L1 Scratch Build - First Draft

[Off Grid Gecko]

Shopping for a motor. I'm looking at a CSI I175-White for the maiden flight. It seems that offwegorocketry is offering the Cesaroni free case deal, and an I motor will get me a 3-grain. With $50 saved, I plan also on getting a couple spacers and a drill-out tool. No rear closure needed on a 38pro, I think. Do CSIs have forward closures? I was sure they didn't but this is like a last-minute sanity check. Won't be placing the order tonight.
Running the flight test on my spreadsheet, the rocket should reach a max velocity of 283 or less m/s (the sheet doesn't calculate anything special for near Mach) and reach an altitude close to 3000ft. Too much for a maiden? I haven't seen too much of the flying field but will look up some vids to get a better inspection. With a flight ceiling of 10,000, I don't think I'll lose the rocket, and I won't launch if it's windy.
Max-V (and prolly Max-Q as well) is 2.4 sec into flight with apogee around 10s later, so I'll need to drill 4 sec off the delay charge, will recheck before I go.
I'm curious if any other manufacturers are running the special, or if there is any other hardware I may have overlooked, as this is my first HPR launch. Will be contacting the club as well with a couple questions about their procedures, field, etc. And I'll have to save up, and COVID-19 possibly interfering. Planning to launch on the 3rd Saturday of next month or possibly the following month.
Can you take your Lvl 2 written test after the flight (TRA) or do you need to wait for your Cert to be sent in? Once you pass the test, how long is that good before you can cert L2? Or is it better to take the test prior to the L2 flight? Kind of excited about getting into bigger motors once I have all the electronics figured out and purchased for higher altitude flights.

 

[Nytrunner]

Pro24/29/38/54 have single use forward closures in the reload kits.

Flight profile sounds alright for a first high power flight. As long as you get the delay right, the hardest thi g should be keeping an eye on it in flight and walking to pick it up (unless its on a tree or power line)

Be advised, depending on your descent speed, it can drift aways. East of the mississippi most folks use dual deployment over ~2500-3000'

I may be mistaken, but if you have your signed cert form, I think you can take the test right there. Test taking procedures and availability (will they have the backup there if you fail?) vary my club.

Electronics do take some learning and lots of practice (Ground Test!), but they're not bad. I always recommend the Stratologger CF by perfectflite (if you can find it) and the Missile works RRC2 or RRC3. The Eggtimer Rocketry series are good if you can solder. If you dont want to deal with blackpowder yet, go for the jolly logic chute release.

Tracking gets important if you fly high or anywhere around trees. Missileworks T3 is great, and the Eggtimer kits are good too

 

[Off Grid Gecko]

Pro24/29/38/54 have single use forward closures in the reload kits.

Flight profile sounds alright for a first high power flight. As long as you get the delay right, the hardest thi g should be keeping an eye on it in flight and walking to pick it up (unless its on a tree or power line)

Be advised, depending on your descent speed, it can drift aways. East of the mississippi most folks use dual deployment over ~2500-3000'

I may be mistaken, but if you have your signed cert form, I think you can take the test right there. Test taking procedures and availability (will they have the backup there if you fail?) vary my club.

Electronics do take some learning and lots of practice (Ground Test!), but they're not bad. I always recommend the Stratologger CF by perfectflite (if you can find it) and the Missile works RRC2 or RRC3. The Eggtimer Rocketry series are good if you can solder. If you dont want to deal with blackpowder yet, go for the jolly logic chute release.

Tracking gets important if you fly high or anywhere around trees. Missileworks T3 is great, and the Eggtimer kits are good too

Thanks for all the pointers. I've gone through all of the study questions once before and had everything down to where I could answer with 100%, so I'll prep for that again. Mainly just a couple numbers that I have trouble remembering (NFPA 1127, range distances from the table, etc). As for electronics, looking over what was available from Altus Metrum. I like the facts that they are open source and they work with the Linux program by default, even found their software in my distro repos, though I did need to run the downloaded script to get the OS part working. Eventually I'd like to build a flight computer out of an Arduino board or a Raspberry Pi, but for now, simple flight controller circuits will work. Taking control of my own data logging could be a huge advantage for future projects.
In any case, I've built and flown RC Helis so electronics don't scare me at all. Can be a pain sometimes to figure out the directions, but mostly I don't have much trouble. I can solder, so I might look into the eggtimer. I assume that'll be a cheaper setup if you have to tin wires to make it work? We'll see.
Thanks again for the great response to my questions.