock. My favorite is the 75mm 3200cc motor with the medium nozzle. This is a baby M class motor.

For any that want to experience hybrids my Contrail mega-package is for sale here: https://www.rocketryforum.com/showthread.php?69703-Hybrid-Motor-Bonanza&p=761185#post761185. Free delivery to MWP12.

A couple more tests to go. the next round will be long burn motors (16 ~ 18seconds)
the challenge will be keeping the O/F ratio in a reasonable margin, and the heat loading.

karlbaum said:

I am curious what the forum thoughts are on hybrids. Why or why not flyers using hybrids? I use hybrids because they cost less per flight than do solids. If you are into EX they are easier to make hybrid fuel grains.

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I thought I would give it a go; I have not ever been a member of a group, nor have I ever started one, but I thought what the heck:

https://www.rocketryforum.com/group.php?groupid=203

Not to take away from the public forum at all, just wanted a group area where hybrid users could post hybrid propulsion and vehicle specifics (non research). From what I can see, the groups don't get much traffic, so if this does not pan out, the group can dissipate.

DRAGON64 said:

I thought I would give it a go; I have not ever been a member of a group, nor have I ever started one, but I thought what the heck:

https://www.rocketryforum.com/group.php?groupid=203

Not to take away from the public forum at all, just wanted a group area where hybrid users could post hybrid propulsion and vehicle specifics (non research). From what I can see, the groups don't get much traffic, so if this does not pan out, the group can dissipate.

Click to expand...

Hey, that is a good idea. There was one thread about a year back on a "research" grain build for standard hardware. Since this does not involve any flammable chems, I wonder if we could cross post and/or make it sticky in this group?

dixontj93060 said:

Hey, that is a good idea. There was one thread about a year back on a "research" grain build for standard hardware. Since this does not involve any flammable chems, I wonder if we could cross post and/or make it sticky in this group?

Click to expand...

We might discuss it with troj and Bob to see if such discussion breaks the research rules.

EMiR said:

hi all,

Just a quick post on some of latest Test firings from our 4" Ex hybrid.

Click to expand...

Very nice... Thanks...

What is your ignitor and ignition sequence??

It looks like you have an AP preheater and a pneumatically driven ball valve releasing the Nitrous. Do you have a valve in-mind for flight hardware??

--MCS

.