Rex R
LV2
- Joined
- Apr 21, 2010
- Messages
- 6,392
- Reaction score
- 384
Beware of the chuff.
like many I had heard that cti motors would either light or they would not, there is no chuff. This is not true. They do on rare occassions chuff. Sunday Sep 20 I prepped my priority stealth 29mm for what turned out to be its' last flight. I 'assembled' a cti G33-9 mellow yellow as per instructions and slid the 'starter' in until it made contact with the starter pellet then placed the nozzle cap on the nozzle. Filled out the flight card and proceded to rso & lco. After being approved I took it out to the pad etc., waited for the lco to run through the count down and push the red button. From there things went pear shape. The motor apparently had a 'hard chuff' which was enough to propel the rocket up 4' of rod when the motor experienced a lack of thrust, the rocket went another few feet up and then fell toward the ground. At some point either on the ground or just above it the motor 'relit', hit a leg of the pad, took one or more bounces and then proceeded to head toward the flightline/lco table. it hit a spectator, the motor landed roughly 100 yards away. the wounded spectator needed 17 stitches.
Speculation/guess, I suppose that it is possible for the starter pellet to wind up in the wrong place due to an error at cti, probably never know, but that Might explain the chuff. If your motor chuffs and apparently goes out give it a least a minute after it stops smoking before approaching the rocket, it might just light at the wrong time!
Rex
like many I had heard that cti motors would either light or they would not, there is no chuff. This is not true. They do on rare occassions chuff. Sunday Sep 20 I prepped my priority stealth 29mm for what turned out to be its' last flight. I 'assembled' a cti G33-9 mellow yellow as per instructions and slid the 'starter' in until it made contact with the starter pellet then placed the nozzle cap on the nozzle. Filled out the flight card and proceded to rso & lco. After being approved I took it out to the pad etc., waited for the lco to run through the count down and push the red button. From there things went pear shape. The motor apparently had a 'hard chuff' which was enough to propel the rocket up 4' of rod when the motor experienced a lack of thrust, the rocket went another few feet up and then fell toward the ground. At some point either on the ground or just above it the motor 'relit', hit a leg of the pad, took one or more bounces and then proceeded to head toward the flightline/lco table. it hit a spectator, the motor landed roughly 100 yards away. the wounded spectator needed 17 stitches.
Speculation/guess, I suppose that it is possible for the starter pellet to wind up in the wrong place due to an error at cti, probably never know, but that Might explain the chuff. If your motor chuffs and apparently goes out give it a least a minute after it stops smoking before approaching the rocket, it might just light at the wrong time!
Rex