The weather in Wisconsin today showed partly cloudy with winds around 5 MPH. My nerves were deftinetley getting the best of me. So much preparation and I didnt want to do something silly and blow my cert attempt. After mulling over my options for motors, I decided to go with a CTI- 54mm 2 grain J430. It seems kinda of silly to not take advantsge of the free case deal. After checking and re-checking my roc-sim data. I was comfortable with the results. It showed just over 5000 feet.
I added my BP to my charge canisters, set my Stratologger to deploy main at 700 feet and decided I would keep the motor eject in at 18 seconds as a back-up if my drogue didnt come out at apogee. Checked my final weight which was at 8 pounds 4 ounces (sim weight was 8 pounds 1 ounce).
My wife arrived , ready to take pictures and my youngest son had anxiously been my helper since ealrier in the morning and was as excited as I was. Finally I was headed to the pad. After a pretty uneventful set up at the pad it was time. Im sure you all can relate but my mind was going thru all kinds of questions, did I fasten the quick links? Did I stick the igniter up far enough? Did I turn on the altimeter? Of course I had gone thru the checklist twice so I knew I was good but it was just a part of that nervousness before the flight.
The next thing I know the countdown has occurred and the motor is roaring to life. It clears the pad and heads into a beatiful blue sky with a couple of clouds. We can see the whole thing and I breathe a small relief when I see the Apogee event occur. Now we are all watching and waiting for the main. It gets down to 700 feet and "pop" goes the charge and out comes the beatiful purple and white chute. All that is left is to clear a few trees ( if you flown at Bong before, trees are always ready to add excitement). Te rocket clears the trees and makes a gentle landing.
L2 achieved. After I downloaded data I see that I hit 4,930 feet ( although I thought counting beeps I was at 4830).
I owe a huge thanks to Chad for letting me ask "stupid" questions and babble endlessly while I was trying to calm down and for being one of my Cert 2 officals. Thanks to Mark for being the other cert offcial. Thanks to all of my Woosh friends at Bong today for there support, Sather, Jeff, Rex, Russ ( the other Russ). Thanks to Gary at Top flight and to Tim from Wildman Hobbies, for there words of encouragement and for there support. In true Tim fashion he showed me some 75mm options I can pursue with my L2.
If your looking for a fun kit that has awesome looks and performs well. You cant go wrong with this kit.
All in all a great day with my son, my wife and a great bunch of people all enjoying a day of launching rockets.
Here are a couple of pics. Enjoy.