Dr Don...
I had two launches using an I211W for the Harpoon's maiden flights last Sunday. The first flight was perfect, but the second one had an early ejection. The nosecone tore off the cord and plummeted to the earth, yet was recovered after digging it out, with only scratches. The rocket, however, landed right on top of a tree, about 40 feet up. I have spent the last 4 days trying to retrieve it with no success.
Today I went out at lunch with Dave, a co-worker, and gave it another try. My mission was to launch another arrow over the lower branch it was now hung on, then get the rope down and re-tie it to the fishline and pull it up. It was VERY windy today, the Harpoon was swinging around like crazy, but not budging due to the parachute.
Well, I launched the arrow and it was a perfect shot, just over the branch at 45'. I had to work the arrow down to the ground, as it was blowing in the wind and swinging a lot, but eventually it made it to the ground. Next, Dave untied the far end of the rope and I untied the other end, then started pulling it back over the tree. We could see it was wrapped 2 or 3 times around the shock cord but was easily pulling back over.
Finally, the rope got stuck, so we gave it a few good yanks and..."POP" the rocket AND parachute came flying right out!!!
YEEEEEHAAAAA!!!! It landed about 6 feet off the ground as the chute got stuck on a limb jut in front of us on another tree, so I walked up and it yanked right off!!!
The HARPOON was home!!!!!!!!!!! Gawd, what a good feeling. The parachute still balooned in the wind when I got it down, which was a good sign, and after examining it, the chute was just fine! What a great day indeed and I gave a BIG thanks to Dave as it needed the body weight of two people to really get it down.
Thanks also to all who volunteered to help if I was unsuccessful today, especially Shane Hielman (Mr Mountain Climber) and Zack Green.
Signed,
A Happy Boy!