After a bit of a crazy off-season, I returned to my home field at the end of last month. Attendance was high, and my excitement was also high.
My first flight was the Wanderer 2.0 on a C11-3. The FlightSketch Mini returned an apogee of 181 ft after a beautiful boost, coast, and ejection. Sadly the parachute failed to come out of the nose and the stubbly little rocket suffered a cracked fin on impact. Oh well.
View attachment trim.BE5EA61E-75D9-44B0-886A-4252D2A89AB5.MOV
I also flew my girlfriend’s Yankee Doodle rocket, with her blessing, on an A8-5…
View attachment trim.FE96C0A3-C299-43DD-8DA8-71767EEAE98B.MOV
and my Star Orbiter on an AeroTech E16-4W.
View attachment trim.0CE8DE7B-CF43-40FC-8190-2ED7B73A666B.MOV
Both airframes recovered successfully. I think I got lucky with the Star Orbiter though, it weathercocked a bit and thus the short delay put it a bit closer to apogee than it would have been otherwise.
Angelica Killion snapped this incredible liftoff photo on DART’s FaceBook page, it’s too good for me to not share here.
I also showed @1904 hank how AeroTech reloads go together using my E16-7W reload in one of his hardware sets, which he flew in his own Star Orbiter. Sadly that suffered a nose detachment, although we did recover the body tube, the important bit.
View attachment trim.1669A744-C07A-4EE7-93C9-71B021D3170D.MOV
That was it! The day was filled with all kinds of chatter, visiting with other attendees including @fyrwrxz (a genuine pleasure as always), and lots of spectacular flights.
My first flight was the Wanderer 2.0 on a C11-3. The FlightSketch Mini returned an apogee of 181 ft after a beautiful boost, coast, and ejection. Sadly the parachute failed to come out of the nose and the stubbly little rocket suffered a cracked fin on impact. Oh well.
View attachment trim.BE5EA61E-75D9-44B0-886A-4252D2A89AB5.MOV
I also flew my girlfriend’s Yankee Doodle rocket, with her blessing, on an A8-5…
View attachment trim.FE96C0A3-C299-43DD-8DA8-71767EEAE98B.MOV
and my Star Orbiter on an AeroTech E16-4W.
View attachment trim.0CE8DE7B-CF43-40FC-8190-2ED7B73A666B.MOV
Both airframes recovered successfully. I think I got lucky with the Star Orbiter though, it weathercocked a bit and thus the short delay put it a bit closer to apogee than it would have been otherwise.
Angelica Killion snapped this incredible liftoff photo on DART’s FaceBook page, it’s too good for me to not share here.
I also showed @1904 hank how AeroTech reloads go together using my E16-7W reload in one of his hardware sets, which he flew in his own Star Orbiter. Sadly that suffered a nose detachment, although we did recover the body tube, the important bit.
View attachment trim.1669A744-C07A-4EE7-93C9-71B021D3170D.MOV
That was it! The day was filled with all kinds of chatter, visiting with other attendees including @fyrwrxz (a genuine pleasure as always), and lots of spectacular flights.