My TARC Team!

My team flew tonight and made three consistant flights.

At my suggestion because their design worked out so well, they made 3 identical copies of the same rocket...just in case.

This years TARC competition called for a "specific"" duration flight.

Basically it had to be;

1.) Two stage (single stage deducts 3 full sec.)

2.) Must carry 2 Grade A large eggs unharmed (only one egg would be another 3 sec. deduct.).

3.) must have a duration from launch to touchdown of 60.0 sec.

My team had 2 eggs and clustered 3 C11-0's to 3 C6-5's for three succesful flight.

Two adult observer times averaged...

Flight #1 was 57.66 sec.

Flight #2 was 57.82 sec.

Flight #3 was 58.31 sec.

All their flights...were succesfull! No cracked eggs! although #2 had a cracked fin...OK we won't count that one...

Now Flight #3....I'm pretty sure THAT is a qualifying flight!

Looks like they'll go to Virginia...I hope!

Sandman,

That's great news. I had my reservations about the 3-cluster to 3-cluster staging but it looks like the kids have made it work reliably. Bravo for them!

And if their first 3 flights were all within 2.5 seconds of the goal, well, we haven't seen that kind of fresh-out-of-the-box success since the "all-up" testing in the Apollo program.

Keep up the great work.

Great flights. Must have been really neat triple motor staging.

congratulations! your team has some seriously good "group" on the flight times. I am sure they will place very well nationally.

today we did launches for 4 teams. two teams did their qual flights, one was 58.3x seconds; the other was 1:15 or so.

these kids are doing good work. it's a pretty good challenge too. I'm tempted to make a TARC rocket for myself!

Those are some nice numbers. Which two flights had you announced as qualification flights? My team flew last weekend and our first qual flight was 61.2 seconds, the second one we will not talk about, lets just say it was...less succsesful.

Are you going to be coming down with them,Sandman?I love these multi stage clusters.There where a bunch of them flown at the last NOVAAR(TARC host) launch.Some of them are right nasty.What I like is that they're usually going so fast that the booster continues upward and over in a nice arch even after the sustainer is long gone.Makes for a very visually pleasing flight.IOW dats puuuuurrdy!

Are you going to be coming down with them,Sandman?

Click to expand...

No, I won't be going, I have other comitments in May but I would like to.

Well...they're not really "MY" TARC team...but the ones I worked with!

But they're goin' to Virginia next month!

6 other Michigan teams also qualified.

I guess, hitting a 60 sec slot duration with two eggs and two stages wasn't as hard as they thought it would be.

RocSim sure helped!

It's gonna be HUGE that's fer sure!Missed it last year because i didn't know what it was.Imagine my suprise upon seeing it in Sport Rocketry.Less than a half an hour from home,too!

After hearing about some (a few?) complaints about how long the competition took last year my idea was a simple ET drag race. You had to get to 1200' and back to the ground as q uickly as possible. Every foot below 1200' cost you a second, and you could only place 2nd if you didn'e make 1200'. I thought that would bring out some incredible ingenuity on landing ideas. They went a different route, but I'm going to guess they can calculate how many 60 second flights they can do in one hour. ;-) That'll keep the show going.

My question......what will you do to compensate for dense (if it's humid) sea level air? I'm seeing this as a disadvantage to Denver kids or maybe even those who worked in the desert in hotter thinner air. Or is it not considered to be a problem and is more picking nits? Or worse, a trade secret?

Chuck

My TARC team called me from Great, Meadows, VA via cell phone a few moments ago.

They place 13th!

Not bad out of what...200 entrys I think!

It was very very close!

Congrats GUYS!!

Was just watching this Sunday morning's NBC Today Show broadcasting from The Great Meadow!

It was short...about 2 or 3 minutes worth. They covered the contest, showed some of the rockets, showed a few flights...all good.

OK they did concentrate a bit much on the "girls" team from California wearing the silly hats...but we did get national coverage!

All positive!

"Old Tavern, VA. 21 May 2005--All three teams from Minnesota flew
qualified flights today. One team won. (As in, first place. The whole
kit and kaboodle. All the marbles. The whole nine yards.) Another team
took fourth place. (Most of the kit and some of the kaboodle. Msny of
the marbles. At least eight yards....)

Legions of aerospace company recruiters are expected next week.

Stay tuned for more details, or watch the Today show on Monday.

--tc. "

And congratulation MN teams.
Stuart